Searching for Sappho

by Philip Freeman

  The first and longest of Sappho’s poems to mention Cleis comes from the oldest surviving fragments of her songs. It is the same poem, mentioned in Chapter 1, that contains the sole reference to Sappho’s mother:

  For my mother used to say

  that when she was young it was

  a great ornament if someone had her hair

  bound in a purple headband.

  But for a girl whose hair

  is yellower than

  a flaming torch . . .

  crowns adorned with

  blooming flowers.

  Recently a decorated headband

  . . . from Sardis

  . . . cities

  But for you, Cleis, I have no beautiful headband

  nor do I know how to get one.

  But the one in Mytiline . . .

  . . . to have

  . . . adorned

  . . . these things of the family of Cleanax

  . . . exile

  . . . memories dreadfully wasted away

  This badly damaged poem is pieced together from two papyrus fragments, one residing in Copenhagen and the other in Milan, that were revealed to the public just as the Second World War was beginning. Exactly where they originated is unknown, but the style and writing of the scribes place them in Egypt in the third century BC—over five hundred years earlier than most papyri from the garbage dump at Oxyrhynchus. This is still a gap of four hundred years from the lifetime of the poet herself, but these precious bits of writing may be the oldest record we will ever have of Sappho’s poetry.

  The context of the poem is uncertain, but the tone is one of longing and regret, with Sappho apologizing to her daughter. She has no way to give Cleis a beautiful and expensive headband from Sardis in Lydia, such as she must have worn herself when she was a girl. Such a decorated purple headband would be available in Mytilene, the chief city of Lesbos, but they are not living there. The rival clan of the Cleanactidae, the family of Cleanax, is now in power and has apparently driven out Sappho’s family. Sappho may be somewhere else on the island, but a more reasonable guess is that this song was composed when she was in exile in Sicily. Her daughter Cleis has accompanied her there and is old enough to wish for the finer things in life that she sees the girls around her wearing. It breaks Sappho’s heart that she is unable to give her child what she had in her youth. She describes the hair of Cleis as “yellower than a flaming torch,” using a term (xanthe) for golden often mixed with shades of red, the same Greek word used by Homer for the fair hair of the heroes Achilles and Odysseus. If Cleis looked like her mother, perhaps Sappho also had golden hair.

  The second fragment in which Sappho mentions her daughter is quoted by the second-century-AD scholar Hephaestion in his book on poetic meters. This short piece expresses Sappho’s love for her child in a most moving way that any mother would understand:

  I have a beautiful child who is like golden flowers

  in form, my beloved Cleis, for whom

  I would not take all of Lydia or lovely . . .

  The word here for “golden” (chrusios) is different from the term used for Cleis’s hair in the previous verses, but the effect of a radiant, shining girl is much the same, with the metaphor extended to her whole form (morpha), not just her hair. She is like golden flowers, or more specifically, like a bloom of flowers from head to toe. The word translated as “beloved” is agapata, an adjective form of the noun agape later used by Christians to express the love of God for the world. Sappho didn’t invent the term, but she is among the first to use it, with Homer reserving it only for sons. Sappho closes the fragment with the declaration that she would not trade her child for “all of Lydia”—the epitome of riches and luxury in her day—“or lovely . . . ,” but there the poem breaks off. The second thing she wouldn’t trade Cleis for is absent, but some scholars have guessed that the missing word is “Lesbos,” perhaps indicating that this poem, too, was composed in exile.

  The last of Sappho’s songs that may refer to Cleis barely deserves to be called a poem, since it is in such a woefully fragmentary state. It comes from a scrap of papyrus found at Oxyrhynchus and now preserved at Oxford University. The text is from a commentary on lyric poetry from the first or second century AD by an unknown author, who says:

  About Cleis later on she says this also:

  “but if me . . . you looked at . . . the gods give wealth . . .”

  One of several problems with this brief fragment is that the name Cleis isn’t actually present on the papyrus, only a final letter that may be from her name. Most of the other words have letters missing as well, so we would be foolish to place too much faith in this broken poem. But if the verse is indeed about Cleis, we might not be amiss in reading the line as a touching phrase by Sappho comparing the look of Cleis to a gift from the gods.

  As we have said, arguing on the grounds of what Sappho doesn’t say in her surviving poems is problematic. But the fact that she mentions only one daughter and that ancient commentators who had access to all her songs refer to a single child suggests, at least tentatively, that Cleis was Sappho’s sole offspring. If this is true, it was an unusual situation for a woman in Sappho’s time and may suggest one reason why her love for Cleis was so strong.

