Day 2 - Sappho

 

Sappho

 

Born: BC 625, Lesbos Island

Died: BC 570

From what I have read it is assumed that Sappho is a lesbian with very little proof. Could it be that the lesbian community need a historic and ancient figure to support their creation story; the origin of lesbianism? It was apparently a french guy who started the lesbian rumour. The fact that she was married with a child would make her homosexual or bisexual in my mind. Unless the assumption is that this was a marriage of convenience not love. The name of the husband causes some to think it is a comic prank. Regardless, there is  a male sperm donor if she has a biological daughter. My initial understanding was that she lived on an island inhabited by only woman which I thought was interesting because I thought it meant that it was an exclusive woman’s community. In reality Sappho's community of woman was a small milieu in a city of all types. It was a liberal culture where woman were free to express themselves. Speculation is that it could have been the equivalent of an all girls school, academy, finishing school. Reports say Sappho was teaching aristocratic woman. Perhaps it was a circle, club, society of priestesses or goddess worshippers. Some say she was a prostitute. I'm in favour of the priestess role. After all many of the poems are in praise of or addressed to the Pagan Goddesses, particularly Aphrodite; he goddess of love, beauty, pleasure and procreation. Aphrodite 'cults' were in existence although I do not like the word cult; in modern terms it can have a negative connotation and was originally used in the 17 century. Meaning it is unlikely that is what it was referred to in Sappho’s time. According to Bulfinch in 1855; ritual prostitution took place at the Aphrodite temples. The Greek euphemism is hierodoule “sacred slave”. Sex with the priestesses was considered a method of worship. Although this practice is not attested in Athens. Greek mythology has an enormous cast of characters with very complex relationships and stories.

The names of male poet counterparts of Sappho are known to us. I am curious if there are any other known woman poets from Lesbos since apparently that is what Sappho was teaching all these woman before they got married. The only two names I came across are; Terpander and Alcaeus. It seems the marriages were a social role and obligation. We have knowledge of the Greek male teachers and the works of their students. We do know that Greek men were participating in homosexual relations so that may support the theory that perhaps the woman were as well. The debate continues about whether Sappho and the woman engaged in physical expressions of love (sex!), of which there is apparently no proof, or love in the sense of romantic views and an admiration and fondness of beauty.

Sappho was apparently wealthy and loved beautiful things. She is known because she created a form of poetry called Sapphic; a four lined poetic form and she was admired and quoted by other poets, including men. Some have said that poetry is a vocation not an occupation. Sappho is primarily recognized as a poet. However in a poem she boasts of having trained a champion runner and reports say that she invented a particular kind of garment, the Chlamys.

chlamys description found here http://everything2.com/title/Chlamys

Obviously lots of speculation among scholars and researchers. All we have is a collection of text fragments that are vulnerable to translations and assumptions that suit the interests and beliefs of the time in history Sappho is being discussed and reported on. Determining a biography from a collection of poems may not be accurate.

The idea of fragments is interesting. Archaeologists gather fragments and piece them together to get the whole picture. With Sappho the words are gone not to retrieved leaving the poems in a new form. Some feel the need to fill in the gaps but the fragments are often beautiful as is. There is a mystery to the notion of fragment; not all is revealed just a taste, a sample that leaves you pondering. I liked what was said in class that compared to Platos Symposium where old men are contriving bizarre explanations about love Sappho paints an eloquent picture with words that depicts the feeling of love.

The text had not been preserved but had been used as stuffing for mummies. I thought this was a sign that the texts were not valued. In class Professor Duguid suggested it indicated that the texts were common place like today’s newspapers. I have been concerned about the disappearance of our digital information but in fact texts throughout history in their varying forms have been lost, burnt, reused, misused. Historically any type of Pagan worship or woman centred spirituality was attacked and brutalized by the Christian church in an attempt to obliterate it. However, we are able to retrieve the fragments left buried in the earth. For me there is a real danger of digital information being obliterated with a less likeliness of being recoverable.

Despite very little is known about Sappho she has secured a significant place in history as one of the nine lyricist poets. Her poems have been referred to as Divine songs. This reminds me of the Bhagavad Gita which are also songs of the Divine.

In class we discussed a variety of poems but the one that stands out for me is the one about the apple at the tip of the top branch.

All alone a sweet apple reddens on the topmost branch,
high on the highest branch, the apple pickers did not notice it,
they did not truly forget it, but they could not reach it.

What came to mind for me was the unattainable, the goddess portion, the ultimate beauty to be revered and preserved.The sacred.

a literal analyzing of the symbolism found here http://ablemedia.com/ctcweb/consortium/ancientweddings10.html

I don’t the like the perversion that some have attributed to Sappho. To me Sappho and her poems reflect a sensuality, a hopeless romantic who aches with and for love. Passionately caught up in the emotion; being distracted, paralysed, drugged by the powerful, consuming feeling of love and attraction. The Aphrodite worshippers were honouring and adoring beauty, love, sensuality and emotion. The feminine. expression of sexual rapture may indeed have been a part of the worship.