Searching for Sappho

by Philip Freeman

  4

  FAMILY MATTERS

  ANTIGONE: Will you help my hand to lift up the dead?

  ISMENE: You mean bury him? To go against the law?

  ANTIGONE: To bury my brother? Yes, and bury yours if you will not help me. No one will call me faithless.

  ISMENE: But Creon has forbidden it! You would not dare.

  ANTIGONE: No one has a right to keep me from my family.

  – SOPHOCLES, ANTIGONE

  AS MUCH AS marriage and motherhood defined a woman in Sappho’s world, the ties to the family of her birth remained strong throughout a woman’s life. Her father was her protector as long as he lived, her mother her adviser and advocate, her sisters her closest friends, and her brothers her childhood companions who stood with her to defend her rights and the honor of the family. As in any age, the potential for conflict, especially between siblings, was ever present, but loyalty to one’s family and the reciprocal care provided by all members was fundamental to ancient Greek society.

  A woman’s relationship with her brothers was especially strong, even after they were all grown. In most cases the siblings continued to live in the same town and saw each other regularly at festivals and family gatherings. A woman’s husband was usually many years older than she was, often to the point that they were an entire generation apart. Her brothers, on the other hand, were closer to her own age and had grown up with her since she was a small child. Given the restrictions on women in ancient Greek society, a brother was often the only male of her age that a woman would know well and, if the two got along, could call a friend. Add to this the role of a brother as head of a woman’s birth family’s household in most cases after the father’s death, and it’s clear that the ties between brother and sister could be quite powerful by both affection and duty.

  The classic literary example of the bond between siblings in ancient Greece is the determination by Antigone, in Sophocles’s play of the same name, that her brother Polynices have a proper burial even though it has been forbidden by Creon, the ruler of the city of Thebes. Antigone berates her sister, Ismene, for her fear of defying Creon and reminds her that the responsibilities of a sister to her brother supersede any law made by a man. Antigone is willing to die herself to guarantee a decent burial for Polynices and indeed brings about the death of almost every main character in the play in her relentless quest to fulfill her duty to her brother. As with any example from drama, we can’t necessarily believe that this portrayal represents a universal attitude among the Greeks, and some in the audience would have thought Antigone was going too far, but the underlying theme of devotion to family above the state would have resonated deeply with anyone watching the play.

  Brothers could be equally devoted to their sisters. When the Athenian tyrant Hipparchus, a few decades after Sappho, was insulted at the rejection of his sexual advances by the handsome young man Harmodius, Hipparchus invited Harmodius’s younger sister to be part of a grand procession of maidens in honor of the goddess Athena and then publicly withdrew his invitation, implying that the sister was not a virgin. This insult to his sister and family honor was so great that Harmodius and his relative Aristogiton killed Hipparchus, though it meant death for them both. Many other examples illustrate devotion of grown brothers to their sisters in ancient Greece that go beyond family honor—so far beyond that it’s hard not to believe that the bond between brothers and sisters forged in the childhood home remained one of the strongest a woman would know throughout her life.

  But just as siblings could be each other’s greatest supporters, they could also be bitterly critical when they felt they had been wronged or when a brother or sister was perceived to be harming the interest of the family. The Works and Days, composed by the poet Hesiod in the century before Sappho, is set as a sermon from Hesiod to his brother, Perses, who had apparently cheated Hesiod out of his inheritance. The poet presents himself as a poor shepherd tending his flock in the harsh mountains while his brother enjoys the company of rich and corrupt men. Whatever the truth in Hesiod’s particular case, fights over money and inheritance were apparently at the root of as many family disputes in ancient Greece as they are today. In Sappho’s own poetry, we have ample evidence that a disagreement with a brother over money and family honor led to one of the most painful episodes in her life.

  THE PAPYRUS FROM Oxyrhynchus containing a short poetic biography of Sappho records: “She had three brothers, Erigyius, Larichus, and Charaxus, the eldest, who sailed to Egypt and associated with a woman named Doricha and spent large amounts of money on her.” The Byzantine Suda encyclopedia says even less: “She had three brothers, Larichus, Charaxus, and Erigyius.”

