The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks

The Home Life of the Ancient Greeks covers the dress, the gymnastic training and the slaves of the Greeks. The text names the two chief articles of Greek dress used throughout almost the whole of Greek antiquity: for the under garment, chiton, and for the upper garment, himation. The text says the short chiton seems to be the usual dress of daily life, especially worn when free movement was required, and so suitable for war or hunting, for gymnastic exercises or manual labour.

The text says there were a great many similar modes or plans of wrestling, all with a special terminology, and that it seems as though no gymnastic exercise had been so thoroughly developed into a real art as that of wrestling. The text mentions boxing among the funeral games in honour of Patroclus, practised in the historic period. The text says it would be impossible to guess the number of slaves in Greece, and that Aeschines mentions only seven slaves to six persons as a mark of a very modest household.