182 BARBARA TSAKIRgIS
some inscriptions (e.g., IG ii^2 1570 lines 24–6) also attest that linen was bought
at market.
Let us recall that several sites – Athens, Olynthus, Halos, and Halieis – offer
evidence that textiles were produced in the home but also were manufactured
on a larger scale in ergasteria. The fact that sixty-seven houses at Olynthus
lacked tools for textile manufacture might indicate that the residents were
able to flee with their weights and whorls or, as Cahill ( 2002 : 179) has argued,
that the Olynthians resident in these houses were wealthy enough to purchase
clothes and textiles made by others and so did not need whorls and weights for
private manufacture. That clothing and domestic furnishings were purchased
outside of the home is attested by numerous sources. Someone bought the
confiscated items first auctioned by the poletai and then recorded in the lists
on the Attic Stelai. Of course, this kind of sale was not an everyday event, so
clothing was purchased in other places. The majority of our sources for the sale
of clothing and other textiles are the comic playwrights, although Xenophon
(Mem. 2.7.6) speaks of Demeas the cape-maker in the deme of Kollytos and
Menon the cloak-maker. A character in Aristophanes’ Wealth (507–34) com-
plains that if all were rich, no one would work, and nothing would be for sale,
including coverlets. Pollux (7.191;10.39) notes male weavers of cushions, and
IG (ii^2 2403) lists male weavers of baskets and bags, both presumably employed
in textile factories. Hermippus (fr. 63 K-A) mentions Carthaginian carpets and
richly colored pillows for sale in the market.
Having blanketed the reader with data, let me attempt here to tease out
some of the separate threads of this vast skein of information. That weaving
took place in Greek houses is no surprise; we knew that already. What we are
increasingly learning, however, as weights and whorls are better and more con-
sistently published, is that there is some disparity from house to house in the
quantity of weights found. Doubtless some of these differences are due to the
caprices of preservation – the varying conditions that led to the preservation of
some remains and the destruction of others. But, as the sample size gets larger,
we are able to make some intriguing comparisons and contrasts.
Weaving for the immediate family needs existed in many Greek houses;
surplus cloth or thread would likely have been purchased by more wealthy
Greeks, especially those who owned numerous slaves involved in manufacture
or labor outside of the textile industry. Depending on the number of people
involved in spinning and weaving, extra cloth and garments could be woven
from time to time and tucked away for barter or sale in lean years. The situa-
tion was analogous to that argued for food and other subsistence commodi-
ties hoarded as provisions for survival in times of need (Gallant 1991 ). In her
study of Xenophon’s Oeconomicus, Pomeroy ( 1989 : 36) notes that the textiles
of many a modern dowry are part of the household wealth, held in case the