The Athenian Women

by Alessandro Barbero

  1

  Seven years have passed. We’re in the countryside, just outside of the walls of Athens, and it’s wintertime. You should imagine bare fields, gnarled olive trees, fig trees without leaves, and two small houses, side by side, their doors barred from within, and a plume of smoke rising from the hole in the roof. Here live the two old men, Thrasyllus and Polemon: they managed to save their hides in the end, though Thrasyllus lost the use of one arm, and his friend now has a scar on his face that slashes across his mouth. They’ve aged quickly, in these seven years, after a life of backbreaking labor in the fields, with the hardships of the war that never ends, and losses in their families: both men are now widowers. All that remains to each is a single joy, their daughters: they each have one, Thrasyllus has Glycera and Polemon has Charis, and by now the girls are old enough to be wed. So many times they’ve said to each other: what a pity that one of us doesn’t have a son! They could be married, and we’d be set for life. Instead, they’ll have to find sons-in-law who’ll take the girls away, and neither of the men much feels like thinking about it.

  Ah, I almost forgot: that other house you can just glimpse at the end of the road, the big one, with the fence and the gate, half hidden among the olive trees, belongs to another Athenian, but not a poor one like our two peasants. He’s one of the “big men,” a rich man who lives in the city, and he only ever comes out into the country to supervise farmwork: Eubulus. He does have a son, Cimon; now, he’d be an ideal match, but there’s no point even dreaming of it, Glycera and Charis are too poor for him. In recent years, the old men have been forced to sell a part of their land, they no longer even own a slave: the war is ruining everyone, even though the politicians keep promising that soon things will get better, and the people continue to vote for them, because they believe all their promises. There, I think I’ve said all I need to, now our story can begin. Look, Polemon’s door is opening . . .

  Charis appeared in the doorway, sniffed at the air, and shivered. The sky was low and gray, and everything within sight was wet: that night it had rained. The young woman wrapped her cloak more tightly around her and ventured out into the mud. On her head she was balancing an empty amphora. As she did every morning, she set out barefoot to cover the ten minutes’ walk that separated her house from the fountain. It was a village fountain, carved directly out of the rock, but the water gushed from a bronze lion head. A long time ago, there had been a whole lion, holding a washbasin between its paws; but the year that Charis was born, the Spartans had invaded Attica and had ventured all the way to here, and not only had they cut down the vines and the olive trees, they’d also carried off the bronze lion. Charis could remember clearly that the fountain no longer existed when she was a little girl, there was nothing but a stream of water gurgling from the rock. Then the community had decided to rebuild it, and the populace had imposed a tax, but there was very little money: they’d installed just the lion’s head, with the waterspout protruding from the animal’s neck.

  At the fountain a group of women were killing time by gossiping while waiting for their amphoras to fill up. Most of them were slaves, and Charis only knew them by sight; the only one with whom she was on friendly terms at all was Moca, the Thracian slave who lived in Eubulus’s house. Charis went to set her amphora down next to Moca’s. Moca was a grown woman, and according to the neighbors she had a loose tongue; they also said that she knew certain of her people’s spells and was willing to let others try them out for a little money. But when Charis had heard the grown-ups talking about Moca and laughing, she’d never been able to figure out what exactly it was they were referring to.

  “What a day!” commented the Thracian woman, referring to the gray sky full of rain.

  “You can say that again,” Charis agreed. “This morning my father gets up and looks outside: it’s raining, a blessing from the gods! He was so happy. As far as I’m concerned, I’d gladly skip it entirely.”

  “Are you working outside today?”

  “He’s decided to start pruning the vines. Today of all days, what do you think of that? He says that it’s already late for it,” Charis informed her, in a tone of resignation. On a day like that, she would gladly have stayed home by a warm fire; but old men always want to do things their way, and in a family, you don’t argue, you obey.

  “Look, here comes your neighbor,” Moca announced. Charis turned around: Glycera was coming toward them, slightly out of breath, her hair hastily combed, with stray locks hanging from her headscarf. With one hand she was balancing the amphora on her head.

  “What a day!” she said immediately, as she was putting down the amphora. The other women laughed.

  “Did you get up late this morning?” asked Charis.

  “Don’t even talk to me about it! My father tossed and turned all night long, he was so eager to get out into the vineyard. It’s pruning time, he can’t think of anything but that.”

  Moca laughed.

  “Well, it’s certainly true, where one dog goes, so goes the other.” She might not know Greek very well, but she had learned all the proverbs.

  “Take it easy with your dog, or my father will have you thrashed,” Glycera exclaimed; but she laughed as she said it.

  In the meantime, Moca’s turn had come, then Charis’s. Once they’d filled their amphoras, they stood waiting for Glycera’s turn; the women who had arrived before them now all left together, hushed by the weight of their burden.

  “Shall we go back?” asked Glycera, once her amphora too was full.

  “Come on,” the other women agreed, unenthusiastically. They had to kneel down to get the amphoras onto their heads, then they staggered to their feet.

  “Today we’ve got twice the work,” said Moca after a while. “The master’s son is coming to see a new stallion, he’ll eat here with all his friends.”

