Xanthippe

[1] In Xenophon's Symposium, she is described by Antisthenes as "the most difficult, harshest, painful, ill-tempered" wife; this characterisation of Xanthippe has influenced all subsequent portrayals of her.

[11] Athenaeus and Diogenes Laertius both report versions of a story that Socrates married twice, once to Xanthippe and once to Myrto, the daughter or granddaughter of Aristides the Just.

This story has generally not been believed by modern scholars, though some have accepted it – for instance J. W. Fitton, who argues that Myrto was Socrates' wife whereas Xanthippe was a citizen pallake ("concubine").

"[23] Medieval authors who mention Xanthippe largely repeat the ancient anecdotes about her, and follow the example of Xenophon and Diogenes Laertius in portraying her as a difficult wife.

In the Wife of Bath's Tale, for example, Geoffrey Chaucer retells Diogenes' story of Xanthippe pouring a water-jug over Socrates' head, though in his version the jug is filled with urine.

During the Enlightenment, some followed in the tradition of a shrewish Xanthippe – such as Pieter Langendijk in his Xantippe, of het booze wyf des filozoofs Sokrates beteugeld.

Others, however, began to treat her more sympathetically: the German scholar Christoph August Heumann was the first to question the historicity of the negative ancient anecdotes about her.

[6] In his essay "The Case for Xanthippe" (1960), Robert Graves suggested that the stereotype of Xanthippe as a misguided shrew is emblematic of an ancient struggle between masculinity (rationality, philosophy) and femininity (intuition, poetry), and that the rise of philosophy in Socrates' time has led to rationality and scientific pursuit coming to exercise an unreasonable dominance over human life and culture.