oikos

The Ancient Greek word oikos (Ancient Greek: (pronunciation oi•kos<ref name= oi-note >Note: approximately, and still certainly a diphthong. (For Attic Greek, spelling is still a reliable guide to pronunciation for the ⟨⟩ form.)</ref>); plural: ; English prefix: eco- in (eg) ecology and economics) referred to three related but distinct concepts: the family, the family's property, and the house. Its meaning shifts even within texts. The oikos was the basic unit of society in most Greek city-states. In normal Attic usage the oikos, in the context of families, referred to a line of descent from father to son from generation to generation.<ref name= MacDowell > </ref> Alternatively, as Aristotle used it in his Politics, the term was sometimes used to refer to everybody living in a given house. Thus, the head of the oikos, along with his immediate family and his slaves, would all be encompassed.<ref name= Cox > </ref> Large oikoi also had farms that were usually tended by the slaves, which were also the basic agricultural unit of the ancient Greek economy. Layout Traditional interpretations of the layout of the oikos in Classical Athens have divided into men's and women's spaces, with an area known as the gynaikon or gynaikonitis associated with women's activities such as cooking and textiles work,<ref name= Morris > </ref> and an area restricted to men called the andron.<ref name= Nevett > </ref> In Lysias' speech On the Murder of Eratosthenes, the women's rooms were said to be situated above the men's quarters,<ref name= Lysias > Lysias, I.9, I.33 </ref> while in Xenophon the women's and men's quarters are next to one another.<ref name= Xenophon > Xenophon, Oeconomicos (Oeconomus), ix.5, 7.35–7 </ref>