Pod Insights Let's Talk About Myths, Baby! | Greek Mythology & the Ancient Mediterranean BONUS RE-AIR Beloved of Aphrodite, the Lives & Legacies of Ancient Greek Sex Workers About this episode This episode originally aired in March 2024. A little look into the lives of ancient Greek sex workers, particularly two Hetairai, Phryne and Rhodopis, whose accomplishments achieved them 2300+ years long legacies. Pre-order Liv's Odyssey adaptation (!!!), The Odyssey: a Modern Retelling. https://geni.us/TheOdysseyBook Submit your question for the next Q&A via email http://mythsbaby.com/questions or a voice note https://www.speakpipe.com/LTAMB. Get ad-free episodes and so, so much more, by subscribing to the Oracle Edition at patreon.com/mythsbaby http://patreon.com/mythsbaby. Enter ourpodcast guest https://www.mythsbaby.com/contact form if you'd like to be on the show as a conversation guest!
CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as deferential as I would be were I referencing the real thing.
Sources: Phryne: A Life in Fragments by Melissa Funke; Love in Ancient Greece by Robert Flaceliere; Herodotus' Histories, translated by GC Macauley https://www.gutenberg.org/files/2707/2707-h/2707-h.htm#link22H_4_0001; Aphrodite by Monica Cyrino (the Nossis poem is found here); Goddesses, Whores, Wives, and Slaves: Women in Antiquity by Sarah B Pomeroy; Venus and Aphrodite by Bettany Hughes; Diodorus Siculus and Strabo, from the Topostext entry on Rhodopis https://topostext.org/people/1758.
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0:00 Liv Albert? Hey nerds, really quick note from me. I want to tell you that we now have the applications open for the next set of listener group trips. This is us going back to the original, the trips that we have held in the past that have been so much fun, so successful, and pretty affordable in terms of wandering around Greece with a bunch of nerds. So, check out the details and get your applications in at mythsbaby.com/groups.
0:35 Speaker 01 At Humana, our Medicare Advantage plans are easy to understand and easy on your wallet, like offering more benefits than you'd get from original Medicare alone, and including dental, vision, and hearing coverage in every plan. And the best part is, every plan has a $0 or low monthly plan premium, which makes it easier to save, too. So, this Medicare planning season, plan well with Humana. Learn more at gethumana.com. Humana is a Medicare Advantage, HMO, and PPO organization with a Medicare contract. Enrollment in any Humana plan depends on contract renewal.
1:14 Liv Albert? Now, the most shameful of the customs of the Babylonians is as follows. Every woman of the country must sit down in the precincts of Aphrodite once in her life and have commerce with a man who is a stranger. And many women who do not deign to mingle with the rest because they are made arrogant by wealth, drive to the temple with pairs of horses in covered carriages, and so take their place. And a large number of attendants follow after them, but the greater number do thus. In the sacred enclosure of Aphrodite sit great numbers of women with a great wealth of cord about their heads. Some come and others go, and there are passages in straight lines going between the women
1:56 Liv Albert? in every direction, through which the strangers pass by and make their choice.
2:02 Liv Albert? Here, when a woman takes her seat, she does not depart again to her house until one of the strangers has thrown a silver coin into her lap and has had commerce with her outside the temple, and after throwing it, he must say these words only: "I demand thee in the name of the goddess Mylita." Now, Mylita is the name given by the Assyrians to Aphrodite, and the silver coin may be of any value; whatever it is, she will not refuse it, and for that is not lawful for her, seeing that his coin is made sacred by the act. And she follows the man who has first thrown and does not reject any. And after that, she departs to her house, having acquitted herself of her duty to the goddess. Nor will you be able thenceforth to give any gift so great as to win her.
2:47 Liv Albert? So then, as many as have attained to beauty and stature are speedily released, but those of them who are unshapely remain there much time, not being able to fulfill the law; for some of them remain even as much as three or four years. And in some parts of Cyprus, too, there is a custom similar to this.
