Masculinities in Early Hellenistic Athens

Abstract

This chapter focuses on masculinities in early Hellenistic Athens, approximately 323–275 BC, based on an analysis of literary sources from this time and place. Of special interest here is to see what the literary sources can tell us about ideal masculinity in Athens during this time. This is achieved through using gender theories, including theories from masculinity studies, when analysing the material. When applying such theories to the study of different historical periods, new insights into the past can be gained, which also is the aim of this chapter. But the more distant the period studied is from the present time, the more problematic the study becomes. This is, of course, because the knowledge of cultural and social aspects of distant periods is less certain, and because the materials that can be analysed are far from complete and can be difficult to interpret. In many ways, this is similar to when researchers try to apply Western masculinity theories to non-Western societies, something that scholars of Asian masculinity have pointed out.1