The antiquated notion of white having been the universal color of Greek garments, a colored dress being considered immodest, has been refuted by Becker. It is, however, likely that, with the cloak-like epiblememata, white was the usual color, as is still the case amongst Oriental nations much exposed to the sun. Brown cloaks are, however, by no means unusual; neither were they amongst Greek men. Party-colored Oriental garments were also used, at least by the wealthy Greek classes, both for male and female dresses, while white still remained the favorite color with modest Greek women. This is proved, not to mention written evidence, by a number of small painted statuettes of burnt clay, as also by several pictures on lekythoi from Attic graves. The original colors of the dresses, although (particularly the reds) slightly altered from the burning process, may still be distinctly recognized.
The dresses were frequently adorned with interwoven patterns, or attached borders and embroideries. From Babylon and Phrygia, the ancient seats of the weaving and embroidering arts, these crafts spread over the occidental world, the name "Phrygiones," used in Rome at a later period for artists of this kind, reminding one of this origin. As we learn from the monuments, the simplest border either woven or sewed to the dresses, consisted of one or more dark stripes, either parallel with the seams of the chiton, himation, and ampechonion, or running down to the hem of the chiton from the girdle at the sides or from the throat in front. The vertical ornaments correspond to the Roman clavus. Besides these ornaments in stripes, we also meet with others broader and more complicated; whether woven into, or sewed on, the dress seems doubtful. They cover the chiton from the hem upwards to the knee, and above the girdle up to the neck, as is seen in the chiton worn by the spring goddess Opora, in a vase-painting. The whole chiton is sometimes covered with star or dice patterns, particularly on vases of the archaic style. The vase-painters of the decaying period chiefly represent Phrygian dresses with gold fringes and sumptuous embroideries of palmetto and "meandering" patterns, such as were worn by the luxurious South-Italian Greeks. Such a sumptuous dress is worn by Medea in a picture of the death of Talos on an Apulian amphora in the Jatta collection at Ruvo. In the same picture the chitones of Kastor and Polydeukes, and those of the Argonautai, are covered with palmetto embroideries, the edges at the bottom showing mythological scenes on the dark ground.
STONE SET BROOCHES
In the cities Greeks walked mostly bareheaded, owing most likely to the more plentiful hair of southern nations, which, moreover, was cultivated by the Greeks with particular care. Travelers, hunters, and such artificers as were particularly exposed to the sun, used light coverings for their heads. The different forms of these may be classified. They were made of the skins of dogs, weasels, or cows.
The hair is considered in Homer as one of the greatest signs of male beauty among the long-haired Achaioi; no less were the well-arranged locks of maidens and women praised by the tragic poets. Among the Spartans it became a sacred custom, derived from the laws of Lykurgos, to let the hair of the boy grow as soon as he reached the age of the ephebos, while up to that time it was cut short. This custom prevailed among the Spartans up to their being overpowered by the Achaic federation. Altogether the Dorian character did not admit of much attention being paid to the arrangement of the hair. Only on solemn occasions, for instance on the eve of the battle of Thermopylæ, the Spartans arranged their hair with particular care.
At Athens, about the time of the Persian wars, men used to wear their hair long, tied on to the top of the head in a knot, which was fastened by a hair-pin in the form of a cicada. Of this custom, however, the monuments offer no example. Only in the pictures of two Pankratiastai, on a monument dating most likely from Roman times, we discover an analogy to this old Attic custom. After the Persian war, when the dress and manners of the Ionians had undergone a change, it became the custom to cut off the long hair of the boys on their attaining the age of epheboi, and devote it as an offering to a god, for instance, to the Delphic Apollo or some local river-god. Attic citizens, however, by no means wore their hair cropped short, like their slaves, but used to let it grow according to their own taste or the common fashion. Only dandies, as, for instance, Alkibiades, let their hair fall down to their shoulders in long locks. Philosophers also occasionally attempted to revive old customs by wearing their hair long.
The beard was carefully attended to by the Greeks. The barber's shop, with its talkative inmate, was not only frequented by those requiring the services of the barber in cutting the hair, shaving, cutting the nails and corns, and tearing out small hairs, but it was also, as Plutarch says, a symposion without wine, where political and local news were discussed. Alkiphron depicts a Greek barber in the following words: "You see how the d——d barber in yon street has treated me; the talker, who puts up the Brundisian looking-glass, and makes his knives to clash harmoniously. I went to him to be shaved; he received me politely, put me in a high chair, enveloped me in a clean towel, and stroked the razor gently down my cheek, so as to remove the thick hair. But this was a malicious trick of his. He did it partly, not all over the chin; some places he left rough, others he made smooth without my noticing it." After the time of Alexander the Great, a barber's business became lucrative, owing to the custom of wearing a full beard being abandoned, notwithstanding the remonstrances of several states.22 In works of art, particularly in portrait statues, the beard is always treated as an individual characteristic. It is mostly arranged in graceful locks, and covers the chin, lips and cheeks, without a separation being made between whiskers and moustache. Only in archaic renderings the wedge-like beard is combed in long wavy lines, and the whiskers are strictly parted from the moustache. As an example we quote the nobly formed head of Zeus crowned with the stephane in the Talleyrand collection. The usual color of the hair being dark, fair hair was considered a great beauty. Homer gives yellow locks to Menelaos, Achilles, and Meleagros; and Euripides describes Menelaos and Dionysos as fair-haired.
The head-dress of women was in simple taste. Hats were not worn, as a rule, because, at least in Athens, the appearance of women in the public street was considered improper, and therefore happened only on exceptional occasions. On journeys women wore a light broad-brimmed petasos as a protection from the sun. With a Thessalian hat of this kind Ismene appears in "Œdipus in Kolonos." The head-dress of Athenian ladies at home and in the street consisted, beyond the customary veil, chiefly of different contrivances for holding together their plentiful hair. We mentioned before, that the himation was sometimes pulled over the back of the head like a veil. But at a very early period Greek women wore much shorter or longer veils, which covered the face up to the eyes, and fell over the neck and back in large folds, so as to cover, if necessary, the whole upper part of the body. The care bestowed on the hair was naturally still greater amongst women than amongst men. Cut shows a number of heads of Athenian women, taken from an old painting of Pompeii. These, and the numerous heads represented in sculptures and gems, give an idea of the exquisite taste of these head-dresses. At the same time, it must be confessed that most modern fashions, even the ugly ones, have their models, if not in Greek, at least in Roman antiquity. The combing of the hair over the back in wavy lines was undoubtedly much in favor. A simple ribbon tied round the head, in that case, connected the front with the back hair. This arrangement we meet with in the maidens of the Parthenon frieze and in a bust of Niobe. On older monuments, for instance, in the group of the Graces on the triangular altar in the Louvre, the front hair is arranged in small ringlets, while the back hair