  “The easy life is over!” Glycera joked.

  “What can you do about it, sometimes it happens!” the Thracian woman muttered. “We’re just lucky that the elderly master almost always sleeps in the city.”

  They went on joking until Moca turned off and vanished down the road lined with olive trees that led to Eubulus’s property. Glycera and Charis started walking again. There the mud was deeper, less heavily beaten, and their bare feet sank in up to their ankles.

  “But aren’t you sick and tired of working like a slave?” Glycera suddenly blurted out.

  Charis, struggling under her burden, shot her a wondering glance. What a thing to say: working is the fate of human beings, her father always told her so. If you didn’t feel like working, then you should have been born among the gods. Once, truth be told, Charis had objected to the fact that the rich never worked. Her father had made a strange face. “If the people would only open their eyes, you’d see them working too,” he’d muttered. Charis wasn’t particularly interested in the things her father said, so she’d stopped listening.

  Glycera, however, persisted; it was clear that she was following some train of thought. She had always been, of the two of them, the one who asked all the questions. When their girlish bodies had started to change, it was Glycera who had once asked Charis to let her touch the breasts that had blossomed on her chest, and to touch hers in turn. They had done it two or three times, in the cellar, in the dark.

  “No, I’m not kidding about this. I wasn’t born to live like this—and neither were you,” Glycera insisted.

  “Then what are you planning to do about it?” the other girl objected.

  “You want me to tell you? I plan to marry a man who won’t make me work like a beast of burden anymore.”

  “That would be nice!” Charis laughed. “Marry a knight. And at home, order your slave girls around.”

  They went on laughing and kidding around for a while, as they squished through the mud.

  “Have you ever talked to your father about when you are to be married?” Charis as
ked at last. Glycera shook her head.

  “I’ve tried it, but to no avail. You know what he’s like. He just says when the time comes.”

  They both fell into rapt silence. When the time comes: which means when? Men the right age were few and far between in the city. With all the young men that had been killed in the war, especially during the damned expedition to Sicily: an entire fleet had set sail three years ago, and it had never returned home. Even now, there were too many serving at the front and in the fleet: and all the while, the young women back home were growing up—and youth wilts all too soon . . .

  Behind them an extraordinary whinnying sound exploded into the air. Glycera and Charis stopped short in astonishment. There followed another neighing, and then another, so wretched that it sounded as if someone were cutting a horse’s throat, or dragging it toward a wolf.

  The two friends looked at each other.

  “That must be the new stallion Moca was talking about. Shall we go see?” Glycera suggested.

  Charis was afraid of horses, but she didn’t want to admit it.

  “Let’s go,” she agreed, unenthusiastically.

  By now they were on the little lane that led to their houses; they set down the amphoras and ran back the way they’d come. As they got closer to Eubulus’s property, they heard the broken voices of men mixing with the whinnying, and then the clatter of cracking wood. After climbing a low, dry stone wall they crossed the olive grove and approached the big house from behind, where a canopy and a series of corrals housed the master’s horses. Inside one of the paddocks a white stallion, foaming with rage, was galloping back and forth the length of the wooden fence, already half demolished; on the far side of the fence, two mares were watching nervously, tossing their manes. Two men were standing at a safe distance, pointlessly cursing the stallion. As they arrived in their midst, Glycera and Charis recognized two of the household slaves.

  “Stay away, he’s dangerous!” one of them grunted.

  The stallion was dancing around the wooden fence, and and such violence emanated from his sweat-gleaming body that the young women did not need to be warned. Full of curiosity, they stood there watching while the beast carved itself an opening in the fence and burst into the second paddock with a triumphant whinny. One of the two mares trotted away, and then turned around to look, whipping her legs with her tail. The other mare took a few hesitant steps, then stopped, her sides heaving. The stallion drew nearer and then, behold, while the two slaves were each urging the other to intervene—though neither of them actually made a move—beneath the stallion’s body something began to grow longer. Charis and Glycera stood transfixed, staring at the appendage as it swelled until it had reached the size of a man’s arm. Then the horse trotted over to the motionless mare.

  “But is that his péos?” Charis whispered, and she almost couldn’t believe it.

  Glycera burst out laughing.

  “Certainly! Haven’t you ever seen one?”

  Charis shook her head no, wide-eyed.

  “And she’s just standing there waiting for him!”

  Then she realized that the slaves were watching her and snickering, and she heard that they were saying something in a language that neither of the two young women understood. Irritated, Charis turned her back on them.

  “Let’s get out of here, there’s nothing to see here,” she said loudly.

  They’d no sooner walked away than they both burst into laughter like a couple of madwomen.

  “Did you see the look on those guys’ faces?”

  A horseman riding from the big house went galloping past them, kicking up mud as he passed. That was Cimon, their neighbor’s son. He rode well, whipping the horse as he went. Without any need to speak, the young women once more retraced their steps, eager to see what would happen. The water could wait.

