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Housing in Athens and Sparta
The residential area of Athens consisted of narrow, winding streets and small, poorly constructed houses. Most of it
lay to the northeast of the Acropolis. Somewhat paradoxically, it was not until the fourth century BCE., when
Athens's economy was declining, that houses began to be constructed in a more luxurious style, and the cost of
purchasing a house varied enormously. The best-preserved Athenian house was found in the Attic countryside near
the modern town of Vari, a few miles to the southeast of Athens. Although it is a farmhouse, its plan is probably
similar to that of many prosperous houses in Athens: a central courtyard with rooms leading off on all four sides.
There was only one entrance to the house from the road. A south-facing veranda provided a place to work and relax,
shaded from the summer heat or winter rain. Judging from the thinness of its walls, it is unlikely that the Vari house
had a second story. In the southwest corner, however, the foundations are considerably thicker, suggesting that a
tower of two or more stories once existed here.
Building materials were extremely crude. Even the more sturdily constructed houses had lower courses of irregularly
shaped stones simply piled on top of one another. Exterior walls were made of baked or unbaked mud brick,
sometimes coated with lime. For the most part, walls were so thin and poorly constructed that instead of breaking in
by the front door, thieves merely knocked a hole through them. Interior walls were generally covered with a coat of
plaster, whitewashed on top. Some wealthy Athenians decorated their rooms with frescoes. Floors consisted of
beaten earth or clay, occasionally covered in animal skins or reed matting. From the fourth century BCE onward,
they were commonly decorated with mosaics made out of small pebbles. Roofs were made of wood with terra-cotta
tiling. Windows were very small and set close to the ceiling to afford maximum protection against the weather. In the
winter, they were covered with boards or sacking to keep out the wind and rain, supplemented by shutters if the
householder could afford them, since wood was both scarce and expensive. When the Athenians residing in the
countryside evacuated to the city at the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War, they took their wooden doors and
shutters with them.
The houses of the poor consisted of only one room, divided into different living spaces by makeshift partitions.
However, since Greek husbands regarded it as a matter of honor that their wives not be exposed to the public gaze
even when at home, those who could afford it provided them with a separate living area known as the gynaik eion, or
women's quarters. A gynaik eion can usually only be identified in the archaeological record from the discovery of
associated finds such as loom weights. It would generally have been situated at the back of the house or, if the
house possessed two stories, in the upper story.
Lamps provided the main source of artificial lighting. From the sixth century BCE. onward, small terra-cotta lamps
become extremely common in the archaeological record. They were provided with a wick that floated in olive oil.
Several were required to illuminate a single room, and often they were set on tall stands.
All water had to be fetched from outside. Many houses possessed a well in the courtyard that was cut into the
bedrock sometimes to a depth of more than 30 feet. In later times, wells were lined with cylindrical drums made of
terra-cotta to prevent their sides from crumbling into the water. From the middle of the fourth century BCE, however,
following a sizable drop in the water table in Athens, bell-shaped cisterns became popular. These were designed to
catch the rainwater that drained off the roof. The quality of the water obtained in this way must have varied greatly at
different times in the year. Many Athenians, and Greeks in general, relied on the nearest public fountain for their
drinking water. Collecting the daily supply of water was an arduous and time-consuming task. For the most part, it
was performed by slaves, although in the case of the poor, this chore fell to the mistress of the house. The public
fountain was a popular place to gather and gossip, as scenes on vases indicate.
The earliest bathtub to come to light, which is of Mycenaean date, was found in the so-called Palace of Nestor at
Pylos. Nearby it stood two large jars about four feet high, which probably contained water for the bath. In later times,
small terra-cotta bathtubs became common. Given the scarcity of water, however, only wealthy Greeks were able to
immerse themselves in a full bath. Personal standards of hygiene thus varied considerably from one social class to
another. Few houses possessed drains for the disposal of waste water. Men seem to have had few qualms about
relieving themselves in public. In the opening scene of Aristophanes's Women in Assembly, Blepyros relieves
himself in the street as soon as he rises. More sophisticated Greeks used a chamber pot called an amis. Women
used a boat-shaped vessel called a sk aphion. Although babies could be dangled out of the window in an emergency,
well-regulated houses possessed toilets. One toilet, which was found in the Agora, is provided with two holes for the
baby's legs and a hole in the seat. Its detachable stand enabled its contents to be removed without disturbing the
baby.
Joyce E. Salisbury and Gregory Aldrete
Further Reading
Garland, R. Daily LIfe of the Ancient Greek s. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1998; Richter, G. The Furniture of
the Greek s, Etruscans, and Romans. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996; Rider, B. C. The Greek House: Its
History and Development from the Neolithic to the Hellenistic Age. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press,
1965.
Select Citation Style:
MLA
MLA
Salisbury, Joyce E. and Gregory Aldrete
. "Housing in Athens and Sparta." Daily Life through History. ABC-CLIO, 2013. Web. 31 Oct. 2013.
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Entry ID: 1450171