Hetaira
A ', Latinized as ', was a type of highly educated female companion in ancient Greece who served as an artist, entertainer, and conversationalist. Historians have often classed them as courtesans, but the extent to which they were sex workers is a matter of dispute.
Custom excluded the wives and daughters of Athenian citizens from the symposium, but this prohibition did not extend to, who were often foreign-born and could be well-versed in arts, philosophy, and culture. Other female entertainers might appear in the otherwise male domain, but actively participated in conversations, including intellectual and literary discourse.
Summary
Traditionally, historians of ancient Greece have distinguished between and pornai, another class of prostitute. In contrast to, who provided sex for numerous clients in brothels or on the street, were thought to have had only a few men as clients at any one time, to have had long-term relationships with them, and to have provided companionship and intellectual stimulation as well as sex. For instance, Charles Seltman wrote in 1953 that "hetaeras were certainly in a very different class, often highly educated women".More recently, historians have questioned the extent to which there was really a distinction between and. The second edition of the Oxford Classical Dictionary, for instance, held that was a euphemism for any kind of prostitute. This position is supported by Konstantinos Kapparis, who holds that Apollodorus' famous tripartite division of the types of women in the speech Against Neaera classes all prostitutes together, under the term.
A third position, advanced by Rebecca Futo Kennedy, suggests that "were not prostitutes or even courtesans". Instead, she argues, were "elite women ... who participated in sympotic and luxury culture", just as the masculine form of the wordwas used to refer to groups of elite men at symposia.
File:Hetaira playing kottabos - Greek Getty Villa Collection.jpg|thumb|Painting, on the inside of a kylix, of a or prostitute playing kottabos, a drinking game played at symposia in which the participants flicked the dregs of their wine at a target.
Even when the term was used to refer to a specific class of prostitute, though, scholars disagree on what precisely the line of demarcation was. Kurke emphasises that veiled the fact that they were selling sex through the language of gift-exchange, while explicitly commodified sex. Leslie Kurke claims that both and could be slaves or free, and might or might not work for a pimp. Kapparis says that were high-class prostitutes, and cites Dover as pointing to the long-term nature of 's relationships with individual men. Miner disagrees with Kurke, claiming that were always free, not slaves.
Along with sexual services, women described as rather than seem to have often been educated, and have provided companionship. According to Kurke, the concept of hetairism was a product of the symposium, where were permitted as sexually available companions of the male party-goers. In Athenaeus' Deipnosophistai, are described as providing "flattering and skillful conversation": something which is, elsewhere in classical literature, seen as a significant part of the hetaira's role. Particularly, "witty" and "refined" were seen as attributes which distinguished from common. are likely to have been musically educated, too.
Free could become very wealthy, and control their own finances. However, their careers could be short, and if they did not earn enough to support themselves, they might have been forced to resort to working in brothels, or working as pimps, in order to ensure a continued income as they got older.