Ischomachus persuades her to give up these vanities, asking her if she will like him better if he goes about μίλτρῳ ἀλειφόμενος καὶ τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς ὑπαλειφόμενος, “anointed with red ochre, and with pigment under his eyes.”
Fig. 52.—(a) A Pyxis in the British Museum. (b) A Toilet-box in the British Museum.
[Face page 122.
White lead was commonly used for producing a fair complexion; it was prepared by laying lead in vinegar, scraping off, powdering, and heating the white rust thus formed.[209] Various substances were used for producing rouge—some mineral, some vegetable; of the latter, the root of a plant (ἔγχουσα or ἄγχουσα), certain kinds of seaweed (φῦκος), and mulberry juice (συκάμινον), were common. That some kind of pigment was used for darkening the eyelids is further testified by Pollux[210] and Aristophanes.[211] Lamp-black and a sulphuret of antimony (στίμμις), were used for blackening eyebrows and eyelids. Perfumed powders and unguents were used for skin and hair, scented with myrrh or roses or other products. The simplest and most common unguent was, of course, olive oil. In addition to artificial complexions, we learn that false hair and wigs (πηνίκη, προκομίον), were not unknown, and that these came from the East.[212]
Many examples have survived of the various articles pertaining to the equipment of a Greek lady’s toilet-table. Combs, hair-pins, mirrors, boxes, and bottles are numerous in our museums. Combs are usually made of ivory or bone, with a double row of rather fine teeth. Hair-pins of bone, ivory, or metal consist of a single pin with an ornamental head. Mirrors are of highly polished metal, usually bronze, though some have been found in silver. The mirrors may be divided into two classes—disk-mirrors and box-mirrors. The former consists of a single disk polished on one side, the reverse being usually engraved. The disk is furnished with a handle, which is sometimes so constructed that it can serve also as a foot; the mirror can so be made to stand on a table. The handle of a mirror of this kind very frequently takes the form of a human figure.[213] The box-mirror consists of two disks, the lower one, with its polished upper surface, serving as the mirror, the upper one as a cover to protect it. The two are sometimes quite separate and fit closely on to one another, but more often they are joined by a hinge; the cover is usually ornamented with relief work, a favourite subject being Aphrodite and Eros, although other mythological scenes are also found.[214]
Fig. 53.—(a) Bronze Box Mirror—British Museum. (b) Bronze Stand Mirror—British Museum.
[Face page 124.
Of the various receptacles used for containing trinkets, hair-bands, cosmetics, and so on, the commonest is the pyxis, although we find also baskets and little square caskets represented in vase-paintings and on the Attic grave reliefs. A box for cosmetics in the British Museum is in the shape of a bird.[215] The pyxis is a circular box with a lid; its sides are sometimes straight, but more often concave, and it is frequently raised on a foot. Its material was originally boxwood, hence its name, πύξις; but the majority of those which are extant are terra-cotta, though they are known also in ivory, alabaster, and precious metals. A common subject on a terra-cotta pyxis is a toilet scene or a marriage procession.[216]