3:32 Liv Albert? Oh, hi, hello, welcome. This is Let's Talk About Myths, baby, and I am your host, Liv. She's who, well, you know, likes to make fun of the dumb shit men have said in the past. Ultimately, today's episode is dedicated to sharing what I can about the real lives of women in ancient Greece, specifically, sex workers, but I couldn't resist a healthy dose of stupid shit men have said in the past, because of what I just read by Herodotus.
4:01 Liv Albert? Almost certainly isn't true, and is not only some form of wild xenophobia, either intentionally or otherwise, like, you know, putting the Babylons into some other realm of bizarre behavior and suggesting that the Greeks would never. But also just, you know, super unlikely. It is, however, a little introduction into the concept of sex work in ancient Greece, because it was indeed dedicated to Aphrodite, even if it wasn't some form of mass. I don't, I don't even really know how to describe what Herodotus said happened in Babylon, but, you know, ancient sex work probably wasn't ever that. Instead, today I want to talk to you about Heterai and Pornai, ancient Greek sex workers.
4:46 Liv Albert? The women who lived outside the binary forced-on-wives, sometimes of their own free will and with the pride of someone who's accomplished something great when the world was stacked against them. And sometimes, I mean, obviously, not that at all. There have always been different types of sex work, the type that can be freeing and empowering, and the type that is forced by men. The former, I want to go into as much detail as possible, because it's fascinating and interesting, and I think these women deserve to have their stories told in ways that highlight their intelligence and strength in the ancient world, the way they figured shit out for themselves and built the life they wanted.
5:28 Liv Albert? And the latter group I want to talk about briefly to give them the voice, whatever voice that I can, without focusing on what was probably a pretty shitty existence. And again, along the way, we're going to review just a little bit of the dumbass misogynist drivel that I've come across while researching for this episode.
5:47 Liv Albert? Like specifically a book that I own not to take too seriously, but for when I want to remind myself not only how far we've come in just like imagining ancient women to be, you know, people, but also how recent and tenuous it is. Because this book I found in a used bookshop called Love in Ancient Greece. It's written by a French guy in like 1960, it's mentioned in the description. But you'll see where this is going. That said, honestly, actually, for all this book is written very much in 1960, it's like, pretty good about calling out misogyny. So maybe I'm being a little judgmental, but the words have been inspirational, at the least. Because it's in this book where I got the idea to read that wild passage from Herodotus about
6:27 Liv Albert? what he says he learned about women in Babylon. I'm sure they weren't real. Uh, this book has a lot about sex work, too, most of which actually isn't as horrifying as I was expecting. So maybe I made a snap judgment, but we will still begin with a little quote from it. Because the first paragraph of this section on courtesans in this book compares finding a sex worker to the practice of pederasty, you know, the Athenian tradition of men and boys that I don't frankly want to discuss again because it's a lot. I've talked about it before. Google it if you need. I mention it because it's relevant to the line that I'm going to read you. And honestly, it is important to note that pederasty is probably,
7:08 Liv Albert? was probably very similar to ancient Greek sex work. The enforced kind. But regardless of that, it is relevant context for when I read you this last line of the introduction to ancient sex work. Quote, "The heterosexually minded could also easily find heterai, obliging little friends who lived by the sale of their bodies."
7:35 Liv Albert? What a way to introduce the concept of sex work in the ancient Greek world. Not least because this author goes on to explain the enslavement of many ancient sex workers. So like, to both acknowledge the enforced nature of many of their lives and existences while also calling them obliging little friends feels, ugh. While the word horrifying comes to mind if the gag wasn't enough, but it's the type of horrifying that, at least in my opinion, we should laugh at for its utter absurdity and ability to both acknowledge these women while like also completely devaluing their lives. I feel like it's a very 1960. It both points out misogyny while also being misogynist. Art. But I promise, today's episode
8:19 Liv Albert? is mostly about the badassery that came along with at least two different stories of heterai in ancient Greece.
8:41 Liv Albert? This is episode 253, Beloved of Aphrodite: The Lives and Legacies of Ancient Greek Sex Workers.
