Throughout the Greek nation, the peasants live in their houses in villages and not on separate estates. They help one another to avoid the expense of hired labour, and themselves work for hire on the estates of the large proprietors.
The open field system in Homer.
Professor Ridgeway has drawn attention to the knowledge of this open field system in the Iliad and Odyssey;[204] and indeed the division of the land tilled by occupants of villages into small pieces or strips, in such a way that the holding of each consists of a number of isolated pieces lying promiscuously amongst the strips of others, over the whole area under plough, is a world-wide custom and is the habit alike of the east as of the west.
Though the assertion cannot yet be made that the κλῆρος was thus arranged on the soil, it can do no harm at any rate to bear in mind this ancient and still used method of dividing land, whilst considering the question of the relation of the ownership of the soil to the rank and status of the tribesman.
§ 2. The Relation Of The Κλῆρος To The Οἶκος.
Ownership of the κλῆρος vested in the head of the οἶκος.
The connection of the possession of land with the headship of the family finds its counterpart in the right of maintenance of those who had the true blood of that family. And in those countries where the sons remained until their father's death under his patria potestas they had to look to him for maintenance [pg 089] derived from the κλῆρος which descended to him as the means of sustenance for himself and his family. Where the head of the family alone was responsible for the rites to the dead at the family altars, the position of a son would always be incomplete if he tried to establish during his father's lifetime a hearth and household of his own. And it has been already mentioned that it was necessary to emancipate a son from the family of his own father, before he could take property, passing on the death of his mother's relations to her issue, and assume his rightful position as their representative and the living head of their household.[205]
According to Harpocration, the initiation into the mysteries of the hearth only took place on the actual assumption of the inheritance.[206]
Dependence of other members of the οἶκος.