convincing. And for a tainted village girl there was no alternative but life as a spinster, going from door to door doing chores in exchange for food.
A woman named Vasilo from the neighboring village of Babouri had been seduced by her mother’s brother while the family slept, all crowded together on their pallets under shared sleeping rugs. Only fourteen, as ignorant of sex as any village girl, she didn’t realize what had happened until her belly started to swell under the shapeless black homespun. The baby was born by the side of the road and left there as the mother, bleeding and hysterical, ran screaming into the woods where she was finally found. The uncle was never seen again. The villagers composed a humorous song about her, suggesting that she throw herself off a cliff, but she was now huddled in the cave, her face still a child’s, one of the shadow women who had broken the village code.
Even an unblemished bride might find herself deserted. There were many temptations for the tinkers and coopers, who traveled for six months at a time. The traditional journeys were becoming more extended, some men going to Egypt and South Africa; some, like Christos, as far as America, returning now and then to father a child. Some never came back. Anastasia Yakou, Eleni’s neighbor in the Perivoli, had lost her husband to the flesh-pots of Kalambaka when her two girls were babies. Eleni often hired Anastasia to help with housekeeping and planting chores, and the sight of the ragged Yakou girls was a constant reminder of what would happen if Christos forgot them.
But no matter how far the men went and for how long, it was the responsibility of the women, their roots deep in the earth, to protect the family name and the village traditions. Anastasia Lollis had married in 1911 and lived with her husband only a year before he sailed off to America, where, returnees said, he had acquired a wife and family in Chicago. But Anastasia still waited for his return and would continue to wait for more than seventy years.
Women went into labor and gave birth alone, or tried to abort themselves with herbs, wooden stakes and heavy rocks if a pregnancy occurred during a husband’s long absence. Even if the seducer was a bride’s father-in-law, the ruler of her household, she would get no mercy. Many women died in labor despite the best efforts of the village midwife. Eudoxia Kolokithi had labored for five days, exhausting eighteen neighborhood women who took turns holding her upright in their embrace while the midwife worked, but in the end they took the baby out of her in pieces as with a calf-bound cow.
Eleni’s sister-in-law Chryso, first wife of Foto Gatzoyiannis, captured the eye of a Turkish peddler with her beauty in 1909. When Foto heard of the Turk’s offer of a gold sovereign for a night with his wife, he shot the peddler dead. But Foto lost his young wife early, when she died trying to give birth to twins, who were buried in the same shroud as their mother. Unlucky in death as in life, Chryso was found turned when they dug her up, convincing the villagers that she had awakened in the grave. Foto was not one to mourn, though. He had already married Alexo, who would give him nine more children.
Chryso’s death, Anastasia’s abandonment, Vasilo’s disgrace were all threads in the tapestry of village life, but for Eleni it was her mother-in-law, Fotini, who wove the threads into a pattern so that she could understand the proper behavior for a woman who was
taxidimeni
—the property of an absent husband.
A village wife was constantly reminded that she was her husband’s property. From her wedding day the villagers addressed her by the feminine form of her husband’s name: “Nikolina” (Nikola’s woman), “Tassina” (Tasso’s woman), “Papadia” (the priest’s woman), so that everyone nearly forgot their real first names. Eleni’s friends sometimes called her “Kitchina” (Christos’ woman), but the village had
A woman named Vasilo from the neighboring village of Babouri had been seduced by her mother’s brother while the family slept, all crowded together on their pallets under shared sleeping rugs. Only fourteen, as ignorant of sex as any village girl, she didn’t realize what had happened until her belly started to swell under the shapeless black homespun. The baby was born by the side of the road and left there as the mother, bleeding and hysterical, ran screaming into the woods where she was finally found. The uncle was never seen again. The villagers composed a humorous song about her, suggesting that she throw herself off a cliff, but she was now huddled in the cave, her face still a child’s, one of the shadow women who had broken the village code.
Even an unblemished bride might find herself deserted. There were many temptations for the tinkers and coopers, who traveled for six months at a time. The traditional journeys were becoming more extended, some men going to Egypt and South Africa; some, like Christos, as far as America, returning now and then to father a child. Some never came back. Anastasia Yakou, Eleni’s neighbor in the Perivoli, had lost her husband to the flesh-pots of Kalambaka when her two girls were babies. Eleni often hired Anastasia to help with housekeeping and planting chores, and the sight of the ragged Yakou girls was a constant reminder of what would happen if Christos forgot them.
But no matter how far the men went and for how long, it was the responsibility of the women, their roots deep in the earth, to protect the family name and the village traditions. Anastasia Lollis had married in 1911 and lived with her husband only a year before he sailed off to America, where, returnees said, he had acquired a wife and family in Chicago. But Anastasia still waited for his return and would continue to wait for more than seventy years.
Women went into labor and gave birth alone, or tried to abort themselves with herbs, wooden stakes and heavy rocks if a pregnancy occurred during a husband’s long absence. Even if the seducer was a bride’s father-in-law, the ruler of her household, she would get no mercy. Many women died in labor despite the best efforts of the village midwife. Eudoxia Kolokithi had labored for five days, exhausting eighteen neighborhood women who took turns holding her upright in their embrace while the midwife worked, but in the end they took the baby out of her in pieces as with a calf-bound cow.
Eleni’s sister-in-law Chryso, first wife of Foto Gatzoyiannis, captured the eye of a Turkish peddler with her beauty in 1909. When Foto heard of the Turk’s offer of a gold sovereign for a night with his wife, he shot the peddler dead. But Foto lost his young wife early, when she died trying to give birth to twins, who were buried in the same shroud as their mother. Unlucky in death as in life, Chryso was found turned when they dug her up, convincing the villagers that she had awakened in the grave. Foto was not one to mourn, though. He had already married Alexo, who would give him nine more children.
Chryso’s death, Anastasia’s abandonment, Vasilo’s disgrace were all threads in the tapestry of village life, but for Eleni it was her mother-in-law, Fotini, who wove the threads into a pattern so that she could understand the proper behavior for a woman who was
taxidimeni
—the property of an absent husband.
A village wife was constantly reminded that she was her husband’s property. From her wedding day the villagers addressed her by the feminine form of her husband’s name: “Nikolina” (Nikola’s woman), “Tassina” (Tasso’s woman), “Papadia” (the priest’s woman), so that everyone nearly forgot their real first names. Eleni’s friends sometimes called her “Kitchina” (Christos’ woman), but the village had
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