details about military training in Sparta, or, in
Athens, about the early institution of the ephebeia
pyrrhic, or armed dance, was performed nude at the
Panathenaia and included choruses from the Athenian
tribes.75 The convention of the warrior athlete who participated in armed dancing and races, still being held in
the Classical period, may, as Mouratidis noted, have
of the continuingdominanceof the aristocracyin a transforming
environment."Murray's views in Early Greece have been
developedfurther in an article, "The Symposium as Societal
the Eighth Century BC: Tradition and Invention (Stock-
holm 1983) 195-99.
'VecchioOligarca',"Athenaeum66 (1988) 6-10, for the situation in Athens, ca. 440 B.C.
73 "The polis derivedfrom the individuals in arms;it was basically the state of the citizens. Both facts made the defenseof
the state the concernof its folks. T here was no question of
the capacity to serve constitutedthe entirely capable citizen":
V. Ehrenberg, The Greek State (1960) 80. E.L. Wheeler,
"Hoplomachia and Greek Dancing in Arms," GRBS 23
(1982) 223-33, summarizesrecent work on this area.
74 R. Ridley, "The
Hoplite as Citizen: Athenian Military
Institutions in Their Own Social Context," AntCl 47 (1978)
509-48. P. Ducrey, Guerre et guerriers dans la Grace an-
tique (Freiburg,Switzerland 1985) 69-72. For the ephebeia
at Athens and the crypteia at Sparta, see P. Vidal Naquet,
Le Goff and P.
Nora eds., Faire de l'histoire III (Paris 1974) 151-60; see
also supra n. 45.
For http://smtbus.com/__media__/js/netsoltrademark.php?dfkk.buzz/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/dAgrpZ.png ,see Poursat (supra
n. 33).
GrBceancienne (Paris 1968) 123; F. Lissarrague, "Autour
On
the dress of the knights (not a "uniform,"and seldom nude),
see H. Cahn, "Dokimasia,"RA 1973, 3-22.
555
into the Olympic program.76
and of the tan skin that was the consequence of their exercising in the nude. A story about Agesilaos of Sparta
illustrates how, to a proficient military eye, nakedness
allowed an exact judgment of a guy's physical fitness: "He gave directions.., .that the barbarians
captured in the raids be exposed for sale nude. So
stripped, and fat and idle through constant riding in
Buggies, they believed the war would be just
like fighting with girls."77 The contrast between
their own bronzed men's bodies and the white, feminine flabbiness of the Persians renewed the nerve
of the Greek troops.
Male bodies on Attic painted vases show the significance of physical beauty for athletes, youths, citizens,
and soldiers. Most are lithe and slender, though one
Attic red-figure vase reveals a hefty, paunchy body,
(fig. 3): he is a specialized athlete, a boxer.78 A rare
scene of nude guys who are awful turns out to represent slaves who prepare the palaestra, not citizens exercising in the gymnasium (fig. 4),79 indicating the dif-
Body 3. Red-figurecup, ca. 480 B.C.: athletes training. British Museum. (CourtesyTrustees of the British Museum)
ference between the free man who exercised bare,
gymnos, in the gymnasium, and the slave who was
Nude in the line of work and out of poverty. ( http://d-click.armazemdanoticia.com.br/u/18887/88/31/5_0/1fb90/?url=https://familynudism.info/categories/outdoor/8/ on this vase, like the sportsmen, are infibulated.) A
law forbade slaves to work out and anoint themselves in
the gymnasia like free men (though clearly it did
not forbid them to enter in order to do the needed
work for their upkeep).80 The custom of frequenting
the gymnasium was characteristic not only of free men
Generally speaking, but of upper class citizens, who exercised
as members of the hoplite army. The usage of nudity for
magical reasons, on the other hand, belonged to another degree of reality-and was confined, as we've
seen, to herms, satyrs, and the phase.
nudity had changed, from a religious to a civic practice.
From the rite nudity of the kouros-set up, from the
seventh century B.C. on, as picture of Apollo, votive present,
funerary picture, offering or servant of the god-and the
Rite nudity of the athlete who competed in the
Olympic matches, dedicated to the gods, there was a
change to the fit nudity of the citizen-soldier. The
transition was, I believe, initially involved with the
Rite costume proper for initiation rituals.
This passage from a spiritual to a civic circumstance was
