Ancient Greek Housing

Provides an accessible and extensively illustrated introduction to housing and domestic life in the ancient Greek world.

Lisa C. Nevett (Author)

9780521198721, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 25 May 2023

370 pages
26 x 17.5 x 2 cm, 0.81 kg

The temples and theatres of the ancient Greek world are widely known, but there is less familiarity with the houses in which people lived. In this book, Lisa Nevett provides an accessible introduction to the varied forms of housing found across the Greek world between c. 1000 and 200 BCE. Many houses adopted a courtyard structure which she sets within a broader chronological, geographical and socio-economic context. The book explores how housing shaped - and was shaped by – patterns of domestic life, at Athens and in other urban communities. It also points to a rapid change in the scale, elaboration and layout of the largest houses. This is associated with a shift away from expressing solidarity with peers in the local urban community towards advertising personal status and participation in a network of elite households which stretched across the Mediterranean. Instructors, students and general readers will welcome this stimulating volume.

1. Introducing ancient Greek housing
2. Greek domestic architecture ca. 950–500 BCE: re-inventing the house
3. Classical Athens and Attica: the anatomy of housing in a city and its territory
4. Housing in mainland Greece during the classical period: towards a shared ideal?
5. Housing Greek households in the eastern, western and southern Mediterranean and northern Black Sea littoral: the boundaries of an ideal?
6. Housing, power and wealth in Greek communities during the late classical and early Hellenistic periods: stretching the ideal?
7. Greek housing into the Hellenistic period: the transformation of an ideal?
Epilogue: the single-entrance, courtyard house and beyond.

Subject Areas: Classical Greek & Roman archaeology [HDDK], Classical history / classical civilisation [HBLA1], Ancient history: to c 500 CE [HBLA]