  In ancient Greece, women prided themselves on the number of children, especially sons, that they bore and raised. For a woman to have a single child—and a girl at that—would have earned her scarcely less pity than if she were barren. A mother with no sons would have no heirs for her husband and no man to care for her as she grew older. It’s certainly possible that Sappho had other children and that she chose not to mention them in her poems or that such poems didn’t survive, but all we can be sure of is that she had a daughter. If we dare to speculate even further, Cleis seems to have been all the more precious to Sappho because she was her only child. Perhaps for this reason, Sappho does something quite unusual for an ancient Greek writer by celebrating her daughter, her own beloved Cleis, in some of her most beautiful poetry.

  MALE AUTHORS FROM classical times rarely discuss pregnancy and birth. It’s likely that most found the process mysterious and distasteful. The few references we do have are most commonly from medical texts by men who were often mistaken about the basics of female anatomy and physiology. But enough survives on subjects such as fertility, conception, pregnancy, and childbirth that we can create a picture of how these subjects were viewed, at least by men, in the ancient world. The results are often amusing and sometimes frightful.

  A woman’s primary role in ancient Greece was to produce children. However, no one—at least among men—was quite sure how this happened, aside from being the obvious result of sexual intercourse. Male doctors discussed and wrote about various theories of fertility and pregnancy, but we have no surviving records from female practitioners, though we know they existed. Men in the medical profession seemed, in fact, to take great offense at the notion that women might have some insight into reproduction that they did not. Theory usually took precedence over empirical observation, while anatomical knowledge was hampered by the fact that dissection of human bodies was forbidden on religious grounds. The writings of doctors reveal that they could not agree on how or where a man’s seed was formed, what conditions were best for pregnancy, or whether a woman contributed anything to the process of conception.

  The prevailing view among ancient doctors and men in general was that women were simply incubators for men. As the playwright Aeschylus says at the conclusion of his Oresteia trilogy:

  The mother is not the begetter of the child, merely the nurse of the newly-implanted seed.

  Authorities such as Aristotle heartily agreed, but a few medical writers conceded that a mother might have some role in determining the sex and characteristics of her child. It was also thought that the mental state of a woman at the moment of conception could be influential. One ancient medical text tells the story of a notably ugly man from Cyprus who reportedly had his wife look at beautiful statues while t
hey had sex so that she would bear shapely children.

  Virtually all Greek medical writers agreed that conception was a tricky and delicate business. It was supposed that the mouth of the womb had to close immediately after intercourse so that the woman would retain the man’s seed. Aristotle also advised that the uterus should be anointed with cedar oil, lead ointment, or frankincense mixed with olive oil to help the sperm stay in place as long as possible. Insertion into the vagina of a clump of wool dipped in ox marrow or the burning of incense made from sulfur, garlic, and beaver testicles was thought to be helpful. Other aids to conception included a woman having a meal and a massage before intercourse and abstaining from wine. Sex during the waxing moon was also advised, on the grounds that actions in the heavens influenced fertility here on earth. It was also believed that men with exceptionally long penises were less fertile because their sperm would cool down too much by the time it was deposited in the vagina.

  A woman’s role as a producer of children was taken as seriously by wives as by husbands, and the failure to produce a child could be devastating for a young bride. Archaeologists have uncovered numerous inscriptions by women making pilgrimages to sacred sites, such as the temple of the healing god Asclepius at Epidaurus in southern Greece, to pray for a child. Some women left behind small clay models of their wombs as offerings for a successful pregnancy. Women who were not able to become pregnant were often seen as cursed by the gods and subject to divorce on grounds of barrenness. Men, aside from the well-endowed already noted, seldom bore any responsibility for infertility.

  Medical knowledge about fertility increased slowly over the centuries from Sappho’s time to the end of the classical world. It was left to the Roman-era writer Plutarch to offer the most enlightened and balanced view of conception from ancient times: “Nature . . . takes a portion from each partner and mixes it together, producing offspring that are common to both, so that neither the man or woman can distinguish what is his or hers.”

  ALTHOUGH A WOMAN’S chief concern was producing children, there were occasions when she would want to prevent pregnancy. These included having several healthy children already, a shortage of food, or concerns about her own health if she bore another child. Contraception doesn’t feature largely in ancient medical texts, because of the emphasis on fertility and the availability of infant exposure as an after-the-fact birth control method, but also because most doctors seemed to have viewed it as something women handled among themselves. Indeed, the few records we have on the subject from male medical practitioners suggest that knowledge passed among women in private would have been just as effective, if not more so, than any recommendations from doctors.

  Greek physicians mistakenly believed that a woman’s most fertile time of the month was just before or after menstruation. Thus, those couples following their doctor’s advice and seeking to avoid pregnancy would engage in intercourse during the point of a woman’s cycle when she was, in fact, most likely to conceive. This mistaken belief continued for centuries in the face of what must have been overwhelming evidence to the contrary from legions of pregnant women, but male physicians refused to alter their opinion.

