UCLA Electronic Theses and Dissertations
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UCLA UCLA Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title The Life Cycle of Disability in Ancient Greece Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9jg5z235 Author Sneed, Deborah Publication Date 2018 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Los Angeles The Life Cycle of Disability in Ancient Greece A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in Archaeology by Deborah Sneed 2018 © Copyright by Deborah Sneed 2018 ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION The Life Cycle of Disability in Ancient Greece by Deborah Sneed Doctor of Philosophy in Archaeology University of California, Los Angeles, 2018 Professor Sarah P. Morris, Chair Through the lenses of Disability Studies and archaeological theories of identity, I use ancient Greek art, literature, architecture, laws, and bioarchaeology to investigate how ancient Greek communities (ca. 1000 to 100 BCE) understood, treated, and accommodated physical disability among their members. Most specifically, I trace how the intersection of disability with age resulted in different negotiations for infants, children, adults, and the elderly, as well as for mythological figures like the limping god Hephaistos. I demonstrate that far from being ejected from their families or communities, disabled ancient Greeks were integrated where they could be and accommodated where they couldn’t. I highlight, for example, the ways that parents and midwives assisted infants who were born with conditions like cleft palate, as well as military exemptions for disabled adult men in 4th century BCE Athens. I emphasize how individuals with a variety of somatic realities participated and engaged in their communities. By removing disability from a biomedical frame of reference, with its attendant prejudices and estimations of ability predicated on modern modes of production and interaction, and re-locating it to an active, ii social context, I demonstrate the contingent and constructed nature of disability and resist generalizations about the universal plight of the disabled in the past. iii The dissertation of Deborah Sneed is approved. David L. Blank Helen E. Deutsch Gail E. Kennedy John K. Papadopoulos Sarah P. Morris, Committee Chair University of California, Los Angeles 2018 iv To my parents, Cheri and David, and to Scott v Table of Contents List of Figures ............................................................................................................................................ viii Preface ....................................................................................................................................................... xiii Vita ............................................................................................................................................................ xvii Introduction ................................................................................................................................................... 1 Disability Studies ..................................................................................................................................... 9 Foundational Scholarship on Disability in Antiquity ........................................................................ 11 Evidence ................................................................................................................................................. 24 Why It Matters ...................................................................................................................................... 27 Outline of dissertation .......................................................................................................................... 29 Chapter 1: Disabled Newborns in Ancient Greece ..................................................................................... 33 Competing attitudes .............................................................................................................................. 36 Plutarch on a Spartan law regarding deformed infants .................................................................... 39 Plato and Aristotle on ideal societies ................................................................................................... 44 Hippocrates, On Joints .......................................................................................................................... 47 Weasel-armed infants .......................................................................................................................... 50 Clubfooted infants ............................................................................................................................... 52 Dwarfs ................................................................................................................................................. 52 Other textual evidence .......................................................................................................................... 56 Feeding bottles ....................................................................................................................................... 59 Distribution in time and space ............................................................................................................ 60 Attributing function to feeding bottles ................................................................................................ 62 Cleft conditions ................................................................................................................................... 66 Feeding bottles associated with sick or deformed infants .................................................................. 71 “Babies in the well” ............................................................................................................................... 73 Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................. 75 Chapter 2: Disabled Children in Ancient Greece ........................................................................................ 92 Who is a child? ...................................................................................................................................... 95 Protecting children .............................................................................................................................. 101 Appeals to the gods ........................................................................................................................... 101 Magic ................................................................................................................................................ 108 Calling physicians ............................................................................................................................. 111 Alternative measures ......................................................................................................................... 114 Parents as a source of comfort and assistance ................................................................................. 115 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................... 117 Chapter 3: Disabled Adults in Ancient Greece ......................................................................................... 128 vi Hazards of ancient life ........................................................................................................................ 130 Military ................................................................................................................................................ 135 Marriage and reproduction ............................................................................................................... 144 Religion ................................................................................................................................................ 149 Labor and the economy ...................................................................................................................... 155 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................... 164 Chapter 4: The Elderly Disabled in Ancient Greece ................................................................................. 182 The theory of aging ............................................................................................................................. 184 Biological consequences of old age in ancient Greece ...................................................................... 190 Bioarchaeological evidence for old age-related degeneration ......................................................... 190 Medical and literary discussions of the consequences of old age..................................................... 195 Depictions of old age in ancient Greek vase painting ...................................................................... 200 Depictions of old age in ancient Greek sculpture ............................................................................. 204 The experience of old age in ancient Greece ..................................................................................... 207