The Social Category of Courtesans in Lucian’s Dialogues of the Courtesans

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between the individual experiences of literary courtesans and their social category as courtesans in Lucian’s Dialogues of the Courtesans. The relatively limited research that has been done on this dialogue collection has been based on the presupposition that the characters are first and foremost courtesans; the impact of individuality and agency on the experience of the limitations and expectations associated with the social category of courtesans remains unacknowledged. By employing the interpretative model of social dynamics, which offers a way of studying the relationships between individuals and groups, this article demonstrates how Lucian’s Dialogues of the Courtesans depicts these figures as more complex than what has been assumed thus far, by acknowledging the impact of their social category on their daily lives whilst also highlighting how these courtesans negotiate, experience, reinterpret, confirm, undermine, and reinvent these limitations, expectations, and advantages in their social interactions.