THE
PLAGUE OF LUST

Volume I

This work, printed for a small number of subscribers,
Medical Men—Experts and Specialists in
Nervous Diseases—Lawyers—Psychiatrists
Travellers and Anthropologists—is not
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The present copy is

No. 105

The Translator of Dr. Rosenbaum’s great book, the Geschichte der Lustseuche im Alterthume, feels that no apology is required for presenting a Work of this calibre and importance in an English dress,—for the first time. Needless to say the Book in no way appeals,—or is meant to appeal,—to the general reading public. It is a book for Students and Specialists, as is recognized indeed by the conditions of the present publication, in a limited edition and at a high price.

To Historical Students and Medical Specialists alike it is of the highest value and interest, and in many respects an indispensable addition to their Library. The object the Writer proposed to himself was a History of Venereal Disease, to trace its existence, symptoms and incidence, from the earliest notices of its occurrence recorded in Literature onwards. This ambitious programme he has only partially carried out in the present Work, which forms Part I. of the projected Treatise as a whole, and deals with the Disease under its various forms and successive manifestations throughout Antiquity.vi In it he devotes his efforts to proving,—and we think with conclusive success,—the existence, denied by so many, of the dread Disease in different shapes in Europe, Asia and Africa long before the Christian era, and all through the period of Classical Antiquity, scouting utterly, the popular theory of its first introduction at the end of the Fifteenth and beginning of the Sixteenth Centuries from America.

With this end in view the learned and laborious Author collects an enormous apparatus criticus of quotations from Greek and Latin writers, both in prose and verse, and this not merely from the better known authors of Antiquity, but equally from later and much less familiar sources. Obscure Erotic Writers, historical fragments, Christian Fathers,—all is fish that comes to his comprehensive, though not undiscriminating, net; and probably there is not to be found in the whole range of Scholarship so wide and complete a collection of historical and literary illustrations and allusions brought together with the express purpose of throwing light on one special subject of enquiry.

Such in briefest outline is the scope and achievement of Dr. Rosenbaum’s masterpiece. But brief as it is, it suffices to show to how many classes of Students and Scientists the work appeals. First and foremost it is of direct service to Physicians in general and Specialists in Venereal Disease in particular, to Enquirers into the problems of Insanity and the morbid manifestations of a diseased brain, as well as to Anthropologists and all scientific observers of Humanity. On another side, in virtue of its wealth of curious and recondite quotation, it is of the highestvii interest and attraction to Classical Scholars and every Student of Antiquity and Ancient Literature; while midway between these two categories, Students of Morals and Human Institutions cannot possibly afford to neglect a storehouse of “human documents” so invaluable in the domain of their studies.

Even to the general Historical Student, who without laying any claim to the proud title of Specialist, is deeply interested in the conditions of human life on our planet in former days, and eager to enquire into all matters relating to the health and happiness of mankind, the Book has a great deal to offer. Few things have more profoundly modified these factors of human well-being than Venereal disease and its ravages in all ages; while any systematic enquiry into this most important subject cannot fail to throw many side-lights,—lurid enough, but none the less instructive,—on life and morals, social relations and sexual aberrations, among different Peoples and at different Epochs. What can be more interesting,—painful as the interest often is,—than much of the information here afforded, at first hand and from authentic citations of Ancient writers, of social and sexual habits and ideals, of strange rites and rituals and abominable practices, prevalent as well in the free Republics of Greece as under the corrupt sway of the Roman Emperors.

Great and wonderful no doubt were the Communities of the Ancient world, beautiful the fine flower of graceful living, and high the level of philosophic and literary culture attained, consummate the artistic relics they have left us; but what a seamy side this same Classical Civilization had to show,—whatviii unspeakable abominations underlay its social life, what atrocities of foulness, cruelty and lust,—some of them flourishing under the sanction of Religion itself,—counterbalanced the virtues of wise citizenship and warlike valour and Stoic self-denial. Lurid and terrible indeed are some of the pictures of horror that shape themselves from certain of Dr. Rosenbaum’s pages,—the whole Section, for instance, in Vol. I. dealing with “Brothels and Courtesans”, and in an even higher degree that on “Paederastia” and the diseases consequent on this unnatural practice. Specially graphic and vivid sections again, in Vol. II., are those treating of the practice of “Depilation” among Greeks and Romans, and the Baths and Bathing habits of Antiquity.

To return for a moment to the Medical and Anthropological aspects of the Work. Perhaps no single branch of Scientific Enquiry has made such noteworthy strides of late years as Anthropology, and in particular the special Department of that Science devoted to morbid and anomalous manifestations of the sexual appetite,—unnatural lusts, sensual aberrations, sexual inversions, and all the rest. The subject, no doubt, is repulsive, but it is none the less profoundly important from the scientific side, in connexion both with the general advance of our knowledge of Mankind, and with the special Study of Insanity and Madness, as well as from the humanitarian point of view as giving material for the eventual alleviation of many of these manifestations of Mental Disease. Out of a host of names, it is only necessary to mention two, those of Lombroso and Krafft-Ebing, to demonstrateix the high place these investigations have vindicated for themselves among the scientific triumphs of the Century that has just closed. On this side the Geschichte der Lustseuche is of the highest importance, supplying as it does innumerable instances of those very phaenomena of morbid sexual perversions that constitute the subject matter of this rapidly progressive branch of Science, one likely in the near future to prove of infinite benefit to afflicted humanity.

Of the Author personally there is no need to say much, nor indeed is there much to be said. His life was quiet and uneventful, as a Scholar’s and Savant’s should be. After holding a Professorship at Berlin, he was summoned to fill a similar post at the University of Halle, where he succeeded to the Chair left vacant by the death of the celebrated Dr. Baumgarten-Crusius; and it was here that he completed his great Work,—in spite of difficulties and lack of books, which he naïvely and rather pathetically laments in his Preface. Halle had already been made illustrious by an earlier and even more distinguished worker in the same field, the famous Sprengel (died March 15, 1833), author of a masterly History of Medicine and many other professional works; and with a characteristic touch of Teutonic sentimentality our Author dates the Preface to his own Geschichte on Sprengel’s birth-day.

