DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.13851#0651
of the m-SOM&tmV customs of GREECE. ti£3
glance upon those who had misbehaved themselves in the wars, some -
times sung encomiums upon those who had done any gallant action, and
by these means inflamed young men with an emulation of their glory ;
for those that were thus commended, went away brave and well satisfied
with themselves : and those that were rallied, were as sensibly touched
with it as if they had been formally and severely reprimanded ; and so
much the more, because the kings and whole senate saw and heard all
that passed. Now, though it may seem strange that women should appear
thus naked in public, yet was true modesty observed, and wantonness ex-
cluded ; and it tended to render their conversation free and unreserved,
and to beget in them a desire of being vigorous and active, and filled them
with courage and generous thoughts, as being allowed their share in the
rewards of virtue as well as men. Hence came that sense of honour,
and nobleness of spirit, of which we have an instance in Gorgo, the wife
of king Leonidas, who being told in discourse with some foreign ladies,
that the women of Lacedasmon were the only women of the world who
had an empire over the men, briskly reparieed, that there was good rea-
son, for they were the only women that brought forth men. Lastly, these
public processions of the maidens, and their appearing naked in their ex-
ercises and dancings, were provocations and baits to stir up and allure
the young men to marriage and that not upon geometrical reasons, as
Plato calls them (such are interest and equality of fortune,) but from the
engagements of true love and affection.'
Afterwards, when Lycurgus's laws were neglected, and the Spartans
had degenerated from the strict virtue of their forefathers, their women
also were ill-spoken of, and made use of the freedom which their law-
giver allowed them to no good purposes ; insomuch that they are censur-
ed of unlawful pleasures, and branded by Euripides, as cited by Plu-
tarch (1), with the epithet of possessed with furious love of, and, as it
were, running mad after men.
CHAP XIII.
of their customs in child-bearing, and managing infants.
Those who desired to have children, were usually very liberal in mak-
ing presents and offerings to the gods, especially to such as were thought
to have the care of generation. I shall not trouble the reader with a
particular account of the names of these deities, and the manner they
were worshipped in ; but it may be requisite to observe, that the Athe-
nians invoked, on this account, certain gods called Tmorftiyogss, or T^iro.
TtaTgsis. Who these were, or what the origination of* ili^ir name, is not
easy to determine : Orpheus, as cited by Phanodemus, in Stiyjas, makes
their proper names to be Amaclides, Protocles, and Protocleon, -^d will
have them to preside over the winds. Demo makes them to be winds
themselves ; but what business winds or their governors have in genera
tion, is difficult to imagine. Another author, in the same lexicographer,
(1) Numa.
glance upon those who had misbehaved themselves in the wars, some -
times sung encomiums upon those who had done any gallant action, and
by these means inflamed young men with an emulation of their glory ;
for those that were thus commended, went away brave and well satisfied
with themselves : and those that were rallied, were as sensibly touched
with it as if they had been formally and severely reprimanded ; and so
much the more, because the kings and whole senate saw and heard all
that passed. Now, though it may seem strange that women should appear
thus naked in public, yet was true modesty observed, and wantonness ex-
cluded ; and it tended to render their conversation free and unreserved,
and to beget in them a desire of being vigorous and active, and filled them
with courage and generous thoughts, as being allowed their share in the
rewards of virtue as well as men. Hence came that sense of honour,
and nobleness of spirit, of which we have an instance in Gorgo, the wife
of king Leonidas, who being told in discourse with some foreign ladies,
that the women of Lacedasmon were the only women of the world who
had an empire over the men, briskly reparieed, that there was good rea-
son, for they were the only women that brought forth men. Lastly, these
public processions of the maidens, and their appearing naked in their ex-
ercises and dancings, were provocations and baits to stir up and allure
the young men to marriage and that not upon geometrical reasons, as
Plato calls them (such are interest and equality of fortune,) but from the
engagements of true love and affection.'
Afterwards, when Lycurgus's laws were neglected, and the Spartans
had degenerated from the strict virtue of their forefathers, their women
also were ill-spoken of, and made use of the freedom which their law-
giver allowed them to no good purposes ; insomuch that they are censur-
ed of unlawful pleasures, and branded by Euripides, as cited by Plu-
tarch (1), with the epithet of possessed with furious love of, and, as it
were, running mad after men.
CHAP XIII.
of their customs in child-bearing, and managing infants.
Those who desired to have children, were usually very liberal in mak-
ing presents and offerings to the gods, especially to such as were thought
to have the care of generation. I shall not trouble the reader with a
particular account of the names of these deities, and the manner they
were worshipped in ; but it may be requisite to observe, that the Athe-
nians invoked, on this account, certain gods called Tmorftiyogss, or T^iro.
TtaTgsis. Who these were, or what the origination of* ili^ir name, is not
easy to determine : Orpheus, as cited by Phanodemus, in Stiyjas, makes
their proper names to be Amaclides, Protocles, and Protocleon, -^d will
have them to preside over the winds. Demo makes them to be winds
themselves ; but what business winds or their governors have in genera
tion, is difficult to imagine. Another author, in the same lexicographer,
(1) Numa.