"
PRIVATE LIFE
The Athenians created so many political functions that a part of the
citizens was engaged in fulfilling them. The citizen of Athens, like
the functionary or soldier of our days, was absorbed in public
affairs. Warring and governing were the whole of his life. He spent
his days in the assembly, in the courts, in the army, at the
gymnasium, or at the market. Almost always he had a wife and children,
for his religion commanded this, but he did not live at home.
=The Children.=--When a child came into the world, the father had the
right to reject it. In this case it was laid outside the house where
it died from neglect, unless a passer-by took it and brought it up as
a slave. In this custom Athens followed all the Greeks. It was
especially the girls that were exposed to death. "A son," says a
writer of comedy, "is always raised even if the parents are in the
last stage of misery; a daughter is exposed even though the parents
are rich."
If the father accepted the child, the latter entered the family. He
was left at first in the women's apartments with the mother. The girls
remained there until the day of their marriage; the boys came out when
they were seven years old.
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