9:04 Liv Albert? Let us go into the temple and look at the image of Aphrodite, curiously wrought of gold. Polyarchus gave it from the rich harvest of her body's splendor.
9:17 Liv Albert? That was a 3rd-century poet called Gnosis, writing about a shrine to Aphrodite in Magna Greca, the Greek colony in Italy, and presents the claim that a gold statue of Aphrodite in this temple was donated by a woman who had to be a pretty successful hetera in order to afford something so nice.
9:37 Liv Albert? Sex workers were sacred to Aphrodite. I won't pretend that meant they had it good, but they were broadly recognized as being associated with the goddess, and sometimes even might have worked in some explicit connection with her temples or shrines. In her book Venus and Aphrodite, Bethany Hughes talks about Aphrodite as also a goddess of ports broadly, before saying, “Perhaps unsurprisingly, given her connection to both sea and sex, Aphrodite was the goddess of not just ports and port towns, but also of prostitutes. Indeed, we hear from both Roman and Greek sources that she was considered the patron saint of the oldest profession.”
10:18 Liv Albert? Hughes also goes on to point out the region of Karamikos was one of the main places where ancient sex workers would find work in Athens, and in the excavations of the cemetery there, which, just as an aside, is also a very fun place where one can often, very appropriately, find Athenian tortoises fucking.
10:37 Liv Albert? But tortoises aside, lots of artifacts have been found there that are in dedication to the goddess and thus probably associated with sex work. But there also is at least one that was dedicated to the goddess Astarte, who's the Phoenician goddess who's often understood to have inspired the Greek Aphrodite. So it also has this connection to ports and trading and just travel. But there's one piece that Hughes details in this book that frankly, I have to pass on to you. It's a medallion, maybe a wall hanging, she says, and on it, quote, "Aphrodite rides a goat through the night sky with Eros as her companion. Kid goats and doves frolic across the scene. Another young naked boy leads the way in front of the goddess.
11:22 Liv Albert? A ladder, the ancient Greek word for ladder is climax, is propped up behind the determined looking deity." She also goes on to note in a truly joyful parenthetical, quote, "A common ancient phrase for climactic orgasm was Aphrodite's finishing post." So you know, you're welcome for all of that. Aphrodite contains multitudes, and one small part of that is certainly an affinity for sex work. This is a little less linked to Aphrodite, save for Hughes' section on this book reminding me, but there are absolutely endless examples of erotic art on pottery that we generally understand to feature Heterai.
12:07 Liv Albert? One of the most famous types of parties from ancient Athens were symposia, drinking parties where only men were allowed, except like, that's not actually true, they just didn't let their wives come and they called it only men and then allowed Heterai to join them. And so we often find these pieces of pottery that show distinct simpatic imagery and also sex and also women, thus probably Heterai, and the type that were, for lack of a better term, fancy enough to attend these parties. And there are some amazing stories of what these women were able to accomplish with the riches that they got from men in this field of work. Work, though, is the key word here.
12:49 Liv Albert? So let's first lay out the different types of sex work that existed in ancient Greece.
12:55 Liv Albert? I'm certain there's like, there's far more detail and complexity to this, and there's no doubt that I will miss a lot about these women of the ancient world, and maybe give them more success and agency than they might have felt, but I'm gonna do my best, and gods, it's well-intentioned. So there is certainly so much complexity on an individual level, from, you know, woman to woman, living these types of lives. But for the purpose of today, we're just gonna simplify the nature of ancient Greek sex work into two basic categories: heterai, who I've mentioned, but we will go into detail, and pornai.
13:26 Liv Albert? Hetera is the singular form of the word heterai, and as I have screamed into this microphone many times, it is best translated as companion. In fact, the male form of the word is heteros, and it's most often translated as like, friend, companion, or comrade. And then when it's women, it's often accompanied by a modifier word that suggests something different, like a more transactional relationship. And as far as I understand it, you know, it became a kind of euphemism, really, for the type of sex worker that we're talking about, even if it just means companion! The worst is when it gets translated as whore, and you're like...