  Coitus interruptus was also known but depended on the discipline of the male partner to deny himself pleasure at the moment of its greatest height. Thus, it fell to the woman to prevent the man’s seed, as it was believed, from taking root in her womb. The Greek physician Soranus recommended that women practice the following to ensure the sperm was expelled: “During intercourse when a man is at the point of orgasm, the woman should hold her breath and shift her position beneath him slightly so that his seed doesn’t shoot too far into her uterus. She should then get up immediately and assume a squatting position in which she should make herself sneeze, wipe her vagina all around, and drink something cold.”

  One Greek physician offered related advice that could reportedly work up to several days after intercourse. One of his female relatives owned a beautiful slave whom she employed as a prostitute and so needed to prevent from becoming pregnant. One day when the slave believed she might have conceived, the doctor told her to jump up and down touching her heals to her buttocks with each leap to shake loose the fertilized egg, which reportedly came out after seven jumps. This story also shows the blurred line between contraception and early-stage abortion in ancient medicine, with pregnancy viewed as a process taking several days rather than the work of a single night.

  Various kinds of ointments and physical barriers to pregnancy were also prevalent, such as pastes made out of myrtle oil and white lead and sponges soaked in vinegar, aged olive oil, or honey. Some physicians recommended inserting into the vagina before sex a squirting cucumber, a plant that forcefully expels its own seeds and would presumably do the same to the semen of any man. Other doctors prescribed a meal of beans and water for women in the vain hope that it would prevent pregnancy for up to a year.

  Amulets and other magical devices were also popular, as were various sexual activities designed to give a man pleasure without running the risk of pregnancy. If the images from erotic vase paintings are to be taken as evidence, these techniques seem to have been especially in favor with prostitutes whose owners had economic incentives for them not to bear children. Such activities were undoubtedly popular with husbands as well, who were looking for something different from what they would find at home. Paintings show oral, manual, and anal sex acts with prostitutes, none of which would have been thought proper by most wives.

  When, in spite of a woman’s best preparations, an unwanted pregnancy did result, reasonably effective methods of abortion were available, though the practice was often condemned, at least by men, in ancient times. The famous Hippocratic oath includes a provision by which a physician swears he will not give a woman any medicine to induce an abortion. But this opinion was not held by all doctors, many of whom would employ various drugs and instruments for those women who could afford their high fees.

  More cautious physicians warned women that abortions could be hazardous: “For abortions are more painful than birth since it is not possible to expel the embryo or fetus except through force with drugs, potions, foods, suppositories, or something else. This risks ulcerating or enflaming the womb.” Less invasive methods were also available, though of questionable effectiveness. Soranus recommended that a woman wishing to terminate a pregnancy should walk about energetically, jump up and down, and carry heavy objects. Long hot baths and bleeding at the hands of her physician were also prescribed.

  The majority of women who could not afford professional medical care to induce an abortion were forced to take matters into their own hands with the painful and dangerous insertion of instruments into the womb or the use of powerful drugs. Many of these women ended up seeking the services of a physician in the end. As one doctor reported: “When, as so often happens with women trying to cure themselves, a woman suffers from a deep wound as a result of an abortion or whose uterus has been damaged by powerful suppositories . . . if she is treated promptly she will regain health but will thereafter be sterile.”

  The social stigma of abortion also must have discouraged many women from such measures. Women were considered ritually impure for forty days after terminating a pregnancy, and their entire household was thought to be polluted as well. In some Greek cities, a woman who had an abortion after the death of her husband could be charged with a crime and executed, since she was depriving his family of an heir.

  Although no evidence suggests that Sappho had to make such a difficult and heartrending decision about a pregnancy herself, the legal and social constraints placed on women in this respect once again reveal how thoroughly men dominated both the private and public aspects of a woman’s life, making her achievements even more remarkable.

  CARVED IN STONE at the temple of Asclepius at Epidaurus is a story about a young woman named Ithmonica who came to the healing god to seek a child. As was the custom, she lay down in the shrine to sleep, in hope that Asclepius would come to
her in a dream. When he appeared, she asked him whether she might conceive a daughter, and he agreed. When the god asked if there was anything else, Ithmonica said she needed nothing more. She became pregnant, but three years later she had still not given birth. Returning to the temple, she asked the god why this was happening to her, but Asclepius said again in a dream that he had given her exactly what she asked for, since she hadn’t mentioned anything about actually delivering the child. She then begged the god to let her give birth, and the god agreed. She woke up, left the sanctuary, and gave birth to her daughter in the courtyard outside.

  Most pregnancies in ancient Greece undoubtedly were easier than that of poor Ithmonica, but doctors had little understanding of the process, and there were many potential dangers along the way. Physicians were divided on whether the fetus slowly became more human inside the womb as the months passed or quickly took on its final shape and merely grew larger over time. One medical text claimed that the developing child first began to breathe, then to feed on the mother’s blood, followed by movement after several months. Aristotle took the unusual step of experimenting with fertilized chicken eggs and reported that the bird’s heart is visible beating after only three days. He thus reasoned that the heart was the first organ to develop in the growing human child.