Leontion

Leontion (or Leontium) ( _el. Λεόντιον), was a Greek woman who achieved fame sometime around 300 BC.

She was a follower of Epicurus and his philosophy. She was the life companion of Metrodorus of Lampsacus. The information we have about her is scant. She was said to have been a hetaera - a courtesan or prostitute. This might be anti-Epicurean slander, or misogyny aimed at an independent minded woman in the male-dominated society of Ancient Greece.

Epicurus' school was unusual in that it allowed women and even slaves to attend. We know that Themista of Lampsacus was another woman who attended Epicurus' school. (Although a century earlier we hear of two women - Axiothea and Lastheneia - attending Plato's school.)

Diogenes Laërtius seems to have preserved for us a line from a letter that Epicurus evidently wrote to Leontion, in which the master praises her for her well-written arguments against certain philosophical views (which aren't mentioned in Diogenes' quote). According to Pliny, she was painted by Aristides of Thebes in a work entitled "Leontion thinking of Epicurus"." [Pliny, "Nat. Hist.", 35.99.]

Leontion is said to have published arguments criticizing the famous philosopher Theophrastus:

Leontium, that mere courtesan, who had the effrontery to write a riposte to Theophrastus - mind you, she wrote elegantly in good Attic, but still, this was the licence which prevailed in the Garden of Epicurus. [Cicero, "De natura deorum" i.33/93.]

Pliny also wondered at how a woman could possibly write against Theophrastus. [Pliny, "Nat. Hist." Praefatio, 29.] Writing in the 14th century, Boccaccio wondered if Leontion was the stronger of the two of either dragging philosophy down to her level or if philosophy was the weaker because of her having an enlightened heart to be dominated by her disgraceful acts. [Virginia Brown's translation of Giovanni Boccaccio’s "Famous Women", pages 124 - 125; Harvard University Press, 2001; ISBN 0-674-01130-9]

Notes

References

*Diogenes Laërtius, Book X.
*Pliny, "Nat. Hist.", 35.99; praefatio, 29.
*Cicero, "De natura deorum" i.33.93.
*Athenaeus, "Deipnosophistae", xiii, 588, 593.