A by no means unimportant feature of Dr. Rosenbaum’s book, and one according well with his patient and laborious methods, is the very extensive and valuable Bibliography, which will be found at the end of the Work. This embraces almost everything that has been written on the subject in all languages,x and should prove of inestimable service to the serious student.

For any errors that may have crept into his version, the Translator must crave indulgence. Some such are inevitable, more particularly in the renderings of the innumerable Latin and Greek quotations, many of which are involved in diction and obscure in allusion, and some of disputed interpretation. The labour involved has been no small one,—the mere proof-reading itself being a heavy task in a book like the present crammed with citations from several languages.

For the general appearance and get up of the Book, the Publisher, Mr. Charles Carrington, of Paris, is responsible, and his name, so well known in connection with the production of Medical and Scientific works of this kind, is a sufficient guarantee of excellence.

In conclusion, the Translator offers with confidence the result of his labours to all Englishmen interested as Specialists in the History of Medicine, in Anthropology and the Scientific Study of Insanity, as also in Classical Scholarship and the Study of Antiquity and Ancient Literature, as well as to Enquirers generally into the History of Morals and the life and life conditions of earlier days. In doing so, he feels sure of a favourable reception for so important and scholarly a Work, throwing such a flood of light on all these different departments of study.

Oxford, June 14, 1901.

DR. ROSENBAUM’S

PREFACE TO THE FIRST (GERMAN) EDITION

xiii

It is now six years ago, during my residence in Berlin, and with a view to a historical Survey of miliary fevers, that I began a closer and more systematic study of the Epidemics of the XVth. and XVIth. Centuries. In the course of these enquiries my attention was inevitably directed to the subject of Venereal disease, which exerted so powerful an influence at that epoch both on the physical and the moral life of nations. Accustomed as I was to regard History as being something more than a mere quasi-mechanical aggregation of facts, the observation was soon borne in upon me that only through a painstaking examination of the contemporary conditions of epidemic disease could the Venereal Disease of the period be really understood. Consequently I felt I must isolate this terrible scourge of humanity from the general survey,—so general as to be well-nigh all-embracing,—and consider it as a phænomenon apart.

Once started on these lines, I occupied myself specially with the subject, and arrived at the surprising result, that the Venereal Disease of the XVth. Century owed its terrible characteristics solely andxiv entirely to the contemporary exanthematic-typhoïdal Genius Epidemicus, which made itself known in the South of Europe by petechial fevers and by the Sudor Anglicus (English Sweating-fever) in the North. I concluded further that the disease was not epidemic at all, merely liable to arise under epidemic influence; and must consequently have been already extant before the arrival of the said Genius Epidemicus.

Time and circumstances compelled me to remain satisfied provisionally with this general conclusion, and only after I had fixed my abode permanently at Halle, could I resume my earlier investigations. Yet again these were interrupted, partly by my work on the Diseases of the Skin for the Dictionary of Surgery edited by Prof. Blasius, partly by my Habilitation (formal entry on the Staff) at the University of that place, to which I had been repeatedly invited after the unexpected death of the late Dr. Baumgarten-Crusius. Eventually I was enabled to devote the greater part of my leisure hours to this subject, one which in the meantime was never quite lost sight of. I began to sift and arrange the material I found accumulated, but in a short time I convinced myself that in its treatment I had to strike out a different road from that followed hitherto, if I ever intended on my own account to reach important results; and I felt it would be impossible to complete the whole Survey in a single moderate-sized volume. Consequently I proceeded to limit myself to the enquiry whether or no Venereal disease had been extant in Ancient times, and it is this investigation that I now publish as a first Part of the History of Venereal disease.

The general plan I have followed in my treatment of the subject is sufficiently explained in the Introduction; while a perusal of the text will show in what relation my investigations stand towards those of my predecessors, and at the same time to what extent these have been made use of, or indeed could be made use of, in my work. Owing to thexv very nature of the subject the Survey as a whole was bound to assume a critical character, dealing as it does not solely with the history of the Disease, but also with the examination of an extensive array of views and opinions already formulated. The conduct of this examination I leave the reader to judge of; but I believe I can confidently assert it was always the matter, never the man, that I subjected to critical treatment. Accordingly I laid little stress on brilliant results, and made no effort to conceal lack of facts by dazzling hypotheses; instead I made it my supreme object to come at the truth as near as possible, and preferred to confess my ignorance, if the helps and authorities I had at my disposal failed me, rather than advance propositions the baselessness of which a sober criticism is only too soon in a position to demonstrate.

“I imposed this law on myself—to believe no man’s mere assertion; to depend on original authorities; to look at every passage with my own eyes, and read it in connexion with its context; to pick out the plain fact observed from the Chaos of hypotheses, and to accept as exact only what I could deduce from the authorities myself and see to be the evident purport of the observation,—absolutely unconcerned how each arbitrary theory might be affected or the sacrosanct authority of such or such a Scholar stand or fall. Why should we deem great men infallible? why find it impossible to honour them and yet dissent from them in opinion?—I felt I owed to my reader a corresponding impartiality in statement of the facts and arguments based upon them. If I was determined to take nothing on trust, but to examine and see for myself, I could not reasonably demand faith from the reader and refuse to communicate to him the proofs and original documents I had drawn upon. It was no case of mere quotation from books,—I was bound to lay open the original evidence for his inspection.” These words ofxvi Hensler’s I took as my guiding-principle, and if I have deviated from their standard in the Third Section, this only happened because the greater part of the passages there quoted have been repeatedly handled by my predecessors, and I feared to increase the bulk and consequently the cost of the Book to the prejudice of the reader.

