Xenophon and Aristophanes: The Results of a Husband’s Desire for Control :: Xenophon Aristophanes Power Papers

Xenophon and Aristophanes The Results of a Husbands Desire for ControlIn Greek society women had little control over their lives. A husband cherished to be able to control his wife so she would run his household as he saw fit, so she did not damage his reputation, and so he knew the paternity of his children. A husband wanted the girl to be closely controlled by her father before she married for the same reasons. Aristophanes comedies and Xenophons Oeconomicus contain actually different depictions of a Greek citizen womans life before she is married and during the time shortly after she is married. Both the comedies and Oeconomicus examine how girls were educated, how closely reticent they were in their fathers household, and their willingness to deceive their husbands. In Oeconomicus, Xenophon wrote about the ideal girl, but she was exaggerated in the direction of perfection. In the comedies, however, some the female characters were around the exact opposite of the girl in Oeco nomicus. Even though ideas about how girls were raised and how they behaved after they were married are very different in Oeconomicus and in Aristophanes comedies, both sets of ideas get at a husbands passion for his wife to have been closely controlled by her father, and then by him. Aristophanes and Xenophon illustrate this desire by presenting the ideal characteristics of a wife and the characteristics men fear. They also use exaggeration to make the distinction between the good wife and the undesirable wife even clearer. Because husbands wanted their wives to be controlled first by their fathers, and then by them, women spent their entire lives under the control of men.There was also a huge difference between how closely guarded by her father Ischomachoss wife was, compared to the girls in the comedies. Girls were not only guarded to keep them from learning alike much, but they were also guarded to keep them away from men so they would not have sex with or be raped by them. B ecause if a girl was, and after marriage her husband found out, he would be unsure of the paternity of his children. Ischomachoss wife had previously lived under diligent control in order that she might see and hear as little as possible (Oeconomicus, VII, 5). She obviously did not leave her house much if her family was do an attempt to have her see and hear as little as possible.