ABSTRACT
The title of the Hellenistic courtesan treatises, On Athenian Courtesans, sometimes shortened to On Courtesans, suggests that such women were Athenian, or at least bore Atticized names. The attribution of nicknames to notorious individuals, to politicians as well as to more marginal figures such as courtesans and parasites, appears to have been standard practice in classical Athens. The punning encountered in Machon's account of the names of courtesans also appears to have been popular among their Alexandrian chroniclers. The Athenian practice of omitting the names of reputable, living women from the public record, especially in oratory, is by now a commonplace of classical scholarship. Pericles' famous advice to women widowed by the Peloponnesian war has long served as the starting point for discussions of the discursive exclusion of women in classical Athens. This chapter examines the rare appearance of metronymics on inscriptions, a subject almost entirely neglected by scholars, invites speculation about the social status of the women.