I am well aware that the method I have adopted hardly corresponds with the taste of the present day; and if the public choose to find in my work nothing but an idle display of quotations, I cannot fail to be mortified. Nevertheless I prefer to encounter, if needs be, the reproach of pedantry rather than that of superficiality. With the difficulties I met with in connection with particular investigations I need not trouble the reader at greater length, as they are sufficiently familiar to everyone engaged in similar researches. I may be allowed to point out what a task was presented by the co-ordination of so considerable a number of scattered data. These I had, in the almost total absence of earlier works on the same subject, to collect mostly by my own reading from very widely separated Authors; and anything like symmetry of arrangement was made still more difficult when, as occurred more than once, the discovery of a single passage forced me to entirely re-write a substantial part of my manuscript, often within a short time of its going to Press. For the same reason the indulgent reader must excuse it, if here and there a later observation involves the supplementing and in some degree correcting of a previous statement,—a thing that would have been done much more frequently, had I not dreaded treating my material in too rambling a fashion. It would be quite easy now to subjoin in the form of appendices a multitude of additional proofs, of course only corroborating views already laid down,—proofs I owed to further reading of the Ancient authors. However absolute completeness is impossible of attainment for the individual; and I can only hopexvii the humble request I hereby express,—a request addressed specially to professional students of Antiquity,—that others may favour me with contributions and remarks relevant to my subject, may be not entirely without result. So later on perhaps the material accumulated may be utilised more efficiently, if the interest manifested by the learned in my undertaking is of such a nature as to demand a re-modelling of the whole Investigation.

The necessity I found myself under of expressing this request for countenance on the part of students of Antiquity is the very thing that specially induced me to strongly recommend the First Part of my work, even on its Title-page, to their particular consideration; and it will be a source of self-congratulation if the attempts incidentally introduced to gain a better insight into the relics of Antiquity, meeting with their approval, become an inducement to the Physician in his professional studies to offer a helping hand to human weaknesses. The question at issue is nothing less than that of gaining a clear insight into the nature and origin of the operation of a Disease that destroys the very marrow of Nations. Without such insight the Physician cannot hope, whether in the particular case or speaking generally, to obtain a radical cure; and of all forms of Disease the Venereal is pre-eminently that where obscurity in the history of the malady conditions obscurity in its curative treatment. For the first time it is successfully proved with irrefragable certainty that the Ancients were infested with this morbus mundanus (World-disease) just as much as the Moderns. Honourable nations are freed from the shameful reproach of fathering this Complaint; and at the same time Physicians see themselves forced to seek a reason for the untrustworthiness they recognise at the present day as belonging to the so-called “Specifics”, not in the nature of these remedies, but in the changes which the Disease has undergone under external influences. Moreover theyxviii will find that the non-mercurial treatment nowadays so highly extolled is far from being the mere creature of fashion; rather it is the direct consequence of the alteration in the common and universal genius of the Complaint, which appears at this moment to be again tending to a gradual disappearance. The grounds for this assertion I have already more than once explained to my hearers in my repeated Lectures on Venereal Disease; and I propose to communicate them fully in the Second Part of my History of the Disease, framed on the same principles as the First.

When I shall publish this Second Part, if ever, will depend first on the reception of the preceding volume; secondly on whether more favourable external conditions provide the leisure that is indispensably necessary for Historical investigations of the sort, and at the same time put at my disposal a more complete literary apparatus than has hitherto been the case. For historico-medical studies in general there exists hardly a more unfavourable1 place than Halle; and this is specially and peculiarly so with regard to epidemic diseases. As far as Venereal Disease is concerned the whole literary wealth of our University Library amounts to something like ten or twelve Works, half of which are all but worthless. I myself shrank from no expense to obtain possession of the literary helps required, and my collections, particularly on the subject of Epidemics, might boast of being not inferior to those of any private individual; yet they are quite insufficientxix for my purpose, so much, especially from the earlier Centuries, being no longer procurable by way of purchase.

But when all that is extant in writing is procured, the business is still far from being done. I am still in want of quite a formidable array of facts that can only be the fruit of observations in more recent times. For this reason may I appeal to my elder professional brethren, and above all to the different medical Unions and Associations at home and abroad with the request that they will, whether directly or indirectly, help me to the possession of the facts in question. Such are in particular facts concerning the influence of the Genius Epidemicus on the different forms or Venereal Disease, and first and foremost it behoves me to learn—what influence Typhus manifested during the first fifteen years of this Century, particularly since 1811, in different Countries. That such an influence, and a disastrous one, did take place is evidenced not only by the 364 pp. of collected Authorities, but also by the data of the brilliant Sachs in his “Concise Dictionary of Practical Therapeutics”, II. Pt. 1. (Article: Guajac) p. 637. To my sorrow I have only just, since the appearance of the Index to that valuable Work, become acquainted with these data, which appealed to me all the more from the fact that throughout they corroborate the results reached by myself in the historical sphere.

Sachs, and so far as I know he was the first to express this opinion openly, holds as a fully established conclusion that the Venereal Disease of the XVth. Century owed the characteristics it then possessed merely to the prevailing Genius epidemicus typhodes; though at the same time I cannot favour his assumption of a leprous-syphilitic Diathesis (general condition of body) as already existent. Nothing is better fitted to give a clear insight into these earlier conditions than a knowledge of the period of the Thirty Years’ War and of the Typhusxx epidemics at the beginning of the present Century. Would it had happened to any of those heroes of the healing art who played an active part in the great Drama of that time to have crowned his day’s-work by leaving us a more detailed medical recital of the incidents. The number of men qualified for the task grows daily fewer, the possibility of gathering the material required daily harder of realization; and, though it is not so yet, the work may later on be impracticable2.

In conclusion—may I be allowed hereby to offer my sincere thanks to all who in any way have granted me active support in the course my enquiries. I should be glad to give their names, did I not fear they might dislike seeing themselves recorded in connection with a History of Venereal Disease. In spite of this scruple I feel compelled to make an exception in the case of one of them, viz. my friend, Dr. Eckstein, Headmaster of the Royal High-School (Pädagogium) of Halle. He shared with me the exceedingly laborious duty of correcting the proofs; and both myself and my readers into the bargain owe him a debt of warmest gratitude for so doing.

Written on the birth-day of C. Sprengel.

CONTENTS
AND
GENERAL INTRODUCTION.

xxiii

INTRODUCTION:

FIRST PART.

Venereal Disease in Antiquity.

xxv

If we would undertake to write the history of a Disease, the very first thing needful is to frame in one’s own mind a clear conception of what the History of a Disease in a general way is, for it is from a right preliminary conception, that the right conditions will follow which a Historian as such is bound to fulfil. Consult experience,—in other words enquire what has been usually understood under the name History of a Disease, and you find to be included in the idea,—first, a more or less complete chronological comparison of the different observations and views of different Physicians at different times on such or such a Disease, secondly, a survey of the course of the Disease in the individual case. The first is properly only a history of the opinions of Physicians, the History of the Literature so to speak of the Disease, which must come before the actual History, while the latter is nothing else than a history of a Disease in a single instance, that is to say the history of a particular case of disease, the history of individual patients; and this we have long been in the habit of reckoning a part of Clinics.

