Young women Athens

• kyrios


  The male head of a Greek household, with responsibility for and authority over his wife, children and any unmarried female relatives
• exposure


  The ancient practice of leaving an unwanted baby outside the city to die
• dowry


  An amount of money paid to a prospective groom by the bride's family
• kyria


  The wife of the kyrios, under the direct control of her husband
• wetnurse


  A woman who looks after and breastfeeds another woman's baby. Common in Athens, wet-nurses were usually slaves, foreigners or poorer citizens who charged for their services
• Betrothal


  The engagement ceremony in which the dowry was agreed and they would swear a solemn oath in front of witnesses. From this point the couple were considered legally married
• Hearth


  The symbolic centre of the home
• Exposing babies was not illegal or immoral as the baby was left in the hands of the gods and it was up to them to save it or let it die
• Baby girls were at a greater risk of being exposed. This is because raising a girl would be a greater strain on the family's resources than raising a boy
• A boy could grow up to work in the family business, inherit the estate therefore boosting the family's wealth and reputation
• A girl would be married into another household and her kyrios would have to give an expensive dowry to her new husband's family. A dowry could be between 5-20% of the kyrios' total wealth
• Therefore some poorer Athenian families exposed baby girls
• Athens had no state education system
• Each family had to arrange education for their children - normally this would mean employing a range of subject-specialist tutors to teach literacy, numeracy, music and physical education. This was normally only for male children
• Mothers would normally educate their daughters, teaching them a range of practical skills that they would need to be a good kyria in later life
• Skills would include spinning wool, weaving, cookery, managing the household finances and managing the household slaves
• Girls from a lower-class family would need to take more of an active role in running a family business and therefore might have had more extensive training in finances and record-keeping than the upper class girls
• Marriage for an Athenian girl would have been arranged by her kyrios as soon as she reached puberty, around the age of fourteen
• Making a marriage match was handled like a business deal, with no room for romance
• The girl's kyrios would select an appropriate groom and they would agree a dowry
• Then they would swear a solemn oath in front of witnesses, as the extract from Menander's Perikeiromene shows
• From the moment of this betrothal (engagement) ceremony, the couple were considered legally married
• But, betrothals could happen at any age and it was common for years to pass before the actual wedding ceremony
• The primary concern of the kyrios when making a match was that the relationship be beneficial to both families
• It would be common for a kyrios to give his daughter in marriage to one of his friends or business partners
• Dowry


  An important part of negotiating an Athenian marriage. A kyrios who could not offer a dowry would have difficulty in arranging the marriage of his daughters. It is probable that the dowry was intended to compensate the groom's family for the expense of providing for the bride. The dowry could also help to protect the bride, because if a husband wanted to divorce his bride he would have to return the dowry
• This could encourage men not to mistreat their wives or to seek a divorce without good reason. If the dowry were large enough and the husband had spent the money, he would not be able to divorce his wife at all and she might be able to use this fact to influence him
• Athenian weddings


  1. On the first day: the bride would make sacrifices to Artemis, Aphrodite and Hera

  2. On the second day: the bride would have a ritual bath, be dressed in fine clothes and jewellery, and there would be a wedding feast and torchlight procession

  3. On the third day: the bride would receive gifts from the new members of her family
• There were no records of married couples in Athens - so the eyewitnesses were very important. If someone ever claimed a couple were not married, the eyewitnesses would have to testify in court to give evidence
• Scholars debate on how practical this three day ceremony would have been for poorer Athenians
• Menander, fourth century BC fragment: 'A man who teaches a woman to write should recognise he is providing poison to an asp'
• This suggests that teaching girls to read and write was not the norm, and that some men viewed literature women as dangerous. REMEMBER Menander was a comic playwright so this could be a joke and not representative of the views of Athenian society
• Images


  • Mid-fifth-century red-figure hydria showing a mother passing her baby to a wetnurse
  • Red-figure hydria depicting a seated woman reading with three attendants, suggesting she is from a wealthy household
  • Mid-sixth-century black-figure lekythos depicting a wedding procession with the bride veiled
• Menander, Perikeiromene, 1012–14: 'I give you this girl for the plowing of legitimate children'
• Daughters were seen as a drain on resources and worth less to the family than a son
• A young woman's educated was centred around her role as a kyria and being able to run the household, young women were not worth the money it would cost to expand their academic education
• A young Athenian woman's childhood and upbringing prepared her to serve her kyrios and provide him with children
• Women, even in childhood and upbringing, are viewed as less important and valuable than men
• The marriage ceremony of Athenians is centred around the woman moving from one household to another (and one kyrios to another). This ceremony was transactional and the woman is treated like an object