Theron and Rhodopis

Athens, Greece 5^th Century B.C.

‘The wife for our house and honor, the Hetaera for our solace and delight.’

Demosthenes

Rhodopis was nine-years-old when she first saw a man’s fully erect penis.

Rhodopis was named after the famous Greek slave girl who married a Pharaoh and became his queen. The odds – the gods – were seriously against her namesake ever having one of her slippers stolen by a falcon and dropped in a king’s lap. This one particular little Ionian orphan was still too young to take part in philosophical arguments concerning Fate vs. chance, and even though she was forced to obey the laws of the mortal gods who ran the household where she grew up, she was never in awe of them, or of their authority over her, not even when she was still so small she had to crane her neck to look up at them. All adults are as tall as Olympians to a small child, a fact her developing rational faculties latched onto as profoundly significant since she liked the way it made her feel.

Rhodopis was in her first day of a new class and so far it was making her favorite course on the use and preparation of herbs and other plants seem dull by comparison. She had seen many scantily clad and even naked men and women before – the Atrium of the school in which she lived was proud with statues – but they were made of marble not flesh-and-blood, and they certainly never interacted in such a breathtakingly violent way that was also as controlled and choreographed as a sacred dance. Some of her classmates were giggling helplessly, although their wide eyes looked more shocked than amused, Rhodopis was quick to note. As for herself, she remained respectfully silent, her hands clasped in the lap of her tunic. She was old enough to understand she was witnessing the mysterious heart of her future profession. A young man and woman occupied the center of the room. At the beginning of the presentation they seemed as casually familiar with each other as brother and sister, yet by the end of the class they struck Rhodopis as the most the passionate of adversaries relentlessly seeking out each other’s weaknesses to the violent glory of them both. Somehow each one emerged victorious from the sensual struggle, and Rhodopis felt they should have been awarded a crown of laurels as they stepped down off the couch placed in the center of the room to serve as a stage for life’s most important drama. This was the sort of play respectable Greek women were not allowed to witness, much less study in detail, but Rhodopis was an Ionian in the care of Athen’s infamous Hetaeras.

The young man’s bare chest was glistening with perspiration and rising and falling in a way that made it difficult for Rhodopis to catch her own breath. She was disappointed when he slipped his modest chiton back on and concealed his manhood, which was much larger than any she had ever seen carved in stone. His lovely partner’s sexual organs were less overt, yet they were a strangely complex personal revelation Rhodopis took serious note of. The woman hired to demonstrate the erotic arts was herself, naturally, a Hetaera. The young man, also not surprisingly, was an unpaid volunteer. Rhodopis thought she recognized his face; he looked like one of the slaves who tended the villa’s lavish gardens, hard won from the dry Attic soil (and who were also rumored to tend to the still healthy erotic appetites of the old Hetaera who had founded the school.) When he removed his chiton at the beginning of class her first wild thought was that his erect male organ resembled a very large mushroom with an abnormally long stem and a cylindrical head rising from it. It looked much firmer than a mushroom, however, and Rhodopis knew the Hetaera kneeling at his feet was not eating it as she did bread and cheese even though she was licking it, and then slipping it hungrily into her mouth in a way that made it appear much more delectable than any of the food Rhodopis had ever been served. During this part of the demonstration many of her fellow students had to be commanded to keep their eyes open, their shocked and even revolted gasps impatiently silenced by the instructor.

‘There is nothing frightening or distasteful about the art of fellatio,’ she said sternly, ‘it is, in fact, a Hetaera’s most important skill. If you fail to excel in this supreme erotic act you will have only shriveled old men for company!’

This dire prophecy had the desired effect, and the wet sucking sounds made by the experienced Hetaera showing off her skills sounded even more significantly loud in the strained silence. She had not paused in her dedicated performance when the instructor chastised her audience, and the man smiling down at her bobbing head seemed unaware of anything else. Rhodopis made note of the fact that fellatio appeared to be a very good way of getting a man’s full and undivided attention, but since it was impossible to speak with her mouth full, she would have to come up with other, creative ways of expressing what she wanted. After a while the Hetaera moved her hands from his thighs and began playing his erection like a flute, except the only sounds she produced were deep groans that escaped his lips as his eyes closed. His own fingers responded to her subtle skills by roughly threading themselves through her fiery red hair. No doubt the result of regular applications of red powder, Rhodopis thought, biting her lip as she watched the Hetaera cup the man’s scrotum in one hand, as reverently as she probably did the drachmae-filled silk pouches awarded her by satisfied male friends. Her head and mouth and hands all worked in rhythm as her partner’s tall body swayed slightly in response to the silent music she was making with his flesh.

As a general rule Rhodopis did not get on with her classmates and kept mostly to herself, but she too was aghast when the man suddenly gripped the Hetaera’s head and pushed his rampant column of flesh all the way into her mouth, shoving it determinedly down into her white throat. Yet unlike most of the young girls in the room, Rhodopis did not suddenly find herself dreading the profession into which she had been dedicated when she was still too young to remember. For her the brutally refined demonstration posed a fascinating challenge. She did not merely see a man’s penis violently invading a woman’s defenseless mouth – she saw a woman in complete control of her body mysteriously defeating the force seeking to conquer her by absorbing and accepting it, and in the end winning something intangible and yet also very real for herself. At first what she got for her efforts appeared even worse as the man pulled her to her feet, unwound her chiton, and urged her back across the couch so he could spread himself on top of her and stab his fleshly weapon into her yielding body over and over again. Rhodopis thought he must surely be hurting her, yet the gratified little smile on the Hetaera’s face, not to mention the very willing way she spread her legs, seemed to say otherwise.