Plato, Leges 813a-b: female athletics in Plato’s political theory

Plato, Leges 813a-b: female athletics in Plato’s political theory

early-to-mid 420s - 347 BCE

Political Philosophy

Literary source

A: Yes, most truly. These matters also let the man who is appointed our Director of Music take over and supervise, with the help of kindly fortune; and let us supplement our former statements concerning dancing and bodily gymnastics in general. Just as, in the case of music, we have supplied the regulations about tuition that were missing, so also let us now do in the case of gymnastics. Shall we not say that both girls and boys must learn both dancing and gymnastics?
C: Yes.
A: Then for their practices it would be most proper that boys should have dancing-masters, and girls mistresses."

Robert G. Bury, Plato, Laws, vol. 2, Books 7-12 (= Loeb Classical Library; 192), Cambridge, MA/London, 1926.

Ἀθηναῖος
ἀληθέστατα τοίνυν. καὶ ταῦθ᾽ ἡμῖν παραλαβὼν ὁ περὶ τὴν μοῦσαν ἄρχων αἱρεθεὶς ἐπιμελείσθω μετὰ τύχης εὐμενοῦς, ἡμεῖς δὲ ὀρχήσεώς τε πέρι καὶ ὅλης τῆς περὶ τὸ σῶμα γυμναστικῆς πρὸς τοῖς ἔμπροσθεν εἰρημένοις ἀποδῶμεν: καθάπερ μουσικῆς τὸ διδασκαλικὸν ὑπόλοιπον ὂν ἀπέδομεν, ὡσαύτως ποιῶμεν καὶ γυμναστικῆς. τοὺς γὰρ παῖδάς τε καὶ τὰς παῖδας ὀρχεῖσθαι δὴ δεῖ καὶ γυμνάζεσθαι μανθάνειν: ἦ γάρ;
Κλεινίας
ναί.
Ἀθηναῖος
τοῖς μὲν τοίνυν παισὶν ὀρχησταί, ταῖς δὲ ὀρχηστρίδες ἂν εἶεν πρὸς τὸ διαπονεῖν οὐκ ἀνεπιτηδειότερον.

John Burnet (ed.), Platonis Opera, vol. 5, Tetralogia IX, Definitiones et Spuria, Oxford 1907.