Hygiene’s Dirty Little Secret

While visiting the J. Paul Getty villa in Malibu, I was overwhelmed. Although much of the museum confused me organizationally, like the thematic grouping of antiquities as opposed to a geographic or chronological sorting method, my experience in the moment of touring the galleries was one of wonder. I was drawn to exhibits of statuary, as cult and temple sculptures connect modern scholars most directly to the ancient Greek religious lifestyle and, therefore, to the societal values espoused by ancient mythology. In particular, I enjoyed the cult statue of Hygieia, a Roman[1] marble piece of the Greek goddess of good health. The piece is preserved in stunning condition, which is (shamefully) why I was first attracted to it. However, after spending more time with it I began to ask questions about Hygieia’s role in the pantheon. What did she symbolize? How was she related to other deities? Most importantly, how did her female identity qualify her role as a higher power?

Hygieia is the ancient personification of health and hygiene, and daughter to Asklepios, the god of medicine. I found it interesting how related father and daughter were in their areas of symbolism, and yet one major difference was striking. While Hygieia is literally health/hygiene, a state of existence and often a goal of the individual, her father represents a mechanism through which to achieve health. Asklepios is a profession and plays an active role, while Hygieia is the goal or prize of that profession, and is locked into a passive role. I wondered what about the two gods could be used to explain the distinction. My thought process immediately wandered to gender. The male/female distinction of this pairing lines up precisely with the active/passive distinction. Interested, I did some more research into the cult of Hygieia in ancient Greece.

A few online searches later, I discovered that Hygieia is not the only female personification of the medical process, but indeed she shares the imagery with two other goddesses, her sisters Panacea and Iaso, who respectively represent the concepts of cure and remedy (Hygeia). All three are daughters of Asklepios, and through medicine, he ties the goddesses together in a unified and applied process. More research brought up similar portrayals of female deities in other areas of the Greek pantheon. Aphrodite represents love, beauty, and pleasure, but Eros, usually portrayed as her son, is often her agent in translating these feelings into actions of individuals: for instance, Aphrodite uses Eros to “work on” Paris and have him fall in love with Helen (Davidson 8). He represents the action to her symbolism. Likewise, all deities representing spheres where control is totally out of the hands of an individual are female: the Fates, Nemesis, and Tykhe all represent elements of chance, luck, and a general lack of agency. I began to form a consistent image of male agency and female embodiment in different areas of Greek mythology.

As I continued finding connections across the Greek pantheon, I began to see the foundational elements of Sherry Ortner’s thesis taking shape yet again. Her essay “Is Female to Male as Nature is to Culture?” refuses to stay put at the beginning of this course’s syllabus, but rather keeps resurfacing in each inquiry I begin into the study of gender in the ancient world. Symbolically, female figures tend to be associated with pure elements and concepts, while their male counterparts tend to represent the process of transforming and applying those elements; male gods are often linked to techne. Ortner phrases a similar argument by linking the male identity to culture and the female to nature. She posits that societies throughout human history have given men more developed jobs and reputations compared to their female counterparts, who are usually associated with more baseline components of such professions. Her reasoning makes more and more sense to me as I identify its component parts in all areas of ancient Greek society, a culture after which much of the modern western world is modeled.

Especially in ancient times, religion was an essential component of forming and propagating societal values. Through myth and legend, ancient Greeks learned right from wrong, truth from lies, and male from female. Or did they merely learn what was given to them? The objective of religious stories, in ancient Greece and arguably in all contexts, is not to teach reality, but rather to maintain societal trends under the guise of truths. By worshipping male deities in active positions and female deities in largely symbolic and passive roles, Greek children learned to apply these views of gender to their own lives, and the same religious practices passed the rhetoric down to following generations, contributing to the patriarchal nature of Greek society and all societies it played a role in inspiring. I don’t mean to suggest that a single statue, or even thousands, established the patriarchy. However, don’t representations of gender add up across time and culture? Did portrayals of female goddesses like Hygieia tangibly build up a societal belief in female incompetence? I’m certainly inclined to believe so. Perhaps the most terrifying aspect of my belief that mythology served as a medium for teaching and maintaining these beliefs is that it can be applied to modern day. What forms of media exist in modern society? How are they used to deliver societal rhetoric? We may not have marble temples devoted to symbolism of the patriarchy, but how much has really changed?

[1] For the purposes of this analysis, I am assuming that the Greek cult surrounding Hygieia worshipped her as the Romans did; Roman mythology was often a direct absorption of Greek mythology, so this is not a ridiculous presumption.

 

Works Cited

Davidson, James N. The Greeks and Greek Love: A Bold New Exploration of the Ancient World. New York: Random House, 2007. Print.

Ortner, Sherry B. “Is Female to Male as Nature Is to Culture?” Feminist Studies 1.2 (1972): 5. Web.

“Science Museum. Brought to Life: Exploring the History of Medicine.” Hygeia. UK Science Museum, n.d. Web. 10 Apr. 2016.