The festival begins with a sacrifice, and is followed by the solemnity in which mother and child, who, according to ancient notions, are regarded as unclean by the act of birth, are purified or cleansed, along with all who have come in contact with the mother. This part of the ceremony is the real "Amphidromia" (literally "running round"). The nurse takes the child on her arm, and, followed by the mother and all who have come in contact with her, runs several times round the family hearth, which, according to ancient tradition, represents the sacred centre of the dwelling. Probably this was accompanied by sprinkling with holy water. At the banquet the relations and friends of the family appear in great numbers. In their presence the father announces the name which he has chosen for the child. After this all take their places at the banquet, even the women, who, as a rule, do not take part in the meals of the men. The standing dishes on this occasion are toasted cheese and radishes with oil; but there is no lack of excellent meat dishes such as breast of lamb, thrushes, pigeons, and other dainties, as well as the popular cuttle-fish. A good deal of wine is drunk, mixed with less water than is generally the custom. Music and dancing accompany the banquet, which extends far into the night.
The first years of his life were spent by the little boy in the nursery, in which things went on in much the same way as with us. During this period boys and girls alike were under the supervision of mother and nurse. If the baby had bad nights and could not sleep, the Athenian mother took him in her arms just as a modern one would do, and carried him up and down the room, rocking him, and singing some cradle song like that which Alcmene sings to her children in Theocritus:--
"Sleep, children mine, a light luxurious sleep. Brother with brother: sleep, my boys, my life: Blest in your slumber, in your waking blest."[A]
At night a little lamp burnt in the nursery. Although, as a rule, in small houses the apartments for the men were below and those for the women and children in the upper storeys, yet it was customary for the women to move into the lower rooms for a time after the birth of a child, partly in order that they might be near the bath-room, which was necessary both for mother and child. During the first years of their life the children had a tepid bath every day; later on, every three or four days; many mothers even went so far as to give them three baths a day. When the child had to be weaned, they first of all gave it broth sweetened with honey, which, in olden time, took the place of our sugar, and then gradually more solid food, which the nurse seems to have chewed for the child before it had teeth enough to do this itself. Aristophanes gives us further details about Greek nurseries, and even quotes the sounds first uttered by Athenian children to make known their various wants.