page_title: Women in the Byzantine Empire
section_title: Prostitution
hierarchical_section_title: Women in the Byzantine Empire / Sexuality / Prostitution
caption_attribution_description: English: Crossing Red Sea and Miriam dancing. Chludov Psalter
context_page_description: Women in the Byzantine Empire played an important role, but many details of their lives are a matter of debate. Numerous sources paint a picture of the Byzantine patriarchal society in which women did not have independent significance and were imprisoned in a gynaeceum. For a long time, the attention of historians was attracted only by prominent Byzantine women, mainly the Empress, especially the wife of Emperor Justinian I Theodora, who had a significant influence on the events of the first half of the VI century.
  The scientific study of the legal and economic status of women in the Byzantine Empire began in the second half of the 19th century and is currently intensively ongoing. The subject of study is both women in general and related issues of family and property law. The scarcity of surviving sources leads to diverse assessments of the place of women in Byzantine society. With the development of gender studies in the 1970s, there is a tendency to revise early views, according to which this role was not significant.
context_section_description: The prostitutes were at the bottom of the social ladder and were known by a variety of names - hetairai, “public women”, “(women) from the attic» (Ancient Greek: αἱ ἐπὶ τοῦ τέγους). They are more known from hagiographic literature (where they appear under the designation "humiliated» (Ancient Greek: ταπειναί) or “miserable» (Ancient Greek: οἰκτραί)) or in civil or church law attempting to limit this phenomenon. Probably, prostitution has always been prevalent in Byzantium. However the word Ancient Greek: πορνεία referred not only to communication with prostitutes, but to many other deviations from the recommended sexual behavior. Prostitution flourished in capital and the largest cities of the empire - Alexandria, Antioch, Beirut and Edessa, later in Thessaloniki and ports of Asia Minor. Engaging in this activity was relatively voluntary when the daughters of actors or artisans were seduced by tales spread by the brothel holders (Ancient Greek: πορνοβοσκοί) about the luxurious life of getters; also prostitutes could become slaves and prisoners. Mistresses of brothels also went to the provinces to find suitable girls, buying them in poor families. However, such transactions were illegal, and the found father of the family was deprived of parental rights and could be sent as a punishment to the mines; for the members of the Church, the punishment was excommunication. But, obviously, these measures were applied without much success, and at least in the 12th century, prostitution was not only voluntary. Attempts to limit prostitution geographically were also futile even in Constantinople - founded even under Constantine the Great Lupanar was empty, and under the emperor Theophilos (829-843) the building was transferred to the hospital.
  Women whose activities involved trading of their bodies also included mime artists, performers on flute, and singers at weddings or banquets. According to the Byzantines, engaging in secular art is not befitting an honest man, and women of these professions were considered prostitutes of a separate kind. The lower class prostitutes were considered to be maidservants in taverns and xenodochiums, about which, according to the tradition dating from ancient times, it was believed that they should satisfy all the needs of the guests.
  A frequent topos of Byzantine hagiographic literature was the spiritual degeneration of the “harlot," who, repenting, "acquired holiness for herself." So, for example, this happened with a saint of the V century Pelagia of Antioch or a saint of the VI century Mary of Egypt. According to the suggestion of Judith Herrin, the mother of Constantine the Great Saint Helena was a prostitute in the tavern.
caption: Dancing Miriam, miniature from Khludov Psalter, mid-9th century
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