Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks

The People 87
ones” in Argos. Their names alone indicate their wretchedness,
though we cannot be sure whether they were indentured serfs or
merely very poor citizens.
Another group comprised manual workers and artisans known
collectively as banausoi (from the Greek baunos, meaning furnace
or forge)—namely, blacksmiths, metalworkers, sculptors, jewelers,
house painters, potters, vase painters, carpenters, shoemakers, and
the like. Although there was considerable variety in the economic
status of persons in this category, overall they would probably have
been regarded with condescension by the landed gentry unlike the
gêôrgoi, whose livelihood, like that of the landed gentry, was based
on the land. Many artisans may well have been either foreigners or
slaves, as evidenced by the fact that the names of several potters
and vase painters are foreign. One Athenian vase is even signed by
a certain “Lydos the slave.” Some artisans at least were fairly well
off. In Xenophon’s Memoirs of Sokrates, Sokrates says, “Don’t you
know that by producing grain . . . Nausikydes not only supports
himself and his family . . . but has so much to spare that he often
performs liturgies (see p. 223); that Kyrebos feeds his whole household
by baking bread, Demeas of Kollytos by making capes, and
Shoemaker at work. Courtesy akg-images, London.