Monogamy was early established in Greece as the basis of society. There were some instances of polygamy or rather concubinage in the early ages and on some occasions where large number of men were lost in war or from other causes. This might have been resorted to in order to replenish the state but this was of rare occurrence.
In early times in Greece divorce was in the hands of the husband and he could exercise it whenever he felt that he was justified but in later times this right was somewhat restricted. The Spartans seldom divorced their wives. In Athens divorce was easy for the man, but a bill of divorce was required to be presented to the magistrate in which the reasons for the divorce were set forth. They would, no doubt, have been more frequent had it not been that in divorce the husband had to restore the dowry to the wife or pay her a sum each month for her support. For a man to divorce his wife was considered a great dishonor to her. It was difficult for a woman to procure a divorce, Athens being more favorable to women in this respect than the other states of Greece. But here she had to present a bill of grievances to the magistrate and it required his action before separation could take place. "The terms expressing the separation of men and women from each other were different. The men were said to dismiss their wives; to loose them from their obligations; to cast them out; to send them away; to put them away. If a woman left her husband, it was termed simply to depart from him."[164]
Dress.
Boys commonly wore only the chiton. The young men, from the age of seventeen to twenty, called the ephebi, instead of the himation wore the chlamys, which was an oblong cloth, thrown over the left shoulder and the open ends were fastened over the right shoulder with a clasp. The himation of Sparta was smaller than that at Athens, scarcely covering the person, and which was called the tribon. The women wore the chiton and the himation and in addition they wore another garment over the chiton, called the crocotos, which sometimes had sleeves and was of a rich purple or saffron color and frequently had a broad border of embroidery. The Doric maidens usually wore but a single loose woolen garment. It was without sleeves and fastened over the shoulders with clasps. It usually extended about half way to the knees, it was worn with or without a girdle, and the left side was left open, which might or might not have been fastened with a buckle or clasp.
The garments were made of linen, cotton, or wool, and in later times silk also was used. White was, perhaps, the prevailing color and yet many colors were used, as, purple, red, green, yellow, gray, brown, olive, azure, cherry, and changeable colors. If the entire dress was not colored, it might have had colored borders, embroidery, or stripes, worked in or sewed on, and sometimes there were fringes or tassels. The undergarment, in time of mourning, was sometimes black.
The Greeks, both men and women, were especially careful of the hair. The men wore their hair and beard long and they had the hair curled or braided and bound up in a large bunch on top of the head or it might be arranged along the forehead and kept in place with golden grasshoppers. Dandies went to extremes and let their hair grow till it fell down on the shoulders. Most of the men had thick hair. In the cities the men usually went bareheaded but sometimes they wore hats or caps, when at work and on journeys.
The Grecian women for the most part had long, rich hair and, naturally, they took even more care of it than did the men with their hair. Sometimes it was allowed to fall loosely down the back; sometimes the hair was combed over the back in waving lines and a ribbon tied around the head; it might be that the front hair was combed back over the temples and ears and tied at the back of the head in a knot, held in place with hairpins of ivory, bronze, bone, gold, or silver; and there were many other ways of keeping the hair.
The hair of children was carefully attended to. The girls' hair was often twisted into artistic curls and then drawn together over the forehead and held by a fancy comb. In Sparta the boys' hair was kept short till their majority had been reached, when it was allowed to grow long. Among the Athenians the hair of the boys was permitted to grow till they had reached maturity, when it was cut off and burned to some deity, after which it was allowed to grow long again.
There were oils, perfumes, ointments, and essences for the hair. Curling-irons were in use for curling the hair. Powders were used on the hair and especially the kind that gave it an auburn color. There were dyes for the hair and they were well resorted to. Nets were used by the ladies to enclose their hair, and veils of a light fabric and of transparent texture were worn. On festive occasions wreaths and garlands were worn by both men and women.
Among the Greeks the hands were not usually covered, gloves rarely being worn. The feet were not covered in the house and even sometimes in the street there was no covering to the feet. There was a great variety of foot-wear from the simple sandal to the high boot, the three main kinds being the sandal, the shoe, and the boot.