  Cimon had dismounted and was berating the slaves, who listened, their heads hanging low. The stallion had broken away from the mare, and now the animal looked around, dazed. The mare moved away a short distance, shook herself, then trotted over to the shed and started chewing hay. One of the slaves removed the bit and bridle from the horse on which the master had ridden up.

  “Give it here!”

  Cimon tore the tackle out of the slave’s hands, strode through the gap in the fence, and went up to the stallion. Placated, the beast watched him come closer without understanding. The young man stroked his head and neck, put the bridle on, and placed the bit in the horse’s mouth. He kept the riding crop clamped under his arm. When I get you home, I’ll teach you a lesson, he thought to himself. He grabbed the mane with both hands and vaulted onto the horse’s back. The horse, irritated, bucked two or three times, but Cimon knew what he was doing, even without a saddle. Feeling the bit cutting into his gums, the stallion once again tried to rebel, but then it dawned on him, through his confusion, that he had better obey. Pulling on the reins and pressing his knees together, the young man forced the horse to remain still. There, that’s right, learn who’s in charge here. And now, home.

  Only then did he notice that he had two female spectators. He scarcely knew them: the daughters of their neighbors, two good-for-nothings. But they had become women in the meantime, he noticed with some interest, as he rode past them.

  “Did you enjoy the show?” he laughed. Charis blushed and dropped her eyes. Glycera, instead, stood watching as he cantered off easily, one hand resting loosely on his hip, his long curls dangling around his neck. She remembered how he had yelled at the slaves, she saw how he was mastering the stallion, and she felt a stab of desire. Who knew what it would be like, to be possessed by such a man?

  Cimon, too, as he rode off sitting tall on the horse’s back, kept thinking about the two young women for a moment. He managed to formulate an idea: he wouldn’t mind riding those two, either. But the rage that surged through his body over the stallion’s escape, the stupidity of his slaves, and the ruined fence all curdled that thought. He whipped the horse into a trot; but he lacked the patience to take the beast all the way to the stables. Halfway there, he leapt off, grabbed the bit, and started whipping the horse’s muzzle. The horse whinnied and tossed his head in terror, but Cimon was too agile for him: he never released his grip and just kept on whipping.

  That evening, Thrasyllus sent Glycera to invite the neighbors, Polemon and Charis, over. In the winter, darkness fell early, too early to go straight to bed. The two old men sat around the fire, coughing from the smoke, drinking wine and cracking hempseeds. In a corner, the two young women were spinning wool, warmly wrapped in their cloaks, because the heat from the hearth scarcely reached them. Every so often, they would whisper between themselves, but in the presence of the old men they were careful not to gossip too much.

  “By god, one day the people will figure it out, you’ll see,” Thrasyllus ruminated. “The wealthy are raising their heads again. Tyranny is at the gates.”

  “People understand nothing,” Polemon muttered discontentedly. “Tyranny will rear its ugly head without them even noticing, actually, they’re even likely to clap and cheer. Don’t you see it already? These gentleman horsemen go around with their long hair and unkempt beards, they even ride through the marketplace on horseback! There was a time when people jeered at them, and catcalls would fly: Friend of the Spartans! When are you going to shave your beard? But now, no one says anything!”

  “No, if you ask me, people will open their eyes. Tyranny won’t prevail,” Thrasyllus said again. “And you, why are you staring at me like a dead fish?” he exclaimed turning to Glycera, who had gotten up to add charcoal to the fire.

  “Papa, I can’t stand hearing you go on about this stuff,” the young woman snapped. “Tyranny this, tyranny that, you see it hiding under the bed, this tyranny! These days it’s all anyone talks about.”

  “Don’t talk about things you don’t understand!” Thrasyllus silenced her; but Glycera wouldn
’t give up that easily.

  “For instance, just the other day at the market! A man bought a sea bass, he paid ten obols for it; after he left, the anchovy vendor in the next stall over spat after him and muttered: ‘If you ask me, that guy is stocking up food for the tyranny!’ You’ve all lost your minds, with this tyranny of yours!”

  “Ten obols for a fish!” Thrasyllus exclaimed. “Three days’ pay! It’s clear that there are people around who can freely dump their money into the sea. For shame!”

  “Papa, if someone has the money, they can spend it however they like, why should they wallow in poverty like we do?”

  Thrasyllus took offense.

  “We don’t wallow in poverty! We live on our stipend, like everyone!”

  Glycera shrugged her shoulders, since it was dark, and sat down. But Charis, who had listened openmouthed, broke in.

  “Papa! I’ve been wanting to ask you this for some time now. Why do people get the stipend?”

  Polemon cleared his throat. His daughter didn’t speak often, but when she asked a question, she expected an answer, that’s one thing the old man had learned.

  “We get a stipend because we are the masters of many cities, and they all pay us tribute.”

  “Are we masters?” Charis asked, incredulously.

  “By we I mean all Athenians. And therefore all the citizens, when they go to the assembly or to court, get the three obols of their stipend.”

  “And there are those who go every day,” Glycera laughed. At the market she listened to all the gossip. “Even when there’s no trial, the courthouse is still full of jurors, and they all get paid anyway!”