Most sacrifices connected with the slaughtering of animals were followed by a festive banquet, at which the flesh of the victims constituted the principal dish, and thus the wedding sacrifice also was followed by a feast, which was generally held at the house of the bride’s father. As this must, according to custom, have taken place in the afternoon, we may assume that the other wedding ceremonies had been performed in the morning. The wedding banquet was one of the few occasions when men and women dined together; this generally occurred only in most intimate family circles, but not when guests were present. The luxury of these wedding banquets seems to have increased so much that the State was at last obliged to limit the number of guests by law. Plato would not have allowed husband and wife to invite more than five friends and five relations each--that is, twenty in all--on any occasion, whether a wedding or otherwise; and a statute of the fourth century B.C. makes thirty the maximum limit for weddings, and instructs the officials who had charge of the women (γυναικόνομοι) to see that this rule is not infringed; and they seem to have carried out their office so strictly that on these occasions they often entered the house, counted the guests, and turned out all who exceeded the legal number. At the banquet, as well as at the sacrifice which preceded it, the bride appeared in all her bridal adornments. Some female relation or friend who took the part of a modern bridesmaid (νυμφευτρíα) undertook to deck the bride and anoint her with costly essences, and dress her in clothes of some fine, probably coloured, material, while special shoes, ribbons, and flowers in the hair were regarded as important, as well as the veil, which was the special mark of the bride, and covered the head, falling low down and partly covering the face. The bridegroom, too, appeared in a festive white dress, which differed from his ordinary clothing chiefly by the fineness of material; he, too, wore a wreath, as did all the other guests at the banquet; but special flowers, supposed to be of fortunate omen, were worn by the bride and bridegroom. We do not hear of any special dishes supplied at weddings, but cakes, to which the Greeks assigned a symbolical connection with festive occasions, played an important part, and in particular cakes of sesame found a place at the wedding banquet. A special custom peculiar to Athens was for a boy, both of whose parents must be alive, to go round wreathed with hawthorn or acorns carrying a basket of cakes, singing, “I fled from misfortune, I found a better lot.”