The Trial of Phryne the Courtesan Before The Areopagus is based on actual events which took place in Ancient Athens around 341 BCE, and follows the storyline of Ms Stephens’ award-winning short story of the same name.  This play dramatizes the true events in the life of a courtesan who was put on trial for impiety before the city council (Areopagus) because she reenacted the ritual baths of Aphrodite during the city’s religious festivals. This offense was performed in the nude and with her hair down, in plain view of the entire assembly of Athenian society, and resulted in Phryne being charged with impiety, an offense for which the punishment was death (and for which Socrates was executed fifty-four years earlier.)  Featured are Phryne’s involvements with the sculptor, Praxiteles, the painter, Apelles, the philosopher, Diogenes, both the prosecuting and defense counsels (Euthias and Hypereides), and assorted members of the Areopagus.  Also illumined are the humor and friendships that existed between men and courtesans, the rights of women in the ancient world, and the peril’s faced by educated women of ancient Athenian society. In Ancient Greece there were wives, mistresses, prostitutes, and courtesans.  The latter were called hetaerae (he-tay-rī). Paid enormous sums for the pleasure of their company, counsel, and charms, hetaerae were some of the wealthiest, best educated, most entertaining, and fascinating women in Ancient Greece and in history.  There were many names among the great hetaerae, but the most notorious was Phryne.