Ancient History Pamphlets Volume 2 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1921 edition. Excerpt: ...reduplication beside 6rjrf, "mother's breast." As to the word rpod?, Herodianus (I, 225, 1. 11, Lentz) refers it to Tpefa). Hesychius1 contrasts it with 6pip.p, a, "nursling." Pollux (1. c.) seems to distinguish Tpo(f6; and fiala and to take the latter as meaning more strictly, "Ea quae lactat," as Stephanus remarks in his Thesaurus. Various meanings were attached to the word fiala. Besides its use as "mid-wife," it was employed as a form of address in speaking to nurses: tl d Syt Hi) p-M, pala ixij.13 pout, 6t v ficv &ipa Kai dvifUtKu irp avayKfl.1 fiala, TraKiv fiov xpinov KMpukap.TM The signification was even extended to embrace the true mother, as attested by Euripides, Alcestis 393, where the child says of its mother: p.cua 8rj Koltq f3e/3a.Kv. To distinguish accurately and sharply between the different words for nurse is not our present purpose. Doubtless the differences between them were not broad and clear even to the Greeks themselves. rpof6i seems to be employed as the generic term, while Tct07 is generally used for "wet-nurse" andT/o ds and Ttdijvrj for "nursery-maid." 18 Lexicon, s. v. XQocpol. "Od., xxiii, 171. Of. xxiii, 35, 81, 11; xix, 482, 500, etc. 14 Homeric Hymn Dem., 147. 15 Euripides, Hipp., 243. CHAPTER II SOCIAL STATUS OF THE NURSE From Homer to Herodotus The Homeric poems deal wholly with the life of the upper classes. Hence we do not get from them a complete picture of how all classes lived. Even for the aristocrat therein described, the habits of life were simple. Mothers nursed their own children: thus Hecuba speaks to her son, Hector: "Eicrop, Tikvov (fiov, rait r aldto xai /i" fkt'ijaov avT7)V, el jroTf Toi a6iKrjSta...