14:06 Liv Albert? And that's the whole reaction. Heterai are often the type of sex workers that we might call like, maybe escorts today. I don't even know if that term is, um, still relevant. I'm old. It doesn't always come with sex, is the point, though, but companionship. And often it wasn't money that was exchanged, but gifts of one kind or another. There are many examples of heterai who began their lives enslaved too, perhaps as pornai, which, again, we'll get to, and then who were able to buy their freedom and make lives for themselves. We have stories of some pretty incredible feats these women achieved, its greatness and wealth and names that are remembered even now. Now pornai, on the other hand, were sex workers who were, I gather,
14:49 Liv Albert? typically enslaved, if not always. If they weren't, you know, formally enslaved by someone, then they were basically enslaved by poverty. These are the women who usually lived in port cities, where they could get regular business. They worked or were enslaved to brothels, and where money was exchanged for sex. We have less about them, though we do know that they were beloved by and sacred to Aphrodite, just like the heterai. And yes, this is where we get the word porn in all of its forms.
15:19 Liv Albert? When it comes to this type of sex worker and hetero broadly, we unsurprisingly have lots of evidence for their lives in these port cities. I mean, it makes sense, the cities where you have the most traffic of foreigners and travelers would be where these women would get the most business. It's why later we'll hear Herodotus mention the Egyptian port city of Naukratis, but it's also why I want to tell you a little bit about the role that Corinth played in this world of sex work. Because, oh, Corinth. See, Corinth is a city, like, it's right on the Ithmish, that bit of land that connects the Peloponnesian peninsula with the Greek mainland. One of my sources, a book simply called Aphrodite, calls it, quote, "the most prominent center
16:01 Liv Albert? for the secular profession of prostitution." I won't focus on them much, both because I worry about what we do know from the sources, like, if something survives, I can't imagine that it was particularly kind or aware of the actual women who lived these lives, and also because, well, like, I want to focus on the women that we know of who turned being a hetero into, at least as far as I can see, a badass career where they got to not only live lives free of the confines of marriage that often forced at least Athenian women to be, like, little hermits in their homes, whose roles are basically just like home and baby maker. But also, you know, it let them build lasting and truly incredible legacies for themselves. I don't want to suggest that the women who were not able to do this, or couldn't or
16:46 Liv Albert? didn't try, were any less, but at least we have these stories of these women who were able to turn this into a career that they seem to have been incredibly proud of. Like, of course, the woman who inspired this episode in the first place, Frene.
17:15 Liv Albert? You might have heard Frene's story before, either because you listened to my episode last year with Melissa Funky all about Frene, or because you've encountered her story somewhere or other on the internet, because she really is quite famous. I'm gonna first read how Britannica dot, I'm assuming org, explains her story before we get into more actual detail, because frankly, like, I live for the drama and it is well said here.
17:41 Liv Albert? When accused of blasphemy, a capital charge, Frene was defended by the orator Hyperides. When it seemed as if the verdict would be unfavorable, he tore her dress and displayed her bosom, which so moved the jury that they acquitted her. Another version has Frene tear her own dress and plead with each individual juror.
18:05 Liv Albert? Yeah, Frene is the one whose story goes around as a Tumblr meme every now and then. The woman who got acquitted of a major capital charge because she showed her tits to the jury.
18:18 Liv Albert? Fortunately for us and Frene, there is so, so, so, so much more to her story and she probably never had to show her tits. In truth, she probably didn't get naked in the courtroom and honestly, good for her. For more details on this trial and the sources that we have for it, listen to my episode with Melissa Funky, which I will be putting back into your feeds this week in some form, so stay tuned, because it's just all too fitting and I don't want to rehash it all because that episode exists and it was so fun. And today, I want to talk about not her trial, but the success and legacy of this woman who made a career as a Hetera. Stories like hers are rare, certainly, but they're not
19:00 Liv Albert? singular. Probably the most famous is Aspasia, Aspasia, who I won't talk about today, but she probably started out as a Hetera and then also was like a top advisor to Pericles. One day I will talk about her. But the fact that we have examples of more than one woman achieving utter greatness by being Hetera is just fucking cool. I like to imagine that, you know, even if it wasn't an easy life or remotely guaranteed to gain success and wealth, that these stories of a few Heterai who left behind wealth and legacies that last for us today, give us, you know, some hope that women in ancient Greece, ideally
19:43 Liv Albert? classical Athens where it was worst, were able to find freedom and lives that they chose for themselves, rather than being either enslaved, poor, or a citizen wife confined to her home. Stories like Phreni's and the other I'll talk about today feel like women who were able to manipulate the system that oppressed them. They were able to use the only thing many men cared about them, their bodies, to gain riches and security and fame that allowed them to otherwise, like, basically live whatever lives they wanted. And even better, to be remembered for them millennia later.
