ABSTRACT
In an effort to explain women’s key role in the building of a new national identity, and in order to justify the right to education at a first stage and later claim access to civil rights, Greek women resorted to classical Greece. This deliberate (re)turn to the classics by nineteenth-century Greek women was unexpected, paradoxical, and unconventional; it was in itself contrary to their social conditioning and submissiveness. Classicising the woman question was born from Greek women’s need to vocally challenge traditional gender and social roles, while spotlighting the identity and civil rights crises they were facing. Within a Greek society under transformation, leading male figures began to reconsider women’s role in society and claimed that they could be regarded as trustworthy active agents capable of contributing to the nation’s rebirth by helping preserve the Greek language and culture, educating young Greeks, and instilling into them strong feelings about the country.
