Greek dress : $b a study of the costumes worn in ancient Greece, from pre-Hellenic times to the Hellenistic ageAbrahams, Ethel Beatrice
History
Greek dress : $b a study of the costumes worn in ancient Greece, from pre-Hellenic times to the Hellenistic age
Abrahams, Ethel Beatrice
Clothing and dress -- Greece
Κομισθεὶς γὰρ ἐς τὰς Ἀθήνας ἀπήγγειλε τὸ πάθος· πυθομένας
δὲ τὰς γυναῖκας τῶν ἐπ᾽ Αἴγιναν στρατευσαμένων ἄνδρων
δεινόν τι ποιησαμένας ἐκεῖνον μοῦνον ἐξ ἀπάντων σωθῆναι,
πέριξ τὸν ἄνθρωπον τοῦτον λαβούσας καὶ κεντεύσας τῇσι
περόνῃσι τῶν ἱματίων εἰρωτᾶν ἑκάστην αὐτέων ὅ κῃ εἴη ὁ
ἑωυτῆς ἀνήρ. Καὶ τοῦτον μὲν οὕτω διαφθαρῆναι, Ἀθηναίοισι
δὲ ἔτι τοῦ πάθεος δεινότερόν τι δόξαι εἶναι τὸ τῶν γυναικῶν
ἔργον. Ἄλλῳ μὲν δὴ οὐκ ἔχειν ὅτεω ζημιώσωσι τὰς γυναῖκας,
τὴν δὲ ἐσθῆτα μετέβαλον αὐτέων ἐς τὴν Ἰάδα· ἐφόρεον γὰρ δὴ
πρὸ τοῦ αἱ τῶν Ἀθηναίων γυναῖκες ἐσθῆτα Δωρίδα τῇ Κορινθίῃ
παραπλησιωτάτην· μετέβαλον ὦν ἐς τὸν λίνεον κιθῶνα, ἵνα
δὴ περόνῃσι μὴ χρεώνται. Ἔστι δὲ ἀληθεϊ λόγῳ χρεωμένοισι
οὐκ Ἰὰς αὕτη ἡ ἐσθὴς τὸ παλαιὸν, ἀλλὰ Κάειρα, ἐπεὶ ἥ γε
Ἑλληνικὴ ἐσθῆς πᾶσα ἡ ἀρχαίη τῶν γυναικῶν ἡ αὐτὴ ἦν τὴν νῦν
Δωρίδα καλεῦμεν.
“When he came back to Athens bringing word of the calamity, the wives
of those who had been sent out on the expedition took it sorely to
heart, that he alone should have survived the slaughter of all the
rest; they therefore crowded round the man and struck him with the
brooches by which their dresses were fastened, each, as she struck,
asking him where he had left her husband. And the man died in this
way. The Athenians thought the deed of the women more horrible even
than the fate of the troops. As, however, they did not know how else
to punish them, they changed their dress, and compelled them to
wear the costume of the Ionians. Till this time the Athenian women
had worn a Dorian dress, shaped nearly like that which prevails at
Corinth. Henceforth they were made to wear the linen tunic, which
does not require brooches.
“In very truth, however, this dress is not originally Ionian, but
Carian; for anciently the Greek women all wore the costume which is
now called the Dorian.”—RAWLINSON.
[79] v., 87.
He goes on to say that after this the Argive and Æginetan women, out
of rivalry with the Athenians, wore much larger brooches than before.
The importance of the passage is that it tells us of the two types of
dress worn by Greek women. We learn that down to the early years of
the sixth century all the Greek women wore the Dorian dress fastened
with pins of such size and strength that they could become dangerous
weapons in the hands of women excited by grief or passion. Later the
Athenian women adopted a different dress, which did not need these
large pins to fasten it, and which Herodotus calls the linen Ionic
chiton, afterwards correcting himself and explaining that this kind
of dress was really Carian in its origin.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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