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Aristotle's views on women influenced later Western thinkers, who quoted him as an authority until the end of the Middle Ages, and are thus an important topic in women's history. He saw women as subject to men, but as higher than slaves. In Chapter 12 of his Politics he writes, "The slave is wholly lacking the deliberative element; the female has it but it lacks authority; the child has it but it is incomplete". ==Differences between male and female== Aristotle believed that men and women naturally differed both physically and mentally. He claimed that women are "more mischievous, less simple, more impulsive ... more compassionate() ... more easily moved to tears() ... more jealous, more querulous, more apt to scold and to strike() ... more prone to despondency and less hopeful() ... more void of shame or self-respect, more false of speech, more deceptive, of more retentive memory () ... also more wakeful; more shrinking () more difficult to rouse to action" than men.〔History of Animals, 608b. 1–14〕 Moreover, in accord with his society's custom of allowing girls and women to eat only half as much as boys and men, he added that the woman "requires a smaller quantity of nutriment".〔 (History of Animals, 608b. 14〕 Aristotle wrote extensively on his views of the nature of semen. His views on how a child's sex is decided have since been abandoned.〔Generation of Animals, II, 728a〕 He wrote that only fair-skinned women, not darker-skinned women, had a sexual discharge and climaxed. He also believed this discharge could be increased by eating of pungent foods. Aristotle thought a woman's sexual discharge was akin to that of an infertile or amputated male's.〔Generation of Animals, I, 728a〕〔Generation of Animals, VI, 728a〕 He concluded that both sexes contributed to the material of generation, but that the female's contribution was in her discharge (as in a male's) rather than within the ovary.〔 His idea of procreation was an active, ensouling masculine element bringing life to a passive female element.〔(Aristotle on woman )〕 Aristotle explains how and why the association between man and woman takes on a hierarchical character by commenting on male rule over "barbarians", or non-Greeks. "By nature the female has been distinguished from the slave. For nature makes nothing in the manner that the coppersmiths make the Delphic knife - that is, frugally - but, rather, it makes each thing for one purpose. For each thing would do its work most nobly if it had one task rather than many. Among the barbarians the female and the slave have the same status. This is because there are no natural rulers among them but, rather, the association among them is between male and female slave. On account of this, the poets say that "it is fitting that Greeks rule barbarians," as the barbarian and the slave are by nature the same."〔Dana Jalbert Stauffer The Journal of Politics, Vol. 70, No. 4 (Oct. 2008), pp. 929–941〕 While Aristotle reduced women's roles in society, and promoted the idea that women should receive less food and nourishment than males, he also criticised the results: a woman, he thought, was then more compassionate, more opinionated, more apt to scold and to strike. He stated that women are more prone to despondency, more void of shame or self-respect, more false of speech, more deceptive, and of having a better memory.〔''History of Animals'', book IX, part 1〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Aristotle's views on women」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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