The styles of women’s hair-dressing can be best understood by looking at the statues, vases, and terracottas in the collection. A variety of ornamental kerchiefs was worn, especially a very pretty band called sphendone, “sling,” from its shape ([fig. 71]). On the bottom of Case J in the Fifth Room is a large stamnos decorated with groups of women dressed in the Ionic and Doric chitons and wearing various kinds of head-dresses. Many of the terracottas in the Sixth Room and the head of a young goddess, No. 7 in the Sculpture Gallery, illustrate the “melon” coiffure which became the mode in the fourth century.
Fashions in dress were the same in general throughout the Greek world, although of course there were local peculiarities. In Sparta boys and men often wore only a small wrap without a chiton, and young men commonly went barefoot. The women wore the Doric chiton.
FIG. 72. STRIGIL
The jewelry in use included necklaces and bracelets, rings for the ears and fingers, and pins for the hair and clothes. The Doric chiton originally required two very large pins, which were inserted with the points upwards, but they went out of use in the sixth century when the Ionic chiton came into fashion and were not worn with the later Doric chiton. The fibula or safety-pin was used throughout the Greek and Roman world. A group of these pins of various types is exhibited in Case D in the Second Room. The fibula illustrated in the head-band is in the Gold Room. Greek jewelry of the fifth and fourth centuries was frequently of great beauty. Precious stones were used but seldom until the Hellenistic period, but the excellence of Greek workmanship has rarely been equalled by other craftsmen. The Greek gentleman permitted himself only a handsome ring which was useful as a seal, and the artistic value of these engraved seal rings of gold or of gold set with a semi-precious stone has made them favorites with collectors for many centuries. The rings and gems in cases in the rooms of the Classical Wing, and the beautiful jewelry in the Gold Room are proofs of the skill of Greek workmen and the fine taste of their patrons ([fig. 70]).
FIG. 73. RAZOR
FIG. 74. ALABASTRON
Roman dress was similar to that of Greece in its principal characteristics. The clothing of women was the same as that of the Greek lady of the Hellenistic age represented in the terracotta statuettes. The Ionic chiton, made usually of wool instead of linen, and called stola, was worn in the house, but the married woman’s stola had a wide piece like a flounce sewn on at the bottom. For the street the himation, called by the Romans palla, was worn over it. The Roman citizen wore a white woolen tunic like the Greek chiton, but it was usually provided with short sleeves. Senators, knights, and free-born children had this tunic ornamented with purple stripes running from each shoulder to the bottom, both front and back. In the statue of a camillus in the Eighth Room the stripes were inlaid in silver, of which traces remain. Over this was worn the toga, corresponding to the Greek himation and arranged in the same general way. The toga, however, was usually larger than the himation and was semicircular on the lower edge. For senators, knights, and children it was ornamented with a broad purple stripe following the straight edge. Shoes and sandals of various kinds were in use; a special kind of high shoe called calceus was always worn with the toga, and the tunic, toga, and calceus formed the regulation dress for citizens in public. The toga, being a very heavy, cumbersome garment, was not worn for traveling or active work, and for these purposes there were many small wraps and longer cloaks of various shapes.