Table of Contents

1. Introduction; 2. Models and methods I; 3. Models and methods II; 4. Public and private in classical Athens; 5. The law of adultery; 6. Adultery, women, and social control; 7. Law, social control, and homosexuality in classical Athens; 8. The prosecution of impiety in Athenian law; 9. The enforcement of morals.

Promotional Information

Examines the regulation of sexuality, the family and unorthodox religious beliefs in classical Athens, by placing the question in a larger comparative and theoretical framework.

Reviews

"...a sophisticated and provocative analysis of the relationship between public norms and private morals in classical Athens...it is Cohen's focus on the character of the Athenian 'public/private' dichotomy that makes his book distinctive and groundbreaking." American Historical Review "David Cohen has written an interesting and illuminating comparative social anthropological account..." American Journal of Sociology "David Cohen's Law, Sexuality, and Society is an ambitious and broad-ranging attempt to disentangle the relation of classical Athenian law and society in the particularly fraught areas of adultery, homosexuality, and (to a lesser extent) religion." Rosalind Thomas, Times Literary Supplement "This is a book that should be read, if for no other reason than to help one define and refine one's own views about certain forms of 'deviant' sexual and religious behavior--namely adultery, homosexuality, and impiety--in Athens during a specific period of its history." American Journal of Legal History "...offers an engaging and undogmatic introduction to a theoretical approach uniquely revealing of the conflicting attitudes that underlie social practice." Nancy Worman, Classical Journal