Decorations at Banquets

     When ever you think of decorating your house for a special event or holiday, what do you think about putting up? I think about putting out the nice table clothe and making my house look clean and tidy.  In Ancient Greece what did they use to decorate for their banquets and festivals? How were the rooms set up? Do they have furniture?

• The banquet is held in a large room with multiple doors and posts.
• Tall chairs were placed around the walls and the chairs were strewn with embroidered stuff made by the women.
• On the chairs the enthroned the leaders of Phaiakia were drinking and dining. This suggests that the chairs were the klines of classical Greece. A kline is related to the word recline and these chairs could be reclined upon. The seat was a frame with stretched cord about 3 feet off the ground. The frame was 5-6 feet long and 2 feet wide with an armrest on one end.
• boys of gold on pedestals held aloft bright torches of pitch pine so the banquet could be held indoors at night.

Ancient Greek Festival

     During banquets men would lean on elbow couches, making themselves more reclined.  They would be bedecked in garlands.  The couches would be in the Andron and they would be far from the door of which you entered the room.  There would be seven to nine couches in a room and they could hold up to about twenty-seven people.  The rooms were in very domestic settings.  I couldn't imagine having a party in a place like this.

     Apart of the decoration when going to a festival would be the tons of pottery.  Some items would include wine coolers, jugs, various drinking cups, and mixing vessels.  Many of these drinking potteries had scenes of festivals for the Greek god Dionysos, the god of wine.

   I feel that having these decorations at ancient festivals make the living space more lively, as opposed to an empty room with just a few tables and chairs.  Using reclining couches was a way to make people feel more comfortable in the Symposium.

Proper Etiquette in Ancient Greece

     Banquets had always been very important in the culture of the Ancient Greeks, but how exactly did one act at these festivals/banquets? What were the norms and what did they consider improper etiquette? 

     
     By the turn of the seventh century B.C. Greeks slowly showed more interest in the actual meal than just the conversation and talks of the Symposiums. “Banquets had become an elegant party during which people, leaning on comfortable pillows, reclined on the precious cloths laid over soft mattresses; a luxurious surroundings” (Ricotti). But the elegance of this period was not always like this. 

Hero eating his meal

     Some behavior that was tolerated, surprisingly, was fighting. If two men were to get in a verbal argument at a banquet, it was acceptable for the two to start to fight. This behavior was also brought up in many writings of Homer and Aeschylus. Men were also susceptible to getting very intoxicated at the banquets, also causing violent action. Aeschylus described the Homeric heroes assembling for dinner, getting so drunk that they broke their chamber pots on the head of their contestants. Since arguments and conversation were a regular thing at the symposium, it only had to be accepted as normal behavior and not taken as a bad thing. 

Men in conversation at the Symposium

     Although some rowdy behavior happened at the banquets, home life and meal times where completely different for the Greeks. They had three meals a day, not unlike us today; breakfast, lunch and dinner. Lunch was always eaten around noon or early afternoon and dinner was at nightfall. Unlike how we eat our meals today, men and women of Ancient Greece ate their meals separately from one another and if the house was too small for them to eat in separate rooms, the man would eat first followed by the woman and children. After everyone else was finished with their meal, the slave, if any, could then eat. The use of forks was not known at this time so people ate their meals with their hands. Although they did have knives to cut their meats.  

Setting Up Dinner

Woman and Child eating in separate room

    

     In manys ways these ideas have been passed on to our generation, such as the “three meals a day”, but could you imagine verbally arguing and starting a fight at your dinner table?

Source:

http://www.espr-archeologia.it/GoodandBadtablemanners