DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.13851#0638
610
OF THE MISCELEANy CUSTOMS OP GREECE-
knew not what the name of adultery meant.' We are farther told by
others, that strangers, as well as citizens of Sparta, were allowed the
same freedom with their wives, provided they were handsome men, and
likely to beget likely and vigorous children (1) : yet we find their king?
were exempt from this law, that the royal blood might be preserved un-
mixed, and the government remain in the same lineal descent.
Notwithstanding this liberty, which was founded upon mutual consent,
they accounted all other adulteries the most heinous crimes in the world,
and whilst they kept to their ancient laws, were wholly strangers to
them ; for we are told by Plutarch (2), ' that Gerades, a primitive Spar-
tan, being asked by a stranger, what punishment their law had appointed
for adulterers ? replied, there were no adulterers in his country : but, re-
turned the stranger, suppose there were one, and the crime were proved
against him, how zvould you punish him ? He answered, that the offender
must pay to the plaintiff a bull with a neck so long, as that he might reach
over the mountain Taygetus, and drink of the river Eurotas, that runs on
the other side. The man, surprised at this, said, why it is impossible to
find such a bull. Gerades smilingly replied, it is just o? possible to find
an adulterer in Sparta."1
The punishments inflicted upon adulterers in Greece were of divers
sorts, some of which are these that follow :
To begin »vith the heroic ages : if the rapes of women may be allowed
room in this place, we shall find they were revenged by many cruel and
bloody wars. Herodotus makes them to have given the first occasion to
that constant enmity that was kept up for many ages between Greece and
Asia, and never allaj ed till the latter was conquered, and became subject
to the former (3). Lycophron agrees with Herodotus, and makes the
rape of Io by the Phoenicians to have incensed the Grecians against the
inhabitants of Asia ; and after frequent injuries committed, and wars
waged on both sides, to have reduced the Asian empire under the domin-
ion of the Europeans, under Alexander of Macedon : the poet's wards
run thus (4) :
Oxmrro voajtai KapviTtti kvvu,
Oi tj)v (Zocomv tolvpo7ra.^6ivov KOgm
Aspxc dynpti-^ctyro qoptnyoi kukoi,
Hourly 7rcptvtrxi xvtptt Me/wpiT» 7rpof/.if,
E^dpac <T« vvptrov iipzv htr'ii^on S~tnKtti;.
May those Phoenician sailors be accurst,
That Io did convey from Lerna first,
Those savage mariners that forc'd the maid
To be the partner of Osiris1 bed,
And the two empires thus to warfare led. h. h.
He goes on to enumerate the continual quarrels between the two conti-
nents, till Alexander's time. But, however, the truth of this may be
questioned, there being in those early ages no distinction of the world in-
to Greeks and barbarians, nor any common association of those amongst
themselves, or against the others ; yet we have a remarkable instance (to
omit several others) of a long and bloody war, occasioned by Paris's rape
of Helen. But to bring some instances which may seem more pertinent
to our present design : what sentence the heroic ages passed upon adul-
(l) Nicolaus de moribus, apud Stobaeum.
XT) Loco citato,
(3) Lib. i. initio,
(4) Cassandra, r. 1281,
OF THE MISCELEANy CUSTOMS OP GREECE-
knew not what the name of adultery meant.' We are farther told by
others, that strangers, as well as citizens of Sparta, were allowed the
same freedom with their wives, provided they were handsome men, and
likely to beget likely and vigorous children (1) : yet we find their king?
were exempt from this law, that the royal blood might be preserved un-
mixed, and the government remain in the same lineal descent.
Notwithstanding this liberty, which was founded upon mutual consent,
they accounted all other adulteries the most heinous crimes in the world,
and whilst they kept to their ancient laws, were wholly strangers to
them ; for we are told by Plutarch (2), ' that Gerades, a primitive Spar-
tan, being asked by a stranger, what punishment their law had appointed
for adulterers ? replied, there were no adulterers in his country : but, re-
turned the stranger, suppose there were one, and the crime were proved
against him, how zvould you punish him ? He answered, that the offender
must pay to the plaintiff a bull with a neck so long, as that he might reach
over the mountain Taygetus, and drink of the river Eurotas, that runs on
the other side. The man, surprised at this, said, why it is impossible to
find such a bull. Gerades smilingly replied, it is just o? possible to find
an adulterer in Sparta."1
The punishments inflicted upon adulterers in Greece were of divers
sorts, some of which are these that follow :
To begin »vith the heroic ages : if the rapes of women may be allowed
room in this place, we shall find they were revenged by many cruel and
bloody wars. Herodotus makes them to have given the first occasion to
that constant enmity that was kept up for many ages between Greece and
Asia, and never allaj ed till the latter was conquered, and became subject
to the former (3). Lycophron agrees with Herodotus, and makes the
rape of Io by the Phoenicians to have incensed the Grecians against the
inhabitants of Asia ; and after frequent injuries committed, and wars
waged on both sides, to have reduced the Asian empire under the domin-
ion of the Europeans, under Alexander of Macedon : the poet's wards
run thus (4) :
Oxmrro voajtai KapviTtti kvvu,
Oi tj)v (Zocomv tolvpo7ra.^6ivov KOgm
Aspxc dynpti-^ctyro qoptnyoi kukoi,
Hourly 7rcptvtrxi xvtptt Me/wpiT» 7rpof/.if,
E^dpac <T« vvptrov iipzv htr'ii^on S~tnKtti;.
May those Phoenician sailors be accurst,
That Io did convey from Lerna first,
Those savage mariners that forc'd the maid
To be the partner of Osiris1 bed,
And the two empires thus to warfare led. h. h.
He goes on to enumerate the continual quarrels between the two conti-
nents, till Alexander's time. But, however, the truth of this may be
questioned, there being in those early ages no distinction of the world in-
to Greeks and barbarians, nor any common association of those amongst
themselves, or against the others ; yet we have a remarkable instance (to
omit several others) of a long and bloody war, occasioned by Paris's rape
of Helen. But to bring some instances which may seem more pertinent
to our present design : what sentence the heroic ages passed upon adul-
(l) Nicolaus de moribus, apud Stobaeum.
XT) Loco citato,
(3) Lib. i. initio,
(4) Cassandra, r. 1281,