Daily Life of the Ancient Greeks

Private Life 147
the party was a celebration in honor of Agathon, who had just won
first prize in a dramatic festival held earlier in the day. Because
some of the company were suffering from hangovers, they elected
to consume only a modest amount of wine. They also decided to
dispense with the services of a flute girl whom Agathon had hired
for the evening. Instead, they entertained themselves by delivering
encomia in praise of Eros, the offspring of Aphrodite, goddess
of love. The last to speak was Sokrates. Just when he reached the
end of his delivery, Alkibiades burst into the room. He was already
somewhat the worse for drink and tried to make the other guests
tipsy by forcing them to consume large quantities of wine. Eventually
he settled down and agreed to follow the procedure adopted by
the company by delivering a speech in praise of Sokrates. The party
continued until dawn, by which time everyone had fallen asleep
with the exception of Sokrates and Aristophanes, who were still
conversing on the subject of poetry. Sokrates alone was completely
unaffected by the alcohol that he had consumed, and around dawn,
he rose, departed, took a bath, and went about his daily business.
Agathon’s symposium is described by Plato in a work entitled
Symposium, arguably his most charming dialogue. The image it
conveys, however—one of learned gentlemen delivering carefully
crafted speeches over a bowl of wine—can hardly be taken as typical
of Athenian practice. Presented with the choice of either producing
an impromptu encomium or listening to a flute girl, the majority
of Athenians would have undoubtedly opted for the latter. Nor can
there have been many drinkers who had the ability to conduct an
elevated discourse when flushed with wine.
As we know from references in literature, any excuse could be
used to party in ancient Greece: birth, marriage, or death, the departure
or arrival of a loved one from abroad, a feast day, a birthday, or
merely a change in the seasons. Probably in most cases, however,
no pretext was required. Given the lack of alternative entertainment,
we might suppose that drinking parties were an everyday
occurrence. We do not know, however, whether they were exclusive
to aristocratic society or whether poorer Athenians also held
symposia.
Guests
It was customary for the host to inscribe the names of his guests
on a wax tablet, together with the day and hour appointed for the
symposium, and then hand the tablet to a slave who would make