# What is the significance of the virginity of Athena, Artemis, & Hestia? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 10, 2018, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847 "2018-06-10T22:39:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2018, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/41 "2018-06-13T01:54:42Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > (b) they weren’t being “womanly” by physically consorting (or being submissive) to men. This, very much so. The Greek understanding and representation of sexuality was very much the opposite of our post-Catholic (or post-Victorian, possibly) own. To them, men were serious, no-nonsense, trying to get shit done ; whereas women were permahorny and exhausting the men’s energies with their over the top sexual drive. The reason Aristophanes’ Lysistrata is a comedy isn’t because “women trying to end the Peloponnesian War via sexual guerilla” was a funny idea ; rather the hilariousness stemmed from the notion that women would ever be able to keep their legs together for 5 minutes - the debates between the women are chock full of innuendo (which also happen to reference economics & politics - this just to say Shakespeare didn’t invent highbrow dick jokes) and “gosh I can’t go on !” With that in mind, Athena’s virginity (and apparent lack of any desire for humpity humpity) puts her squarely in the “manly” genre. Compare with Aphrodite, who keeps causing trouble because she’s fucking every other god besides her husband and siring monsters all over the place ; or Juno who’s constantly angry with Zeus, not because he’s fucking around (that was part and parcel of marital life among the Greek elites and accepted, so long as you did it either covertly or with prostitutes as opposed to other peoples’ wives) but because _she’s_ not getting any. Athena still has some “feminine” attributes/mores in some of her aspects, notably her vanity and pride which is part of the root cause for the Trojan War. But mostly she’s a dude with tits, or at least an un-woman. In that, she was scary. > [@Nava](#): > > We get the word _lesbian_ from Lesbos, where [Sappho](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sappho) lived. The same poetess gives us the adjective _sapphic_. Indeed, but we get the word because it was notable to the writers of the time and generated outrage and/or wink-wink-nudge-nudge on their part, I believe. As the saying goes, there’s a word for a woman who sleeps around, and a word for a woman who gets pregnant out of wedlock, and a word for a child born out of wedlock - but no word for a man who fucks around and/or bails on his kids. Because the latter is perfectly fine by society, while the former aren’t. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2018, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/42 "2018-06-13T04:09:20Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Oh, and I’d always understood Hephaestos to be, if not completely uninterested in sex, at least not driven by it in the same way that most of the male gods were. Yeah, he’s happy to have Aphrodite as a trophy wife, but if she’s off schtupping Ares every night, well, that gives him more time to go down to his forge and get some work done. > > That said, I’d never heard of the myth of him attempting to rape Athena. Even aside from the question of his sex drive, that just seems remarkably stupid of him (and he’s supposed to be one of the smart ones). Rest a sure that she kicks his ass. ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2018, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/43 "2018-06-13T10:13:45Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > but no word for a man who fucks around and/or bails on his kids man who fucks around: fornicator lothario womanizer hound dog tomcat bails on his kids: deadbeat Males have historically had more opportunities to shirk their parental responsibilities, but the Judeo-Christian cultures have always discouraged it. ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2018, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/44 "2018-06-13T12:29:33Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > man who fucks around: > fornicator > lothario > womanizer > hound dog > tomcat > > bails on his kids: > deadbeat > > Males have historically had more opportunities to shirk their parental responsibilities, but the Judeo-Christian cultures have always discouraged it. Notice that none of the man who fucks around descriptors are in fact pejorative, they are sidewise admiring (possibly not the first one, but who calls someone that these days?) ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2018, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/45 "2018-06-13T14:17:44Z")
Westside Baptist Church? ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2018, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/46 "2018-06-13T16:45:10Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Quoted this one just because it happened to be in front of me; several of you guys have mentioned that being a maiden and patron of childbirth appear incompatible to you. But you’re forgetting that one of the professions which have been mainly performed by women in almost every society, and one which in Southern Europe afforded economic independence to a woman (and, in those legal systems which didn’t consider us automatic imbeciles, legal independence as well), was midwife. Sure, economic independence for a woman would resonate with the idea of being unmarried and independent. My impression (and it is no more than that) is of the midwife being an older woman who has not only presided at multiple childbirths, but has experienced them herself. I don’t know if the word “wife” in “midwife” means “married” (or perhaps widowed), or just “head of household/independent woman”. Probably not provable either way - gods and goddesses and their roles and special responsibilities weren’t chosen all at once, or all for the same goddess at the same time. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [June 14, 2018, 10:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/47 "2018-06-14T10:26:46Z")
> [@mbh](#): > > bails on his kids: > deadbeat Besides what \*\*mbh \*\*said : can you find that word (and that definition of that word) in Plato’s works ? The Bible ? The Canterbury Tales ? Macbeth ? Critique of Pure Reason ? Etc… Beyond it not referring specifically to men who abandon their kids (someone who doesn’t pay his debts or still lives at his parents’ place past 30 could also be dubbed that, for example) ; my point is it’s also a very, very contemporary word (and borderline slang at that, whereas e.g. “bastard” is a clinical term going as far back as the Romans). Mores and morals are changing, perhaps, which is a pretty good thing. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/5f8ce5/32.png) [@The\_Peyote\_Coyote](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Peyote_Coyote)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2018, 7:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/48 "2018-06-20T07:23:46Z")
> [@](#): > > That said, I’d never heard of the myth of him attempting to rape Athena. Even aside from the question of his sex drive, that just seems remarkably stupid of him (and he’s supposed to be one of the smart ones). Chronos, read Ovid’s Metamorphoses and the question is what male god wasn’t a rapist? ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2018, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/49 "2018-06-20T07:37:45Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > But would it have been common for a midwife to be virginal/unmarried/childless/whatever herself? My mental image of “midwife” is much closer to the likes of Nanny Ogg. I don’t know about ancient Greece but it’s pretty well-attested as a profession for unmarried secular women from medieval-onward Spain; note that “unmarried” could refer both to those who had refused to marry and to widows. Being single and childless meant, among other things, being more easily available at all hours or to spend several days in the house of an expecting woman who looked like the delivery might be difficult. Very often they also doubled as herbalists and general-purpose healers. > [@Shodan](#): > > I don’t know if the word “wife” in “midwife” means “married” (or perhaps widowed), or just “head of household/independent woman”. I suspect the Greeks did not speakee mucho English. For a different data point, the Spanish is _comadrona_, augmentative from _comadre_, whose own literal meaning is “woman who shares motherhood duties with another” (a friend close enough that you expect her to take care of your children and them to obey her as if they were their own). ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 20, 2018, 1:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/50 "2018-06-20T13:35:42Z")
Oh, I’m not at all surprised that Hephaestos was an (attempted) rapist. The stupid part is in trying to rape Athena, of all potential victims. You attempt to rape Athena, and she will hurt you. ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/51 "2018-06-21T00:37:49Z")
> [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](#): > > Uranus probably stopped after Aphrodite was born. Considering that Chronos _castrated_ Uranus before the gods were born, I’d think Uranus would have stopped having interest in a _lot_ of things. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/52 "2018-06-21T01:45:11Z")
Please note: Kronos is (probably) not the same entity as Chronos. ---
**Author:** ![Tamerlane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tamerlane/32/7602_2.png) [@Tamerlane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tamerlane)\ **Post date:** [June 21, 2018, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847/53 "2018-06-21T02:30:36Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > The Greek understanding and representation of sexuality was very much the opposite of our post-Catholic (or post-Victorian, possibly) own. To them, men were serious, no-nonsense, trying to get shit done ; whereas women were permahorny and exhausting the men’s energies with their over the top sexual drive. Not post-Catholic, certainly. The medieval Catholic church held a view of female sexuality very similar to the Greeks and I wouldn’t be shocked if the one derived from the other. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-significance-of-the-virginity-of-athena-artemis-hestia/815847.md?page=2)