20:25 Liv Albert? Phreni was originally from Boeotia and her name was Meneserete. At some point in her life, she ended up in Athens and part of the sex trade in some way. But as Funky's book on her opens, quote, "By the end of the 3rd century BCE, that girl, now known to the Greek world as Phreni, had become infamous, a symbol of the elite culture of Athens. By the 2nd century CE, she was synonymous with the city itself, and her name alone was sufficient to invoke the cultural heights of what was considered to be Athens's golden age."
21:03 Liv Albert? She was awesome, is the point. Funky calls her the ultimate fragmented dream girl. We don't know too much about her for certain because her life remains exactly that: fragmentary and kind of mythical. But what we know is more than enough to present a strong woman who made a life for herself on her own terms and left a legacy worth talking about 2,300 years later. She amassed wealth and influence, she had relationships with some big names in the history of Athens, and of course, she was said to be the model for one of the most famous statues of Aphrodite, the Aphrodite of Knidos by Praxiteles. And again, yes,
21:47 Liv Albert? that is the statue that I recently mentioned in the episode on Pygmalion, the incel, and stories of men fucking statues. Because of course it is.
21:57 Liv Albert? And she wasn't just the model for statues of Aphrodite, but herself too. There was even said to be a statue of her in the Temple of Eros. Not a statue of her as a goddess, but one of Phreni herself. She was even said to have paid to rebuild the walls of Thebes after they were destroyed by Alexander the Great. And like, there was even apparently a stipulation that these new walls bear an inscription that said, quote, "Alexander raised them, but Phreni the Hetera put them back up again."
22:36 Liv Albert? It's not nothing too, that she required there to be the inclusion of her status as a Hetera on the inscription. Funky describes this as, quote, "A Phreni who plays with and builds on her own personal brand of infamy, so that Phreni the individual is inseparable from Phreni the icon." She knew what she was. She knew that it was through her status as Hetera that she had not only amassed enough wealth to rebuild the walls of Thebes, but also fame enough that she became so famously impressive and beautiful that she was at least a bit untouchable.
23:16 Liv Albert? Or at least not afraid of saying loudly how she gained her wealth and power. The empowerment that comes with this, this kind of status too, like just cannot be understated. Like, it sounds amazing now, let alone back then. She knew how to work the system. She knew the men to keep as her clients, the ones that could not only make her rich, but powerful and famous for good or bad, those that she could use to not only keep herself in a life of her own, on her terms, but like, a pretty fucking good one.
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26:45 Liv Albert? By descent, Rhodopis was of Thrace, and she was a slave of Iadmon, the son of Hephaestopolis, a Samian, and a fellow slave of Aesop, the maker of fables. She came to Egypt, brought by Xanthys, the Samian, and having come thither to exercise her calling, she was redeemed from slavery for a great sum by a man of Mittalini, Charaxos, son of Scamandronimos, and brother of Sappho, the lyric poet. Thus was Rhodopis set free, and she remained in Egypt, and by her beauty won so much liking that she made great gain of money for one like Rhodopis. In truth, there is no need to ascribe to her very great riches,
27:30 Liv Albert? considering that tithe of her wealth may still be seen, even to this time, by anyone who desires it. For Rhodopis wished to leave behind her a memorial of herself in Helles, namely, to cause a thing to be made such as happens not to have been thought of or dedicated in a temple by any besides, and to dedicate this at Delphi as a memorial of herself. Accordingly with the tithe of her wealth, she caused to be made spits of iron of size large enough to pierce a whole ox, and many in number going as far therein as her tithe allowed her, and she sent them to Delphi.