  A badly damaged Oxyrhynchus papyrus written in the first or second century AD may mention all three brothers, though the text is so damaged it’s hard to be sure:

  Cha(raxus) . . .

  and . . .

  dearest . . . (Lari)chus . . .

  (Eri)gyius for his clothes.

  This shows that she was a good housekeeper

  and hard worker . . .

  as Sappho says in a poem about her brothers . . .

  Aside from the claim that Sappho was industrious around the house, the most interesting statement in this broken fragment is that Sappho wrote a poem about her brothers—a poem, as we will see later, that may have been recently rediscovered. We can say nothing about Sappho’s brother Erygius, but the little we know about Larichus does open a window into an important and fascinating aspect of Sappho’s life—the volatile and often violent political world of ancient Lesbos.

  As mentioned previously, Sappho thought very highly of Larichus, according to the classical writer Athenaeus: “The lovely Sappho often praises her brother Larichus because he poured wine in the town hall for the Mytilenaeans.” The role of wine pourer or cupbearer in the ancient world was one of great honor and political importance. As an ancient commentator on Homer’s Iliad writes: “It was the custom, as Sappho says, for well-born and handsome young men to pour wine.” A cupbearer, among his other duties, was trusted to guard the king or ruler from poison, as Nehemiah did for the Persian King Artaxerxes in the Bible. In the Lesbos of Sappho’s time, the role would have been less grand than in the court of the great king of Persia, but it still would have been a position of honor that demonstrated Larichus was a trusted adviser of the ruler at Mytilene. By extension, it shows that Sappho’s family was in a position of power and high regard at the time Larichus was cupbearer.

  We don’t know all the details about the political history of Lesbos before and during the life of Sappho, but what we do know reads like family rivalries, power struggles, and betrayal right out of a Shakespearean tragedy. In the Archaic period, the island of Lesbos was divided into at least five competing cities, including Eresus in the west, the likely birthplace of Sappho, and Mytilene in the east, the most powerful of the island’s towns. In Sappho’s youth, the family of the Penthilidae, who claimed descent from Homer’s King Agamemnon, ruled in Mytilene with an iron hand. Like many oligarchies, they maintained power through patronage, control of resources, and the violent crushing of any threats to their power. But at some point in the late seventh century BC, the enemies of the Penthilidae had enough and rose up against the family with a man named Megacles at their lead. Aristotle says Megacles and his armed followers slew the Penthilidae while the latter were beating people with clubs.

  Megacles quickly disappears from the scene, but a populist ruler (tyrannos, or “tyrant” in Greek) named Melanchros took over Mytilene for a short time until the noble families overthrew and killed him. The leading families of the town then formed an aristocratic faction that shared power for a number of years. The leader of this group was a portly man named Pittacus, son of Hyrras, who came to be known as one of the greatest wise men and lawgivers of ancient Greece. Others in the ruling circle included Antimenidas and Kikis, two elder brothers of the poet Alcaeus, Sappho’s contemporary.

  At this time, Athens was beginning to fle
x its overseas muscles and attacked the city of Sigeum near Troy in a bid to control the lucrative trade through Hellespont to the Black Sea. Lesbos saw the attack as a blatant intrusion into its sphere of influence and so fought against Athens, losing at first, but then defeating the Athenians, at least for a time. Pittacus distinguished himself in the war by killing, in single combat, one of the Athenian generals, a great Olympic athlete named Phrynon. In the end, however, Athens won control of Sigeum and weakened the hold of Lesbos and the Aeolian Greeks on trade in the region. Unrest spread in Mytilene, and a new populist leader named Myrsilus, of the Cleanactidae clan, arose. But instead of fighting him, Pittacus broke with the other ruling families and swore allegiance to the new tyrant. He further alienated the nobility by marrying a daughter of the Penthilidae, the old aristocratic clan that had ruled Mytilene by force when Alcaeus and Sappho were young.

