We have seen, then, that the use of writing extends only gradually and at different rates in different areas of Athenian life. The growth of documents in some areas from the early fourth century on does not necessarily pervade all walks of life; nor did it necessarily render oral tradition less accurate or extensive. Oral transmission, therefore, could subsist alongside ‘literacy’, and the two were not nècessarily incompatible. Oral communication was in fact still very important in the fourth century B.C., as our sources show. But how, and in what form, was the past remembered, when so little trust was placed on written record for knowledge of the past? I now turn to oral tradition, its formation, character and workings, in the specific case of ancient Athens. I start with family tradition. For against the wider traditions of the whole community, family tradition is comparatively simple, we have clear and direct evidence for it, and Greek family tradition seems to have suffered almost no interference from writing. It is a clear and apt introduction to some of the problems of oral tradition, the importance of transmission for its character and reliability, and the reasons behind its fluidity. We may see clearly how ideals and beliefs help transform traditions. Since family tradition is the corner-stone to our understanding of Athenian traditions – and to the mechanisms of oral tradition in general – it will be necessary to re-examine the ancient evidence in some detail.