28:13 Liv Albert? These are even at the present time lying there, heaped altogether behind the altar which the Hians dedicated, and just opposite to the cell of the temple. Now at Naucratus, as it happens, the cordisins are rather apt to win credit, for this woman first, about whom the story to which I refer is told, became so famous that all the Hellenes without exception come to know the name of Rhodopis.
28:41 Liv Albert? That was a passage from Herodotus, adjusted slightly so I didn't confuse you with unfinished details, about another famous Hetera, called, obviously, Rhodopis. I also can slowly hear myself pronouncing Greek words more Greek and less Englishy. I hope they still make sense. Apparently, I can't help myself, I'm too obsessed. There's a rumor that Herodotus is addressing here in this passage, actually. I cut it from the paragraph because it didn't make enough sense with how much I could read to you, so we're talking about it now instead. See, there was, apparently, a rumor amongst the Greeks that one of the great pyramids
29:22 Liv Albert? of Giza, though admittedly the smallest of the three, was actually built by or for Rhodopis. It's a rumor, obviously, it's not true. It's a rumor that Herodotus even is trying to disprove because he had sense and realized that that wasn't possible or even remotely likely, no matter how impressive she could have been. I mean, even just time, he knew, but the rumor seems to have remained, like, long after Herodotus. Even writers during the Roman period mention it as a possibility, or like, at least something that's been talked about in the past. This idea that it was the tomb of Rhodopis built by her or for her by the wealthy and,
30:05 Liv Albert? like, highly influential men of Egypt that she kept as clients. That's pretty impressive. This is, I already hope I've made very clear though. Again, it's not true. But Rhodopis as a woman, a hetera, who made enough money to leave a mark is certainly likely to have been a real person. Herodotus is speaking of the way that she did, like, actually leave her mark. Not on a pyramid, but instead, he's saying that she paid a tithe of her earnings and saved enough to buy big-ass spits for Delphi for, like, feasting and worship and that they were known to have been dedicated by her and he was said to have just even seen them.
30:46 Liv Albert? She also famously was rumored not only to have lived her earlier life enslaved on Samos, but by the same man who enslaved the famous Aesop, writer of fables. We're taught to believe we're for kids, but we're absolutely not. And later, when Rhodopis eventually found her way to Egypt, where she certainly continued to make a name for herself, she is rumored to have met a man named Heraxus, brother of none other than Sappho, and who's said to have paid to free Rhodopis from her enslavement. If this is true, once she's been freed by Sappho's brother, she would have been able to continue her career, working for herself, and then so eventually save that money, enough
31:26 Liv Albert? that she could dedicate a Delphi. And also so that we remember her now. And if she was real, she would have lived probably a few hundred years before Phryne, too. And there's another, there's one more hetera who's mentioned by Herodotus by name, a woman named Archidike. She doesn't have too much to say about her, unfortunately, but he does say that she became the subject of poet's songs all over Greece, even if she wasn't quite as well-known as Rhodopis.
32:13 Liv Albert? It's hard for me to do these history episodes. They're so piecemeal and like, I don't want it. I don't want this episode to suggest that being a Hetera in Ancient Greece would have been like a particularly good job, or often resulted in freedom and wealth. Anything like these two women were able to make for themselves. Obviously, most cases were probably pretty horrifying, since most cases of sex work would have been enslaved then, either by nature of war or poverty. Most of the women probably had it pretty tough, to put it mildly. But at the same time, just like not all sex work now is coerced and dangerous, it wasn't always then either, and I think it's important to highlight those stories. Like, these women deserve attention, and they deserve
32:55 Liv Albert? it to remain linked to their careers that they made for themselves. And eventually, like, one can imagine that they took some pride in, if not lots of it. Like, Frene had her career as a Hetera labeled on the rebuilt walls of Thebes, and Rhodopis happily sent her tie the way to Delphi, evidence of her success in her career. And sure, these women began their careers in sex work enslaved, which certainly, again, should not be called a career, but they were both freed from that and chose to continue it for themselves, making names for themselves, and fame, and wealth, and status. If I learned anything from the conversation that I had with
33:36 Liv Albert? Melissa Funky last year, it's that Frene's fame was enormous, some during her life and so much after. But her, but she like, achieved something real and tangible in her life, which is something that we have so little evidence for when it comes to real women of the ancient world, that their stories, they just deserve to be celebrated. Even if they were the exception to the rule, they were something so real and huge, and just fucking cool.
