Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks

78 Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks
Mother with child on potty. Courtesy akg-images, London.
In later times, obstetrics aroused considerable interest in medical
circles. The most famous work on the subject is the Gynaecology,
which was written by a physician named Soranos in the early second
century c.e. It provides a highly detailed account of the practices
surrounding labor, childbirth, and nursing.
Household Chores
In the Funeral Speech delivered over the Athenian dead in the
first year of the Peloponnesian War, Perikles states, “Women’s
greatest glory is not to be talked about by men, either for good
or ill” (Thukydides 2.45.2). Likewise, in Euripides’ Trojan Women,
Andromache, the wife of Hektor, declares, “There is one prime
source of scandal for a woman—when she won’t stay at home”
(line 648f.). As noted earlier, however, we should be wary of taking
such statements entirely at face value. They may well reflect
an idealized view of women that was somewhat at variance with
everyday reality.
What such statements do unquestionably reveal, however, is an
overriding concern, amounting to paranoia, on the part of Greek
husbands concerning their wives’ fidelity. Ischomachos, whom we