Manners & Customs

The Greek House

Greek city houses of the 6th and 5th century b.c. were usually modest in scale and built of relatively inexpensive materials. They varied from two or three rooms clustered around a small court to a dozen or so rooms. City house exteriors presented a plain facade to the street, broken only by the door and a few small windows set high. In larger hous...

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Furniture and the Greek House

General information about the rooms is rather clear, but the furniture in the house made each room unique. The Greeks used practicality to furnish their houses and they also borrowed some Egyptian techniques to build the furniture. Their home furnishings consisted of countless stools and chairs, some of which borrowed the folding X-frame from the E...

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Women's Life in Ancient Greece

Greek women had virtually no political rights of any kind and were controlled by men at nearly every stage of their lives. The most important duties for a city-dwelling woman were to bear children--preferably male--and to run the household. Duties of a rural woman included some of the agricultural work: the harvesting of olives and fruit was their ...

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Schooling in Ancient Greece

Education in schools in ancient Athens was at first limited to aristocratic boys. By the 4th century b.c. all 18-year-old males spent two years in a gymnasion, a state school devoted to the overall physical and intellectual development of a young man. More advanced education in philosophy, mathematics, logic and rhetoric was available to the aristo...

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