ABSTRACT
Notoriously, there are as many definitions of beauty as there are cultures. This chapter does not aim to define the details of classical Greek concepts of beauty.1 Rather, it is a corollary to the previous chapter in that it shows how beauty rather than physical aberrance could be used in the classical world as a focus of contention or difference. The first part of the chapter briefly looks at some roles beauty played in classical Greek myth and religion. It then progresses to examine literary treatments of beauty, especially in tragedy, where I demonstrate how Euripides used attitudes towards external appearance, especially that of oneself, as a device to create pity and differentiate character in two plays, Medea and Electra. Finally I argue that the discourse of beauty and its manipulation becomes very subtle and complex in Athens during the fifth and fourth centuries BCE, and that they play a vital role in Athenian self-definition.