Nay, the sum of such clinical histories if takenxxvi all together will not help us to the actual history of a Disease, so long as they merely give an account of the visible symptoms by which the disease makes its presence known. By this means we shall be learning merely the ideal course of the Malady, getting a pictorial representation of it such as is demanded by Pathological specialists,—as it were the internal history of the Disease. We cannot write the history of a single Man or of a single Nation so as to be a sufficient basis for the understanding and right appreciation of them, if we grasp only their inner history, that of their internal development, and consequently view them by themselves as a something separated off from all surroundings, instead of bearing in mind as we should the forms their relations take to environment, to the outer world generally,—in fact their external history. Similarly we are just as little in a position to furnish the history of a Disease, if we include in the matter of our enquiry only the course of the disease and not its external relations as well.

It is only the inner genetic co-ordination of the two, viz. the internal and the external history (for Disease has also an external history) that can conduct to the actual History of the Disease. This may be defined as a genetic co-ordination and statement of the symptoms of a Disease under different conditions and in different individuals, from the first moment at which they arose and came under observation down to the time when the report is made; or, expressed more briefly, the History of a Disease is a genetic co-ordination and account of its development and progress in time (as conditioned by time). Supposing Time, Relations, and Number of individuals definitely limited, a Special History is the result; while the General History of a Disease properly speaking can never be viewed as isolated from its surroundings. In that case the conditions on which the generation and origin of the particular Disease depend would necessarily cease entirely and for ever to exist.

xxvii

Now if we analyse the conception of the History of a Disease into its component parts, we shall get to know its special contents, the efficient factors of which it is compounded, and which the Historian has to comprehend and express. The function of History is to exhibit something that has happened; naturally therefore the first thing the Historian must do is to look out for the point of time at which the process of change began. But certain generating factors and influences are indispensable to every process of change, and their activity again is dependent on certain favourable external conditions; and so it becomes the next duty of the Historian to authenticate the existence of the said favourable influences as well as of the generating factors, and concurrently to determine in what manner they came into active operation. Inasmuch as it happens however sometimes that the interposing or favouring as well as the generative factors are known to be present, and yet no outbreak of disease occurs, so far as we see, or only an incompletely developed one, those influences also will require authentication which hindered or modified the potential activity of the factors.

Only after all this has been systematically and sufficiently analyzed, will it become possible to trace the development and course of the Disease itself and to mark the successive changes offered to observation from its first appearance to the time when its history was recorded. Now these changes are imposed upon it either by its own proper nature or from outside, and so the Historian must explain also the internal and external relations involved. Again in any individual case the various manifestations or signs of a Disease by no means appear all together at one time, but rather develope in a series; so in the general course of a Disease, as recorded historically, a similar continuous series of symptoms will be more or less clearly noticeable, yet without implying that it is dependent solely on external conditions. Further, as every Disease is liable at any given time to comexxviii into conflict with another, the Historian will in this case also have to point out, what forms the relations of either took at the moment, whether the disease in question showed itself as determining the other or was itself determined by it, whether it consented to enter into combinations, whether it led to the annihilation of its adversary or was itself annihilated, or whether lastly both remained in a manner neutral. Finally account must be taken of the influence of medical aid, and generally of the relation of the Physician to the Disease.

These different points once successfully and in a competent manner co-ordinated into a kind of organic connexion, the resulting History of Disease, a clinical History, yet as wide as humanity itself, will supply the most momentous factor towards an insight into the nature and essence of Disease. It will not merely afford the theoretical enquirer the necessary materials for his speculations as to Disease in general and systems of treatment, but also teach the practical Physician the conditions of a rational method of Therapeutics; and will consequently be equally interesting, and what is more, equally needful to both. Such an organic connexion can only be established on the condition that the Historian calls to remembrance step by step, as he proceeds, the sciences of Physiology and Pathology. Only by their help is it possible always and everywhere to mark the inner necessity of the relation of cause and effect and to distinguish the essential from the accidental.

Having learned the Conception and proper Contents of the History of a Disease, we naturally proceed to another closely connected question,—do all Diseases admit of such a historical exposition? It may bexxix taken for granted at the outset with tolerable certainty that the answer to this question will be affirmative for the majority of actual Diseases; at any rate hardly an objection can be alleged from the theoretical stand-point. At the same time practical Experience must be allowed a voice on this point.

Unhappily we gain but little that is comforting from experience. It can scarcely be said that even a beginning has been made so far towards writing the History of a Disease in the indicated sense; and besides this, diseases have been primarily selected for consideration in which the historical factor obtrudes itself, as it were, on the attention, to wit the epidemic diseases. For the rest hardly anything at all has been done, excepting only in the case of Leprosy and the Venereal Disease, for which with singular unanimity an epidemic character has always been claimed. The Proteus-like character of these Maladies hindered every attempt of speculation to penetrate their nature, and so enquirers saw themselves forced to consult History. But the merest superficial glance at the treatment of Venereal disease by its Historians (and this applies equally to Leprosy) will show that little more than an insufficient collection of materials towards an actual History of the disease has thus far seen the light; and this in spite of the fact that no contemptible number of the most distinguished Scholars have devoted time and trouble to the subject, in many cases making it their life’s work.

However, if the matter is looked into more closely, it will be evident that a large proportion of these scholars directed their attention to one single point only, viz. the antiquity and time of origin of the Disease; and regarded all the other factors only in so far as they supported one or other of the views they had formulated. Besides the co-ordination of these factors is seen to be so loose that no general result of any stringency could ever be obtained. The few men whose definite purpose it was to arrive atxxx such a result, failed, in view of the difficulty of collecting the material, to reach the completeness they had proposed, and so deferred working up what they had accumulated till death put an end to their enterprise. In especial this was the case with Hensler, and the non-appearance of the Second Part of his History of the Venereal Disease must doubtless long continue to be mourned as an irreparable loss.

