The Phoenician woman, nurse to Eumaeus, gives us an instance of the nurse of an older child. She had been captured and sold as a slave to a master, whose hard bonds she feared:
ἀλλά μ’ ἀνήρπαξαν Τάφιοι ληίστορες ἄνδρες
ἀγρόθεν ἐρχομένην, πέρασαν δέ τε δεῦρ’ ἀγαγόντες
τοῦδ’ ἀνδρὸς πρὸς δώμαθ’· ὁ δ’ ἄξιον ὦνον ἔδωκε.
· · · · ·
μή τις ποτὶ δῶμα γέροντι
ἐλθὼν ἐξείπῃ, ὁ δ’ ὀϊσάμενος καταδήσῃ
δεσμῷ ἐν ἀργαλέῳ, ὑμῖν δ’ ἐπιφράσσετ’ ὄλεθρον.[[22]]
In striking contrast to this unfaithful slave is Eurycleia, the nurse of the grown son, whose rank is higher than that of the ordinary slave, for she had general supervision over the fifty female slaves of the household and assisted the mistress in teaching them:
πεντήκοντά τοί εἰσιν ἐνὶ μεγάροισι γυναῖκες