  Athenian calathos-psykter with the Lesbian poets Alcaeus and Sappho (c. 480 BC).

  (STAATLICHE ANTIKENSAMMLUGEN UND GLYPTOTHEK, MUNICH)

  The poet Alcaeus was furious at this perceived treachery and thereafter delighted in cursing and vilifying Pittacus in his poetry:

  But Potbelly didn’t take these matters to heart.

  He trampled his oaths under his feet

  and now devours our city . . .

  Alcaeus and his party plotted against Myrsilus and Pittacus but failed and fled to the town of Pyrrha in central Lesbos. Soon, however, they succeeded in overthrowing and perhaps killing Myrsilus and returned in triumph to Mytilene. But once there, they found that the people of the city had rallied to Pittacus and elected him ruler. Alcaeus was livid that the common people would prefer having another so-called tyrant to being ruled by the noble families, but there was nothing the aristocracy could do. Those who opposed Pittacus fled for their lives to distant lands. Alcaeus went to Egypt, while his brother Antimenidas went to Babylon and fought as a mercenary in the army of Nebuchadnezzar, perhaps helping to sack Jerusalem.

  Pittacus devoted himself to reforming the government of Lesbos and was greatly admired in later ages for his prudence and wisdom. One of his famous rulings doubled the penalty for crimes committed while drunk—one share of the penalty for breaking the law and the second for being foolish enough to become inebriated in the first place. As sensible as his governance was, the exiles didn’t give up, but gathered abroad to nurse their wounds and plot their return to power. They managed to persuade Croesus of Lydia to finance one last campaign against Pittacus, but it failed, and Alcaeus was captured. What must have stung the poet even more than defeat was that Pittacus didn’t consider him worth the trouble of executing. Alcaeus, beaten at last, lived out the rest of his life quietly, while Pittacus ruled for ten more years before voluntarily retiring.

  How do Sappho, her brother Larichus, and the rest of her family fit into this age of revolution and turmoil in Lesbos? Sappho’s own poetry provides a few important clues. A small papyrus fragment unearthed at Oxyrhynchus contains parts of a poem that she wrote against a woman who must have once been her friend:

  . . . Mica

  . . . I will not allow you

  . . . you chose the love of the house of Penthilus

  . . . evil betrayer

  . . . sweet song

  . . . voice like honey

  . . . gentle breezes

  . . . wet with dew

  The house of Penthilus, or the Penthilidae, was the family that had ruled Lesbos when Sappho was a child and had been overthrown. Pittacus had later married a daughter of the clan to strengthen his hold on power after exiling the faction of Alcaeus from the island. This fragment gives us a clear idea of which side Sappho and her family took in the conflict; they were supporters of the noble families who, along with Alcaeus, had sided against the populist Pittacus and his followers. Sappho’s sense of betrayal by Mica is palpable in the poem: “you chose the love of the house of Penthilus” over loyalty to the party supported by Sappho’s family. Mica was certainly not alone in her family’s practical choice of reconciliation with Pittacus, but Sappho and her clan must have held Mica and her kin in disdain for selling out so cheaply rather than facing exile as they did.

  The best evidence from Sappho’s poetry of the price she paid in exile is again from the oldest of her surviving poems, the song contained in the two third-century-BC papyrus fragments from Milan and Copenhagen:

  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

  Here, once again, is the sorrow Sappho feels at not being able to provide a suitable headband for her daughter Cleis, as her mother had done for her in the days before Pittacus—probably “the one in Mytiline”—drove the family from Lesbos. What “these things of the family of Cleanax” are is missing, but the hostile reference is clear. They were the family of Myrsilus, whom Pittacus swore loyalty to at the expense of the nobility that must have included Sappho’s clan.

  Political comments in Sappho’s poems are rare, but they do illustrate something quite remarkable. The poetry of her contemporary Alcaeus is brimming with deprecations against Pittacus and his allies, but we would scarcely expect a woman to comment on such matters. Sappho is rightly known as a poet of love, but these two poems show that she was very much interested in politics and protested against the wrongs she felt had been done to her family in perhaps the only way available to her, with the power of her songs. These poems, like the best political satire, have a bite that the endless protests and plotting of men could never achieve.