The Past, on which all experience must draw, affords us so little assistance here that it is to the Future we must look for everything. The Present cannot show us in existence any history of Venereal disease as we understand it, but this in no way entitles it to deny the possibility of such a History. Thus it is of the highest importance to make the attempt to arrange and sift the material now ready and accessible, so far as it concerns the Venereal Disease, on principles conformable to the Conception and proper Contents as indicated above of the History of a Disease, and for this a relative completeness of the collected materials suffices. If in this way we are successful in sketching the history of Venereal Disease at any rate in its general outlines, it can quite well be left to the continued efforts of other Investigators to fill in the individual lines of the picture, especially as then and then only is the particular point ascertained by anticipation, at which later accessions must be worked in.

In every History, what comes first and foremost is to get to know the original Authorities from which the material for its treatment can be drawn, and this forms the proper Contents of the Literary history of the Disease. Accordingly our first duty will be to give a general survey of the literary helps lying ready to hand for the use of the Historian of Venereal Disease, and at the same time to specify how far these were accessible to ourselves. Thus the reader will be enabled at the very outset to form a judgement as to the completeness of thexxxi information supplied; and succeeding Enquirers will learn the gaps that are left remaining for them to fill up.

This will conclude a Survey of the historical results so far obtained in connection with the antiquity and time of origin of the Disease; and it will then be possible to indicate the special Scheme we propose to follow in our treatment of the task before us.

The different Opinions advanced at various periods on the question of the Antiquity and Origin of the Venereal Disease may at the outset be brought under two main divisions, according as the disease is supposed to have been already known to the Ancients and from their time onwards to have been continuously observed, or on the other hand regarded as having first arisen in the ninetieth year of the XVth. Century. Both views were framed much about the same time, and depended largely on the position and education of the person delivering judgement. The former may be styled the view of the learned, the latter the popular view, though indeed at their first inception it was not so much scientific reasons in either case as men’s prejudices that formed their basis.

The few really learned Physicians of the end of XVth. Century and beginning of the XVIth. took as the theme of their study not Nature but rather the medical Writings of the Greeks and Arabians, a field that had long been left unappropriated by them, and all were far too firmly convinced, that Hippocrates, and still more Galen and Avicenna had already included in their Works everything that couldxxxii ever be the subject of scientific treatment at any given time.

Attention was concentrated upon the Skin Affection that was the predominant form at first, and this was naturally enough taken for a kind of Leprosy, and called sometimes Elephantiasis (Seb. Aquilanus, Phil. Beroaldus), sometimes “Formica” (Schellig, Cumanus, Gilinus, Leonicenus, Steber), by others “Saphat” (J. Widmann, Nat. Montesaurus, Jul. Tanus, Jo. de Fogueda, Sim. Pistor). Hence the view advanced subsequently by Sydenham, Haller, Plenk, Thierry, Haward, and held for a time by Sprengel, that the original form of the Venereal Disease was the “Yaws” or “Piana”, and consequently that Africa must be assigned as the original home of the disease; and in this way the Moors also were brought in as part of the concatenation. Later on, when the conviction grew up that the beginning of the Disease consists in local affections of the genital organs, it was easy to show that these had always been in existence from the most ancient times. But as no direct information on the relation between affections of the Genitals and Skin-disease was to be found in the earlier Writers, enquirers were driven to the supposition, that Syphilitic affections of the Skin had been confounded by the Ancients with Leprosy.

A view, which Becket first sought to establish on precise grounds, appeared on the contrary too bold to other investigators, who thought to find some way of evading it. This was to the effect that Leprosy under favourable conditions had changed into Venereal Disease, and the increased rarity of the former seemed to speak for this opinion. Supporters of this last view are in especial Sprengel and Choulant in his Preface to Fracastori’s “Syphilis”. Whilst the particular home of the Disease was fixed in this way by some authors, Swediaur and Beckman thought to find it in the East Indies, and held that the “Dschossam”, a familiar Indian disease, or else thexxxiii “Persian Fire” must be looked upon as the original form of the Complaint. Schaufus agreed with them in part; he believed Venereal disease to have been brought by the Gypsies from India to Europe. Dr. Wizmann3 made the disease arise in the IInd. Century in Dacia, which at that date was transformed into a Roman Colony and had to welcome the licentious Roman soldiery. The excesses of these colonists, in a strange climate, and seconded by a combination of conditions favourable to epidemic sickness, produced the disease, which he says is generated to this day in its genuine form in Turkey. Accordingly Wizmann, as also Sprengel and Choulant, and to some extent Gruner, who considered the Moors to be the parents of the Venereal disease, may be regarded as taking up an intermediate position between the two extreme views, and as making a sort of transition to the opinions of those who look upon the Disease as a new one.

The special supporters of this view were, as mentioned above, the non-medical, though a considerable number of men calling themselves Physicians agreed with them, though on other grounds, differing only as to the mode in which the Disease arose. The prevailing astrological views found the original cause of the Disease in the Conjunction of the Planets, a conjunction declared beforehand by prophecy to bode disaster. With this were included as contributing to the effect Inundations, the oppressed condition of Nations, Famine and the like. The disease was called an epidemic, or what at that period was practically synonymous, a pestilential disease, a Plague, and ascribed of course to the wrath of God. There were other accounts given,xxxiv that still carry some show of probability; the Disease was referred to the poisoning of wells and of wine (Caesalpinus), to the admixture of gypsum with the flour (Fallopia), or actually to indulgence in human flesh.

When coition could no longer be denied as an interposing factor, rumour resorted to all sorts of wild tales, the copulation of a courtesan with a Leper, copulation with animals, and particularly with asses, and finally with the voluptuous Indian women of America. From the latter story grew up by degrees the theory of the American origin of Venereal Disease, which found its chief supporters in Astruc and Girtanner, and in spite of Hensler’s exertions seems even yet not absolutely forgotten.

It now becomes important to consider more closely these various views, as well as the reasons advanced for them, and to subject them to examination. But as the result of this examination will cover to some extent the same ground as the formal History, it will be expedient to treat the two as far as possible in connection with one another. By this method it will ipso facto appear how far the individual views are tenable, and how far the grounds alleged in their favour valid. And this is all the more necessary for two reasons, first because by this means a host of repetitions is avoided, secondly because only in this way are such gaps as still remain clearly recognised and made tangible.

