HUMA 1105 Lecture Notes - Lecture 87: Irony, Immortal Love, Symposium
8 Jun 2017
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[> greek symposion > sympinein to drink together > syn- together + pinein to drink] Symposium = a drinking party or discussion, especially as held in ancient greece after a banquet. It was a party for socially elite men the aristocracy of ancient greece. Besides drinking & food, it often involved music & sex commonly supplied by flute-girls (auletrides) (nehamas introduction xiii). It ended when, exhausted & inebriated, the guests fell asleep on the couches they reclined on (as they ate, Hence, a symposium did not have the modern meaning of a conference or meeting to discuss a particular drank, talked, etc. subject . The love (eros) praised in the symposium is primarily love between men, often between an older man & an adolescent boy, i. e. between an erastes ( lover ), the older man, & an eromenos (the beloved ), the boy.
