Originally published in 1983 and as a second edition in 1993, this book deals with 3 universal but culturally variable phenomena: the family, women and death. The book poses questions about our own ways of looking at the family and private life, at sex and gender and at death, by analysing ancient Greek ideas and by showing how researchers’ presuppositions have been influenced by their own culture and experience. The views of Fustel de Coulanges on the place of tomb-cult in the evolution of the family in the ancient world are critically examined and related to their 19th Century context; the study of the classical Athenian family is related to current historical and sociological debates on the separation between public and private life.
Introduction. 1. Oikos and polis 2. Public and Private Interests in Classical Athens 3. Women in Antiquity Appendix 1: Greeks and ‘others’ Appendix 2: Greek Sexuality 4. The Family in Classical Athens: Search for a Perspective 5. Family Tombs and Tomb-Cult in Classical Athens: Tradition or Traditionalism? 6. Fustel de Coulanges, The Ancient City Part 1: (A. Momigliano) Part 2: (SCH) 7. Death and Time 8. Comparative Perspectives on Death.
Biography
S. C. Humphreys is Professor Emerita of History, Anthropology and Greek at the University of Michigan, USA.
‘There is stimulating material here…’ P. J. Rhodes, The Journal of Hellenic Studies, 105