All the different views fall, as already stated, into two groups, according as they maintain the antiquity or the modernness of the Venereal Disease. In conformity with this division we must separate our investigation from the outset into two parts, of which Part I is to comprise the Venereal Disease in Antiquity, Part II the Venereal Disease to the end of thexxxv XVth. Century. To this will be added further as a Third Part, the History of the Disease down to our own day.

Each of the two earlier Parts will open, in accordance with the views declared above, with a statement and examination of the Authorities.

After that will follow an investigation of the influences that evoked diseases as a consequence of the use or misuse of the Genital organs and are favourable to their genesis, as well as those influences capable of staying, or in the case of diseases already established, modifying their progress. The difficulty of such an investigation is as striking as is its necessity; for on this subject there is an almost total lack of previous Works of any use to consult; and yet it is only by their help we can possibly win a deeper insight into the history of Venereal Disease.

The attitude of medical Science in face of these influences and their consequences will next claim our attention, so far as it is competent to exert a determining and modifying effect on the form and character of the Disease. In this connection it is especially important to determine whether the Physicians correctly diagnosed these diseases for what they are, or generally speaking had any opportunity of doing so.

Having come to a clear understanding, as far as is possible, on all these points, we shall then be in a position to give a genetic exposition of the development of the Disease itself. This will form the conclusion of each separate part, as well as of the whole Work; and then and then only we shall be able to say our task is fulfilled.

THE PLAGUE OF LUST
IN
CLASSICAL ANTIQUITY.

First Part.

3

In Antiquity we find that for a considerable length of time the medical sciences were far from being confined to a distinct profession, and further, where this does seem to be the case, there is always a not insignificant proportion of such knowledge that comes to us merely as popular or traditional Medicine. It is therefore evident, that if we would gain definite information as to the existence of a Disease among the Ancients, we ought by no means to confine our attention to the medical writers. This becomes still more necessary, if we are bound at the same time to try and discover the ætiological relations of such a disease, of which it can be stipulated at the outset that it is intimately connected with the whole life and activity of peoples. The Historian accordingly is absolutely compelled to test and examine thoroughly everything that can possibly enlighten him as to these relations,—to interrogate the Literature of whole Nations.

But here comes in the drawback that only comparatively speaking a very restricted proportion of the Authors of Antiquity have come down to us, even after due account has been taken of the possibility that many an unknown author may lurk concealed in some corner or other of the globe. Then again the Authors that have been preserved are almost without exception Greeks or Romans, so that for the major part of the nations of Antiquity the national authorities are all but entirely lacking,4 or else, where something of the sort does exist, it is written in a language the correct interpretation of which is still partially to seek. From all this it clearly follows that a complete and final explanation of any controverted matter of Ancient times can never strictly speaking be expected, and in particular that it would be a very rash conclusion to declare positively that a Disease did not exist in Antiquity, because in the extant and known books no mention occurs of it.

But in as much as this general incompleteness of information exists with regard to all relations of Antiquity, and yet for many of them sufficient explanations have already been obtained, it is obviously incumbent on us to undertake for our subject also the enquiry how far the extant authorities are capable of throwing light on it,—a task that exceeds indeed the powers of any individual, even should he be able to bring to it all the qualifications indispensable for the understanding of the said authorities. Consequently there is no other course left open for him but to institute at the outset a survey of what has so far been accomplished and ascertained, and then to bring into line with this whatever he has gleaned from his own study of the authorities, in the hope that another enquirer, like-minded and better equipped, may follow on in the track of his endeavours, and so by dint of united efforts the intended goal may one day be reached.

It would be unprofitable for us, having laid claim, as authorities for our special enquiry into the ætiological relations, to the remains of Antiquity in their entirety, to consider them in detail in this place. At the same time it might well seem expedient to specify more exactly such of them as are in a position to afford us information as to the Disease itself. These fall into two classes, viz. physicians and laymen. The estimation of the first class as authorities for the Venereal disease demands a number of conditions which we shall only get to know in5 the course of our subsequent exposition of the ætiological relations themselves, and will therefore more conveniently find its place after this,—in that part of the work where the question is discussed of the influence of medical aid on the disease. Similarly only a part of the lay authorities come in here,—authorities from whom, as may be supposed, we have only to expect rather fragmentary information, but who are all the more important, when they do exist, as by their evidence is proved men’s wide, in fact universal, acquaintance with the disease; and they cannot be charged with having made their observations of it through such or such a pair of theoretical spectacles.

The more copious the materials the Historian provides as to the ætiological relations, the more scanty will be his contributions on the question of the existence of the disease, as historical characters of highest importance, or conspicuous frequency of the disease, give him occasion to mention it.

The case is different, from the first with the Poets. The Satirists and writers of Comedy it is true can only supply hints, and these are often quite unintelligible for later times, if Scholiasts and Commentators had not taken on them the task of explanation,—though again their statements must often be used with caution, as they are so apt to impute to earlier times the opinions of their own. But here also the field of these hints is very circumscribed, as they are only admissible so far as it is possible to extract from the subject-matter a ridiculous, satirical motif (versus iocosi, carmina plena ioci,—jesting verses, songs full of jest, are demanded by the very personality of Priapus); and even then acquaintance with the fact alluded to in general terms is presupposed on the part of hearer and reader. We see from this how ill-considered is the contention of those who say that poets like Horace, Juvenal or Martial, if they had been acquainted with the injurious consequences of sexual intercourse with Hetaerae, could hardly have failed to allude to them on occasion6 in unequivocal terms. Hensler4 excellently observed long ago:—“In our Century certainly no German poet says one word about it,—neither the dallying light-o’-love versifiers nor the serious poets. But from this to draw the conclusion,—then Venereal disease did not exist among the people, then it has never been seen in Germany this year, would make physicians and barber-surgeons smile!”