34:24 Liv Albert? Ugh, nerds, thank you so much for listening, as always. I have been itching to talk about Heterai for ages, so I'm thrilled that I've finally been able to do it. I'm always on the lookout for more conversations that I can have with experts who know far more than me on the lives of Heterai and Pornai in the ancient world. Hopefully I'll be able to bring you more of those eventually. But for now, I feel like we've celebrated their lives, both good and bad, and their achievements, like at least a little. What women like Rhodopis and Phreni achieved in their lives when literally every single thing was stacked against them is fucking enormous. Like, as if everything wasn't already stacked against women, but they were enslaved, and got out of that, and then did this.
35:08 Liv Albert? Again, I don't want to suggest that anyone who wasn't able to get out is any less, but fuck, it's cool to have these stories. Plus, I think it's vital that we all know that climax means ladder and climax. And as a bonus, you should also know that clitoris also means little hill. That's where it comes from, it's a Greek word. You're welcome. I also don't want to suggest that it was only women who were enslaved to sex work, or even found fame in it. We don't have a lot of evidence about the men, because it tends to be written by pro- pederasty sources, and so, huh, there's a lot going on there, but I don't want to suggest it was only women. It's just only women that I've talked about today, because it's Women's History Month.
35:53 Liv Albert? And, speaking of Women's History Month, I don't want to go another episode without talking about the women of Gaza, who are experiencing some of the most horrifying, horrifying, everything. I don't even know how to put it into words anymore, because I just- I don't even know how, I don't know how anyone is just not thinking about this all the time, let alone the idea that I know a lot of people think I'm wrong for saying that so many innocent people just didn't deserve to die. Like somehow that's a controversial topic. I'm just so exhausted by, by the idea that we can't agree that killing so
36:35 Liv Albert? many people who did nothing wrong is bad. I, I mean, I know, Western propaganda is so real. It's so real and this is evidence every day. This is evidence of how well it's worked. But the women of Gaza deserve everything. The people of Gaza deserve everything. They deserve a permanent ceasefire. They deserve to remain on the land that their parents gave to them, that their parents gave to them, all the way down the line. Because, news flash, like, whatever you believe, the history tells us that multiple groups of people existed on the same land in the ancient Mediterranean. There, it, it just,
37:16 Liv Albert? I mean, the word Palestine is 2,500 years old, and I don't say that to suggest that Jewish people were not on that land, or don't deserve to be on that land. There just does not and should not ever be a state that gives rights to one group and nothing to the other. Anyone who truly belongs on land knows how to treat that land. And it says an awful lot that a country is willing to destroy so much.
37:47 Liv Albert? Let's talk about myths, baby, as written and produced by me, Liv Albert. Michaela Smith is the Hermes to my Olympians, my assistant producer. Laura Smith is the production assistant and audio engineer. Select music used in this episode was by Luke Chaos. The podcast is part of the iHeart Podcast Network. Listen on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Help me continue bringing you the world of Greek mythology and the ancient Mediterranean by becoming a patron, where you will get bonus episodes and more. Visit patreon.com/MythsBaby or click the link in this episode's description. I am Liv and I love this stuff. You know what I'd love more? A permanent ceasefire and a free Palestine.
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Previous BONUS RE-AIR Conversations: The Missing Women of Euripides, Fragments w/ Dr Melissa Funke Next Conversations: Get In the Dragon Wagon, We’re Going Shopping, Women in Euripides w/ Dr. Alecto Hardwick Page updated October 31, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated