Source A: Aristophanes, Lysistrata 641-647
The chorus of Athenian women explain why they have the right to advise the city.
'As soon as I was seven years old I was an arrephoros; then, when I was ten, I ground the grain for our Lady Athena; then, shedding my saffron robe, I was a bear at the Brauronia; and once, when I was a lovely grown girl, I carried the basket, wearing a necklace of dried figs.'
To what extent did religion give young Athenian women an important role in the life of the city? Use Source A as a starting point and your own knowledge.
Model answer
Religion gave some young Athenian women an important and very public role in the life of the city, but it was limited to a privileged few and to the years before marriage.
Source A lists a series of honours. At seven the speaker was an arrephoros: Pausanias tells us that two girls lived on the Acropolis near the temple of Athena Polias and carried mysterious objects at night down an underground passage, and the arrephoroi also helped begin weaving Athena's peplos. At ten she ground the grain for Athena's sacred cakes; then she was a 'bear' at Brauron, where young girls served Artemis before marriage, running races and dancing in saffron robes. Finally she was a kanephoros, carrying the basket with the sacrificial equipment at the head of a procession. These roles were genuinely important: they served the gods on whom the city's safety depended, and they were performed in front of the whole city. The maidens on the east frieze of the Parthenon, carrying jugs and incense burners, show that the city celebrated its girls on its greatest temple. The roles were also great honours for families: Thucydides shows how deadly an insult it was when Harmodius' sister was rejected as a basket-carrier.
However, the roles were limited. Only a handful of girls, usually from noble families, could be arrephoroi or kanephoroi, and the roles ended with marriage. Many of them were really about preparing girls for marriage: the arkteia marked the passage from childhood to womanhood, and the kanephoroi displayed beautiful, virgin girls to the citizens. Girls still had no political voice, and the claim of Aristophanes' chorus that this entitles women to advise the city is part of a comedy written by a man.
Overall, religion gave young women their most important public role in Athens, but it was a role for a few, and one that celebrated their purity and readiness for marriage rather than giving them real power.
Explanation
Top answers explain each role in Source A with wider knowledge (Pausanias on the arrephoroi, Brauron, kanephoroi, the Parthenon frieze) and then assess how far these roles really mattered: who held them, for how long, and whether they gave girls influence or just displayed them. Recognising that Lysistrata is a comedy shows critical use of the source.