Then again consider the widely different character of the Peoples and their Languages. The flowery Asiatic and Hindoo was, to begin with, far enough removed from the spirit of Satire, and on all occasions preferred to have recourse to images that to us may well seem more than obscure. The Greek writers of Iambi (Satiric verses in the Iambic metre) are all but completely lost to us, while of the Comedians we possess only Aristophanes, in the interpretation of whom we are certainly not yet far enough advanced to make all his allusions plain to us. Above all, those who pronounce so dogmatically as to the existence of the Disease on the evidence of hints, appear to have hardly a notion of the condition in which the Lexicography of both Greek and Latin is,—a condition still in many respects deplorable.

Besides this the Greeks, and for a time to an almost greater degree the Romans,5 were above all things reticent in speech. The Roman still preserved intact through all the frivolity of his later days certain7 shrines, that were never broken open until the period of the utter corruption of morals; and then no doubt afforded all the richer booty. But in Satire it was not the fact that became matter of derision, but the habits of the voluptuary merely as affecting morality, as for instance is clearly seen from a perusal of the passages of Juvenal6 read in their mutual connection. Moreover the following account will sufficiently prove that even among the Romans affections of thee genitals were never ascribed to natural, only to unnatural coition, Paederastia and the like; and that it was the vice that was derided, and not properly speaking its consequences.

After the Satirists come the Epigrammatic poets, near akin to them. Whether in this province the Greeks will afford much material, later investigations must decide; how abundantly the Roman Martial has rewarded our repeated perusals, the reader will soon be enabled to convince himself.

8

From the Erotic poets who composed their lays under the inspiration of Aphrodité surrounded by the Graces or of the roguish Eros, no one will expect to gain anything towards our object. The fact that the lascivious Erotic writers of Antiquity have for the most part been lost can only be deplored by the Historian of the Venereal disease; for undoubtedly such works were in existence in considerable profusion, only as in our own day they were carefully kept concealed from the eyes of the uninitiated. That the Greeks were not poor in such-like productions Cynulcus teaches us, who says to a Sophist7: “Thou lyest in the tavern, not in company with friends, but with harlots, hast a throng of panders round thee, and carriest always with thee the works of Aristophanes, Apollodorus, Ammonius, Antiphanes and the Athenian Gorgias, who all of them have written of the Athenian Hetaerae. One may fitly call thee a Pornograph, like the painters Aristides, Pausanias and Nicophanes.” Writings of the same character were still extant in Martial’s8 time, for the lascivious epigrams on the walls of the grottos, temples and statues of Priapus9,9 on garden-walls, and so forth, afforded an inexhaustible mine for collecting amateurs, to whom we owe the Priapeia that have come down to the present day. Had they all been preserved to posterity, we should doubtless have had no need to bewail the lack of clear information as to the Venereal disease among the Ancients.

Connected with the poems are the myths and legends of Antiquity. These however being difficult to understand when studied for their own sake owing to the confusion that still reigns in all the interpretations and discussions of them, hardly admit of being used for our purpose with advantage.

Finally we have yet to mention the Fathers as authorities for the history of the Venereal disease, for their “Orationes contra Gentes” (Denunciations of the Gentiles) especially afford much valuable material towards a knowledge of the moral condition of the nations of Antiquity. True it is very likely these only too willingly allow exaggerations at the cost of Paganism, and attribute to an earlier time as already existing then, what really belongs to their own day. Still these drawbacks lose much of their importance in so far as the question for the present is only,—whether previously to the end of the XVth. Century the Venereal Disease existed or no.

The difficulties that arise in the systematic study and manipulation of all these authorities require no further discussion here, being sufficiently well known to every investigator of Antiquity—be he physician or layman.

10

Directly it becomes a question of studying the diseases of a particular part or organ, diseases occasioned by the nature of the use made of that particular part or organ, it is primarily requisite to investigate more precisely the different forms of this use. Then and then only shall we be in a position to define the share which secondary influences are competent to have in producing the said diseases. The natural use of the genital organs is simply the performance of the acts necessary to beget children. On this depends the preservation of the whole species. It is therefore improbable that Nature should have made such use liable to produce disease. As a matter of fact the experience of all ages shows that in a judicious marriage, the natural aim and object of which is the procreation of children, diseases of the genitals seldom, if ever, arise.

There must then be a secondary use of the genital organs, which is carried out without any view of begetting offspring, or in which this plays only a subordinate part, and consequently some other than the natural object is that pursued. This object is Sensual gratification, which is associated with the use of the genital organs, and the use of the genital11 organs for the attainment of this object is Sensuality. Every misuse of any given organ cannot but be associated with detriment both to the organ itself and to the whole organism as well. This must of course also be the case with the genitals,10 and it is in the misuse of them, in Sensual practices, that the most prominent efficient cause of maladies of these organs must be sought. Now it is our business to give a history of the maladies of the genital organs; and this is only possible on the condition that we have first of all gained a clear insight into the history of Sensuality.

Doubtless it is a melancholy task for the Historian to follow up and reveal the moral degradation of Peoples and Nations even to its most revolting details, and the Ethical philosopher might find not a few objections to raise against an undertaking of the kind. None the less is the Physician compelled to search out under all forms the traces of Vice in its most secret hiding-places, and so fathom the nature of the Disease in each individual case; and still more with Nations as a whole is he permitted,—nay! it is his bounden duty, to fix his eyes on their doings and those of each of their component parts. Thus only can he detect the nature of a Disease, which destroys the marrow of Peoples more surely and more terribly for this very reason that its genesis proceeds in secret.

The reproach that the Moral repute of Nations is hereby ruined, and the general mass saddled with the guilt of vices which of course only individuals ever committed, has no place here, for it is solely through the precise knowledge of the doings of these individuals that a due appreciation is possible12 of the danger that threatens the whole body politic from this source. Had not a false ideal of Morality hitherto restrained the individual, as it did the mass, from speaking out the truth, we should be much farther advanced than we are in the knowledge of a Disease, whose characteristic symptom it is that those who suffer from it endeavour, as far as they possibly can, to conceal its cause!

