Gynaeceum
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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A Gynaeceum or Gynaeconitis in Ancient Greece was a building or was the portion of a house reserved for women, generally the innermost apartment. In other words, a women's quarters. Similar to the Persian harem. The gynaeceum is the opposite to the andron, or male quarters.
The married woman of the household would often join the unmarried women and the female slaves at night when she did not join her husband. The women spent most of their days in this area of the house. These rooms were more remote from those reserved for the men by placing them away from the streets and public areas of the house. When visitors were entertained the women were not present, but remained in this secluded portion of the house (Blundell, 139).
A section of the imperial palace of Constantinople during the Greek Byzantine Empire reign was known as the gynaikonitis and was reserved to women. It had its own ceremonial rites and processions as well as political dynamics.
Sources
- Blundell, Sue. Women in Ancient Greece. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1995.
- F. Lauritzen, A courtier in the women's quarters: the rise and fall of Michael Psellos, Byzantion 77 (2007), 251-266
