not effected all at once; and it revealed one or more scenarios particular to Greece.8' Nudity currently comes to mean

Naturism , Feminism and Women . No longer does it mean susceptibility; it means, on the contrary, the preparation to stand up

and fight even though one knew one was exposed. It

has to do with military valor which necessitates risking

one's life, being completely exposed. The girls were kept

covered because it meant they were shielded, not exposed to danger. The relationship of this manly nudity to

the nudity of the gods is also vital: the gods could be

Naked because they relied on themselves.

Writers of the Classical period eventually appeared

back at the custom and offered rationalizing explanations for an institution whose significance had changed

from spiritual and rite to civic.82 The Greeks did

tifying indications of the sportsman. A storyline features the sloth of the

Folks of Sybaris,who saw the athletesof Krotondiggingup

the palaestra and wonderedwhy they did not hire workers

to performsuch menial jobs (Poliakoff[supran. 54] 12-13,

with fig. 13).

80 Aeschin. In Tim. 138; cited in M. Peninsula is more than safe; it's downright friendly, service-oriented, and ,

"Slaveryand

Homosexuality,"Phoenix 38 (1984) 319, who thinks slaves

were actually banned from entering the palaestra. For a

similar law in Crete, view Arist. Pol. 11.19: Cretans give

slaves the same rights as they have, except that they forbid

them from exercising in the gymnasiumand bearing arms.

Gymnasticsand war are mentionedtogether additionally as something normallyforeignto women:supra, text and n. 85.

81 For transformationof earlier institutionsand values, see

Murray 1980 (supra n. 72) 193. Similar transformation,

from spiritual to civil, took place, e.g., in the theatre, or in

the polis, with the usage of the lot.

not wholly understandthe source or the development

of their nudity. Yet they had to describe it, as a peculiarity that exemplified clearly and affirmed in activity the difference between themselves

and everyone else, a difference of which they were

Intensely conscious. We've seen that they attributedthe

origin of athletic nudity to the 15th Olympiad, in the

last decades of the eighth century B.C. The earliest

monumentalkouroi appearedin the seventh century.

But the custom spread gradually, and later, into

everydaylife. Such a gradualdevelopmentcan clarify

the statement of Thucydides (1.6)-echoed later by

Plato (Resp. 5.452a-e)-that athletic nudity had become worldwide in Greece "shortlybefore his time."

These writers were referringto the normalizationof

nudity in real life, to its civic worth,not to its

First appearancein religious ritual and art.

Thucydides viewed the custom of exercising in the

nude in the context of democracy,which had trium:i?? I i ?iiiiii:ii-

phantly been confirmed at Athens just before his

time, after the Persian Wars. The launch of fit nudity into the everyday life of the gymnasium

and palaestra was part of a "modern" way of life,

freer, simpler, more democratic, according to Thucydides. It was the dress, one might almost say the uniform, of the citizen who exercised in order to preserve

himself in preparation for military service. A Greek soldier must be in shape: he must be thin and muscular,

not portly and affluent. Civic nudity marked a

break with the barbarians-everyone

except the

Greeks-who announced their status and wealth by

wearing lavish garments that gave an impression

of elegance and authority."83

While Thucydides clarifies Greek nudity in the

Circumstance of democracy, Plato describes it as an effect of

the reasonable, rational way of thinking of which the

Greeks were so proud.84 In a passage in which he obviously has the Spartan model in head, Plato imagines

the situation that would arise if girls were to have

an equal role with men in society.

If, then, we use the girls for the same things as the

Guys, they must also be taught the same things. Now

music and gymnasticwere givento the guys. These two

arts, and what has to do with war, must be assignedto

the girls also, and they must be used in the same

ways. Perhaps,comparedto what's habitual,many of

the matters now being said would look ridiculousif they

were done as is said. The mostridiculousthing (being)

the women working out naked with the guys in the palaestras, not only the young ones, but even the older

ones, too, like the old men in the gymnasium who,

when they're wrinkledand not pleasantto the eye, all

the same love gymnastic.-By Zeus, he said, that

would appear ridiculousin the presentstate of things. Well, since we've started to talk, we mustn't be

Scared of all the jokes-of whatever kind-the wits

might make if such a change took place in gymnastic,

in music, and not the least, in the bearingof arms and

the riding of horses. But since we have started to talk,

tiated society like that of ancient Greece attention must be

paid to a wide assortment of evidence, from myths and philosophic utopias to anecdotes on the physical appearance,

movements,or dress associatedwith a particularstatus or

Part...