The hetaera (female-companion) must be distinguished from the πόρνη (harlot), though both were under similar conditions as to police surveillance. The hetaera was also strictly speaking a slave-woman, usually stolen as a child or otherwise obtained by procuresses, or bought by older hetaerae. They were educated[151] in all that was understood by the Ancients under the name “Music”, that over and above their charms of person, they might especially captivate their lovers by their intellectual cultivation, who bought them to give them their freedom,—and then more often than not were presently abandoned by them. The great nursery of hetaerae was above all places Corinth, from which centre they travelled through all parts of Greece, as e.g. did Neaera, and frequently acquired enormous riches. The better class of them were everywhere held in high esteem; and many a hetaera, grown weary of her condition, gave her hand to a husband, in order to close her life as an honest wife[152], or else retired so as at any rate to lead a blameless existence[153]. Frequently indeed they were also “Dames de Maison”, and often kept a considerable number of girls under the title of hand-maids. This was the case with Nicareta, just mentioned, at Corinth, as well as with the famous Aspasia at Athens, the latter of whom flooded all Hellas with her protegées[154]. Such as were held in less respect often put themselves under the protection of their more renowned sisters, or else carried on the calling on their own account, and this especially when they were not so well educated, not “musical” (πέζαι ἑταίραι—_prose lady-companions_)[155], at Athens going to settle at the Peiraeus to entice the merchants who arrived in the port, whilst the more choice merely showed themselves there[156]. They often followed the troops on service in crowds, accompanying for instance the general _Chares_[157] and _Pericles_ to Samos, where they made so large an income that they even built a temple of Ἀφροδίτη ἐν Καλάμοις (Aphrodité at Calami,—the Reeds)[158]. For the remaining details as to the life of the hetaerae the classical Treatise of _Friedrich Jacobs_[159] should be consulted.
Even these regular “filles de joie” at first existed almost exclusively for foreigners, who often squandered prodigious sums in their arms; the Athenians at any rate up to the time of Themistocles did not go with them[160]. But the example proved too strong to resist. Little by little the younger men acquired a taste for the freer society of the highly educated and luxuriously bedecked[161] courtesans, who on their side were possessed of tact enough to subordinate the purely sensual to the intellectual, in order to captivate the Greek sense of beauty. Even older men might easily be seen at their feet, for the Greek ladies had but too little aptitude for stepping beyond the household sphere[162]. And so it was no longer matter for surprise when _Chares_ took with him on his expedition, as stated above, a large number of hetaerae. The Athenian youth was already in the habit of killing time in their society[163]; and the important rôle they played in the time of _Pericles_ needs to be no further insisted on. The Greek however never descended to the lowest level of shameless, brutal, coarseness. Before he threw himself into the arms of the foreign Wanton, he first raised her to some equality with himself; and of the handmaid and slave made a friendly companion or hetaera!