Talk:Theodora (6th century)

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"Theodora was history's first pro-choice advocate. . ."

Mmm. . . presentism, anyone? First, abortion was hardly rare throughout the pre-Christian Roman world; Augustus' vitriolic speech against childless patricians suggests that it was common even at the beginning of the imperial era. Second, Procopius' Secret History, hardly an unbiased source, mentions Theodora's abortions three times; the closest he comes to saying that she advocated abortion is when he says that she "boasted of her many abortions" -- and that's in the context of a passage that rails against Justinian's marriage to someone of whom Procopius thought very little, so I don't know how seriously to take it. --MIRV 13:03, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)

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There is another article Theodora describing another byzantine empress who reigned 500 years after this Theodora. That is somewhat confusing. Is there a possibility to disambiguate the two Theodoras, maybe by adding a suffix I. or II.? -- Baldhur 22:45, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

• I wouldn't use I/II if they didn't. How about Theodora, Empress of Byzantium (6th century) and Theodora, Empress of Byzantium (11th century)? - Nunh-huh

I always just ignored that and hoped no one would ever mention it :) There are a couple of problems here:

• "Empress of Byzantium" is a very strange thing to say, because even though "Byzantium" is sometimes used figuratively for the Byzantine Empire, it's really just the city of Constantinople (so it wasn't called Byzantium at the time anyway)
• She had a lot of power, but she was not an emperor or empress in her own right, like the later Theodora was. At this point, the empire is still more-or-less Roman, so she's like a lot of other Roman woman who wielded power behind the scenes.
• Theodora is a very common Byzantine (and Roman) name and could also refer to a number of other people (there is a mini-disambiguation page at the bottom of Theodora, which lists some of them).

So, I don't really know what to do with this...maybe put their birth and death dates in the title? There is a precedent for that with John Hamilton Gray (1811-1887) and John Hamilton Gray (1814-1889).

Adam Bishop 23:32, 21 Feb 2004 (UTC)

I don't quite understand what you mean by 'still more or less Roman', do you mean by this 'Still more or less Latin'? The East had never been predominantly Latin, and even by the early 6th Century it was Greek speaking peoples who held the reigns of the Empire. Why do you despise Greece to this extent?

That would be cool if their dates are known exactly. I was suggesting use of centuries as a sort of fl. date because I don't know the exact dates. How about just leaving out the Empress stuff:

• Theodora (6th century), and
• Theodora (11th century)?

- Nunh-huh

Sounds good. If there is no opposition in the next hours, I will do as Nunh-huh suggested. -- Baldhur 17:57, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Done. -- Baldhur 18:55, 23 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Contents 1 Why does this article misrepresent feminism? 2 Name 3 Fact check 4 Lack of shame

[edit] Why does this article misrepresent feminism?

Other scholars (and those who venerate Theodora as a saint) instead regard Theodora's achievements for women not as a modern feminist "liberation" to commit abortion or adultery but rather as a truly egalitarian drive to give women the same legal rights as men...

This is an unneccesary juxtaposition. The writer of this passage implies slyly that feminism is by nature 'immoral', when in fact the majority of feminists would argue that what is dismissively referred to as "modern feminism," is precisely "a truly egalitarian drive to give women the same legal rights as men." I propose this section be changed to reflect this.

I was about to make exactly this same point. The passage strongly implies that modern feminism is false in its talk of "liberation" (or else why use the scare-quotes?), and that it supports abortion and adultery. (I also agree with your point regarding the negative part of the statement, but it's the positive part that I find the more offensive of the two (and note that by "positive" I mean only "asserting" and by "negative" only "denying").) NPOV anyone? Because I'm just that sort of loose cannon I'm going to go ahead and (try to) clean it up, but if anyone objects feel free to revert the change, or, I suppose, if you feel I've ballsed it up, fix my fix. --24.159.215.162 02:45, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

Also, and I'm just going to throw this out there, how does creation of homes for prostitutes amount to granting women equal rights to those enjoyed by their corresponding menfolk? That's nonsensical, unless there were male prostitutes in the empire that had such homes beforehand... This needs more work than I'm able to give it at the moment. --24.159.215.162 02:49, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Name

What a strange title for this article. Something should be done about this. --—Ghirla | talk 13:04, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

This has been discussed above (about 2 years ago). What would you rather call it? There are many Theodoras, some of whom do not have a family name to distinguish them. Adam Bishop 16:26, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Shouldn't it be mentioned that Theodora was Greek, or at least Greek-speaking r part of the greek population of the time, in contrast to Justinian, who spoke Latin ?

[edit] Fact check

Justinian Article: Justinian would have, in earlier times, been unable to marry her because of her class, but his uncle Emperor Justin I had passed a law allowing intermarriage between social classes.

Theodora article: She convinced Justinian to change the law that forbade noblemen to marry lower class women (like herself).

[edit] Lack of shame

"Procopius also repeatedly notes her lack of shame and cites a number of scenes to demonstrate it, and also the low regard in which she was held by respectable society."

The above is a severe understatement (this from Procopius):

"Often, even in the theater, in the sight of all the people, she removed her costume and stood nude in their midst, except for a girdle about the groin: not that she was abashed at revealing that, too, to the audience, but because there was a law against appearing altogether naked on the stage, without at least this much of a fig-leaf. Covered thus with a ribbon, she would sink down to the stage floor and recline on her back. Slaves to whom the duty was entrusted would then scatter grains of barley from above into the calyx of this passion flower, whence geese, trained for the purpose, would next pick the grains one by one with their bills and eat. "

12.34.246.4 13:52, 5 April 2007 (UTC) Gary