  Sappho and her family probably shared the first displacement of the opponents of Pittacus in Pyrrha on Lesbos, but her second and more lengthy exile was on the distant island of Sicily south of Italy. The Parian Marble, a chronology of early Greek history from an inscription in stone found on the Aegean island of Paros, records that Sappho fled to Sicily sometime around the year 600 BC. The Greeks had begun to settle in Sicily more than a century before Sappho’s birth, and by her time they had many prosperous colonies on its shores—so many that it became a kind of second Greece in the classical age.

  Sappho and her family would have had many choices of where on the island to settle in exile. One possibility was Panormus (modern Palermo) on the northwest coast, though this city was ruled by the Carthaginians. Sappho mentions Panormus in one of her fragments, but this is no strong argument that she lived there. A better guess would be Syracuse on the east coast. This prosperous town had been founded by Corinth a century earlier and had strong commercial ties to the Aegean. We know from the first-century-BC Roman orator Cicero that a celebrated statue of Sappho was on prominent display in the town hall of Syracuse before it was stolen by the greedy Roman governor Verres, though again this is not solid proof that the poet lived there more than four hundred years earlier.

  In the end, we are again left with many questions. That Sappho was as active politically as a woman could be in her age is certain, as is the alliance of her family with other nobles against Pittacus, a man they perceived as a feckless traitor to his own class. Sappho and her family paid the price of exile in distant Sicily, likely for several years, before they were presumably allowed to return to Lesbos after their humiliating final defeat by Pittacus. The service of her brother Larichus as cupbearer in the town hall could have occurred at any point before the family’s exile when Pittacus had allied himself with Myrsilus and then became ruler of Mytilene by popular vote. What became of Larichus afterward, or whether he even survived the final uprising against Pittacus, is unknown.

  SAPPHO’S WORLD WAS small compared to the world we know today. In her poems she mentions the Greek islands and mainland; the coast of Asia Minor, along with the kingdoms of Lydia and Phrygia just to the east; Scythia beyond the Black Sea to the north; and the
large Mediterranean islands of Cyprus and Sicily. She certainly knew about Egypt as well, and the Mesopotamian empires of Assyria and Babylon. Beyond these lands her picture of the world probably grew unclear.

  She may have known about the land of the Ethiopians to the south of Egypt and something of western Arabia, where frankincense and myrrh were gathered. She could have heard stories about the rich kingdoms of India on the trade routes to the east, and it’s just possible that tales of the Seres, or silk people, of distant China could have reached the shores of Lesbos by her day. To the west she would have known about Italy and the coasts of Spain and Gaul, which were being settled by Greek colonists in her lifetime. She also could have heard from Phoenician and Greek traders about the great, unending ocean beyond Spain, where the tin-rich island of Britain lay and, on the edge of the world, Ierne, or Ireland, rumored to be a land of cannibals.

  We know that Lesbos had a lively trade with the lands of the eastern Mediterranean in Sappho’s time. Large transport jars for wine and oil called amphorae were one of the chief exports of Lesbos and are regularly unearthed by archaeologists around the Mediterranean. One of the earliest examples of these jars comes from a coastal fortress near Tel Aviv in Israel dating to the decades before Sappho. Lesbos, in turn, imported fine pottery and other trade items from mainland Greece and Asia Minor, many of which have been recently discovered in excavations at Mytilene and elsewhere on the island. We’ve already seen that Lesbos fought with Athens in Sappho’s lifetime to control the lucrative trade into the Black Sea and beyond. According to the testimony of archaeological and literary sources, including Sappho’s own poetry, Lesbos was a vibrant, wealthy, and outward-looking trade center well placed between Greece and the rich lands to the east and north.

  The references we find in Sappho to other cities and countries are few, but they provide some of our most important literary evidence for trade connections during this period. She mentions the nearby port of Phocaea and its luxury wares in one of her poems recorded by the writer Athenaeus: