Sexual Jealousy in Classical Athens

The script approach given trial runs in the previous chapters is unleashed here in lengthy analyses of Medea’s, Deianeira’s, and Hermione’s emotions at their husband’s relationships with other women. The chapter argues in a nuanced way for sexual jealousy to be considered a separate motivation alongside pride and rage in Medea. The emotion is more straightforwardly the motivation for actual or attempted murder in Trachiniae and Andromache. The three plays suggest that erôs (sexual love) combines with orgê (anger) and phthonos when a wife fears losing to a rival her triple status as homekeeper, bedmate, and bearer of legitimate children to her husband. A related scenario in Attic oratory leads to an exploration of male sexual jealousy in oratory and New Comedy. This is shown to be aroused—in contrast to female sexual jealousy—by the (female or male) sexual partner having sex elsewhere. The chapter ends with a discussion of the emotion term zêlotupia, sometimes wrongly translated as jealousy.

Anger · Art · Comedy · Jealousy · Literature · Pride · Psychoanalysis · Rage (emotion) · Theology · Wife · Biblical Studies and Interpretation · Classical Antiquity Studies · Marriage and Sexual Relationships · Philosophy · Psychology · Social Psychology