Potters and jewelers andshoemakers and smiths and millers and tavernkeepers and all the other artisanswhose work helped keep Rhodes prosperous had their shops in the front part ofthe buildings in which they and their households also lived. Some of themsteadily kept whatever they did for a living. Others made periodic forays outinto the street in search of customers.

"Here -  look at myfine terracottas!" cried a potter -  or would he think of himself as asculptor? Sostratos didn't know. He didn't much care, either. He hoped thefellow made better pots than burnt-clay images. If he didn't, his wife andchildren would starve.

"Coming out!"somebody else shouted, this time from a second-story window. Sostratos andMenedemos sprang back in a hurry. So did everyone else close by. The odorouscontents of a slops jar splashed down in the middle of the street. Somebody whodidn't spring back fast enough -  and who got his mantle splattered as a result-  shook his fist at the window, whose wooden shutters were now closed again.

More men than womenstrode the streets. Respectable wives and maidens spent most of the time in thewomen's quarters of their houses. They sent slaves out to shop and run errandsfor them. Poor men's wives -  the women in families that had no slaves of theirown -  had to go out by and for themselves. Some were brazen, or simplyresigned to it. Others wore shawls and veils to protect themselves from pryingeyes.

"Don't you wonderwhat they look like?  - under all that stuff, I mean," Menedemos saidafter such a woman walked past. "Puts charcoal on my brazier just thinkingabout it."

"If you did seeher, you'd probably think she was ugly," Sostratos said. "For all youknow, she's a grandmother."

"Maybe," hiscousin admitted. "But for all I know, she could be Helen of Troy come backto earth again, or Aphrodite slumming among us poor mortals. In my imagination,she is."