Dinner with Helen and Argia Chapter 16.3

Dinner Time

With everybody sitting around the dinner table, I introduced my two fiancés to the family “Everybody this is Princess Helen Agiad of Sparta and Princess Argia of Thebes both of which I am engaged to be married.”  With the two of them already knowing everybody in the room, I only had to formally introduce my father Xanthippus.

Bewildered, my father asked “Son, weren’t you going to marry Princess Pallene of Thrace?  I don’t understand.”

Sitting down, I explained “That’s right Father, I will be marrying Pallene in Thrace after this school year if she chooses to continue our relationship and be my wife.  I will be doing the same thing with Helen in Sparta and Argia in Thebes if they are happy with our relationship and choose to live their lives as my wives.  By the way, my fiancé Pallene will be coming tomorrow night to dinner to introduce herself to the family, so everybody please be present.”

At this point, Helen piped in “Actually, Pericles, I already wrote my father and told him to register our marriage in Sparta.  From what I’ve seen, having already have been in a relationship with you for this long, I couldn’t imagine spending the rest of my life without you.  I certainly don’t need to wait until the end of the year or graduation from Athena Academy to figure out whether or not I want to marry you.  You are actually currently second in line to become King of Sparta.”

As Helen finished her comment, Argia raised her hand, stating “Uhm, I also wrote my father the day after we agreed to marry, and told him that I wouldn’t accept any other man than you as my husband, asking him to register me as your wife.  You are currently, next in line as the King of Thebes.”  Shocking both my father and I.

After recovering my demeanor, I Raised my wine glass, proclaiming “Well in light of that, here is to a happy life together with me and my wives!” prompting everyone to drink, some heavier than others, notably my father…

Suddenly remembering, I continued “Ooh, I wanted to let you all know.  Last week, Aglaia, my work wife, and I were able to convince her mother Eurydikea Medontidae, that you know well father, to put up a proper dowry for us to be married here in Athens.  I really think she will follow through and our children will be the descendants that continue our family line.”  Though I finished with a big smile, father for some reason accidentally dropped his wine cup on the floor and looked away into the distance with an unfocused gaze.

At that point in time, Alcyone came into the room with plates of the main dish, and after setting them down on the table in front of father and our guests, she replaced father’s wine cup with another before giving him several pats on the head and a kiss on the forehead, telling him “It will be alright and everything will work out…” as she sat down in her spot.

The maids then brought in plates of pan-seared delicate, flakey grouper fillets topped with a flavor-packed combination of lemons, briny green olives, and capers, which they set in front of everybody’s place.  All of us already had bowls of Horiatiki salad made with tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, olives, virgin olive oil, fresh oregano, and of course a slice of creamy feta cheese on top.

Besides a bowl of gorgeous steamed fresh vegetables from the garden, there was also a pan with Patates sto Fourno which are potatoes roasted with olive oil, lemon juice, and oregano until crispy and golden brown as a side dish.

As dinner got well underway, Father asked me “So what is it that you are planning to do with all that political power you are accumulating, do you plan on declaring yourself King of Athens?”

Briefly regarding him questioningly, I replied “What a pain that would be, didn’t the Tyrant Peisistratus already prove to us that Athens is not rulable without the help of an elected bureaucracy?  Besides, I think you and the other Archons are doing a perfectly fine job, unless there is some problem I don’t know about.”

Regarding me closely, Father went on to state “If you marry these two, with the help of Sparta and Thebes you could go on to rule all of Greece.” Ending with a wry smile.

Smiling at my father, I told him a little about some of the things I had been thinking “I would like to see Greece become an actual kingdom, rather than a bunch of warring, bickering tribes and city states ruled by individuals, all of which call themselves kings.  Though, I do think without a doubt that Greece will eventually become a democracy like Athens, I think it needs to transition into a unified kingdom first with a hierarchy of nobility based on population and military power.”

“I also think that there should be a separation of power between nobility with a divine right to rule as descendants of the gods, and the common citizens.  Ideally, there should be a lower house of commoners elected democratically and a guiding upper house of nobles that decides laws in this hypothetical country.  There undoubtedly would also need to be an individual at the top that serves an executive function and leads the country in war such as a King.”

“As things stand now, even my future father-in-law, the King of Thrace could easily topple all these squabbling city states and conquer all of Greece.  There is a long way to go before this land becomes anything even resembling a unified kingdom.  At this point I would like to see mutual defense alliances between the dominant powers in Greece and open, mutually beneficial, free trade with well-developed commerce routes between them.  There is a lot of groundwork that has to occur before we Greeks can even think of reaching towards such a lofty goal of a unified kingdom.” 

Getting to the crux of things, I explained to my father how I intended to support my wives “That brings me to the most important topic, now that I’m apparently married.  I would like to open an Alcmaeonidae General Store in the capitals of Sparta and Thebes to facilitate trade between our city states.  My intent was to use the dowries from my wives to capitalize the stores and the inventories.  I also intended to teach them our family’s advanced farming methods so they, as our allies, can grow their populations and be able to sell the excess to Athens which always needs to import food.”

“This is actually a good time to bring this up because we are coming up on the fall planting season for winter crops.  I truly want three of our agricultural experts that work on our family farm to teach Sparta, Thebes and Thrace how to properly do crop rotation and use our advance farming implements.  In fact, I thought the first products that we would sell would be iron plows, hoes and spades, along with the necessary seed to plant the crops that they would be growing.  The people that we send could also be paid a consulting fee to cover their time, travel and living expenses.”

Giving the idea consideration, Father responded “I’ll have to discuss it with Grandfather Ariphron this weekend.  I think the farmers that work our fields have some older sons that could be ready to head out on their own that would be willing and knowledgeable enough.”