Читать книгу The Herodotus Encyclopedia - Группа авторов - Страница 556

CHRISTOPHER BARON

University of Notre Dame

A courtesan (hetaira) in NAUCRATIS, a Greek settlement in EGYPT. Near the end of his DIGRESSION on the courtesan RHODOPIS (to whom one of the PYRAMIDS at Giza had been falsely attributed on account of her immense WEALTH and FAME), Herodotus notes that the courtesans in Naucratis “have a certain tendency to be charming (epaphroditos).” He gives Archidice as an example of one whose fame was celebrated in song throughout Greece, though she was less “notorious” (perileskhēneutos, the only occurrence of the word in extant ancient Greek literature) than her predecessor Rhodopis (2.135.5). Naucratis was the major port of call in Egypt, and worship of APHRODITE was prominent (Gutzwiller 2010, 135–36). An inscription on the foot of a vase discovered at Naucratis in the 1890s (Hogarth et al. 1898–99, 56 and plate V, no. 108) reads Ἀρ]χεδικη, that is, (Ar)chedice, the spelling of her name which is found in later authors (Ath. 13.596d–e; Ael. VH 12.63).

SEE ALSO: Epigraphy; Prostitution; Sex; Women in the Histories