The imaginative son of the South, already of his very nature prone to attribute all that his unpractised intellect failed to comprehend to the influence of a special Deity, was bound to do this pre-eminently in the case of an act that is even yet to us moderns wrapped in impenetrable obscurity,—the13 act of generation and conception. How could he think of this Deity12, that used his own body as its instrument and in so doing bestowed on him the highest pleasure of the senses, otherwise than under the shape of a Being equally alluring and loving, convinced that this Being must be infinitely more alluring13 than even the beloved form that he held in his arms? “The young man’s fancy” craves a lovely maiden; the maiden needed a loving sister, into whose arms she could trustingly throw herself, who intuitively divined all her soft, sweet emotions, to express which she sought in vain for words, which she scarce dared to own to herself that she was conscious of, and understood them!

To the Goddess’ Temple she wandered, before her poured out the longings that filled her heart to overflowing14, and at the last offered up herself a gift at the holy place, that so Aphrodité Ἀφροδίτη εὔκαρπος, κουροτρόφος, γενετύλλις,—Aphrodité rich in fruit, giving offspring, of the birth-hour) might be glorified in her, and herself be a participant in the highest happiness of Woman,—the joys of Motherhood. First she prepared herself by bodily purifica14tion15 before she trod the Temple threshold, then at the Temple altar she received spiritual purity; and thus thrilled through and through with the influence of the holiest, the Priest’s hand16 led her to the arms of her Lover, who as unspoiled yet and unsophisticated as she, had not sought to unveil the most august secrets of Nature with audacious hand. Intoxicated with rapture he drew his darling on to the Torus (sacred couch) bedecked with fragrant blossoms, and almost unconsciously to himself, became the creator of a being wherein both saw themselves made young again.

If Man is really the noblest of created Beings, made by the Creator in his own image, in very truth then the power that unconsciously raises Man to the level of his Maker must be a divine power too, and that act in the exercise of which it comes itself into play an act of most sublime worship. Are we to suppose there never was a time when Man, pure as he came from the hand of his Creator, followed in the singleness of his heart no other law15 but that written in his heart? Surely not merely in the dreams of the Poet was found the legend of an Eden, from which Man was driven out by his own guilt; more true to say that to this day we are all of us born therein. But alas! others’ guilt or our own tears us away from out the garden of Paradise, ere we have yet been able often to raise our eyes to take delight in its glory. Thus it is that many a man now and again has the memory of a Dream, that accompanies him on his pilgrimage through life, and he hopes to find in the future what long ago, before he grew conscious of its existence, became a thing of the past. Perchance it may be the fatal tasting of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge was nothing else than the misuse of the genital organs, to content bestial longings, to arouse the titillation of an enervating pruriency17.16 “And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked!” The bestial had won the victory over the divine, which fled away from the desecrated altar; and the Genius of Mankind wept over their Fall!

Here is the History at once of Man individually and of whole Peoples. Over the Temple-worship of Aphrodité also impended such a crisis; and sooner or later the holy courts of Venus Urania (Heavenly Venus) changed into the Lupanar of Venus Vulgivaga (Brothel of Venus of the Streets).

A precise knowledge of the extension of the Venus-cult in chronological order would readily supply us the means of following up historically the moral deterioration of the Peoples of Antiquity; but so long as we do not possess this, History cannot be expected to give us anything of great value. All that we are for the present in a position to give, pertinent to the object we aim at, is as follows:

“The worship of this Urania,” says Pausanias18,17 “the Assyrians first introduced amongst themselves, after the Assyrians the Paphians in Cyprus19, and among the Phoenicians20 the inhabitants of Ascalon in Palestine. From the Phoenicians the inhabitants of Cythera21 learned to know and worship her. At Athene Aegeus introduced her worship.” It was at Babylon then that the cult of Venus originated as Mylitta worship, spread over the inland parts to Mesopotamia as the Sabaean22 religion, and was passed on by the Phoenicians to the seaboard peoples as Astarté-worship. For at the spot where this cult first arose, it lasted longest in its original purity, and Herodotus23 could report how18 at Babylon the daughters of the country were compelled once in their life-time to give themselves for money to a strange man to win the favour of the goddess, then to return to their dwelling all the more virtuous for the sin, and neither promises nor gifts, however great these might be, availed ever again to draw them into the arms of a stranger. Later indeed it was different even here, perhaps through the influence of the Phoenicians, who had manifold dealings with them. For Herodotus himself relates elsewhere (Bk. I. 196), that after the capture of Babylon by the Persians, the poorer classes, dreading the forcible abduction of their daughters, if means of subsistence failed them, made them harbour-wenches24. And accordingly Q. Curtius25 felt bound to write of Babylon:

19

“Nihil urbis eius corruptius moribus, nihil ad irritandas illiciendasque immodicas voluptates instructius. Liberos coniugesque cum hospitibus stupro coire, modo pretium flagitii detur, parentes maritique patiuntur.... Feminarum convivia ineuntium in principio modestus est habitus, dein summa quaeque amicula exuunt, paulatimque pudorem profanant: ad ultimum ... ima corporum velamenta proiiciunt; nec meretricum hoc dedecus est sed matronarum virginumque apud quas comitas habetur vulgati corporis vilitas.”

(Nothing can well be more corrupt than the manners of this City, nothing more artfully adapted to excite the passions and allure to voluptuous excesses. Strangers are permitted by parents and husbands, provided the price of shame is forthcoming, to have lustful intercourse with their children and their wives.... At their first entrance to the banquet-room the women’s dress is modest, presently they remove their outer robes one by one, and little by little violate all modesty, ... at the last stripping off the innermost coverings of their persons. And this is no mere abomination of harlots, but the habit of matrons and maids, who consider that in thus making themselves cheap and exposing their bodies they are showing courtesy). This custom we find again carried still further amongst the Armenians, who Strabo2627 says consecrate their daughters for some considerable length of time to Anaitis, and only after this suffer20 them to marry. Herodotus28 relates the same custom of the Lydians, degenerated in the same way as had been the case in later times at Babylon, for here too the lower classes used to abandon their daughters to prostitution for a livelihood. Still in its original purity the usage reached the Phoenicians29, but with them also would seem to have early degenerated, although in particular towns of Phoenicia the practice appears to have been followed only under certain circumstances. Lucian30 relates that the women, of Byblus, where was a Temple of Ἀφροδίτη βυβλίη (Venus of Byblos), if they would not allow their hair to be cut off at the Funeral-feast of21 Adonis, were bound in honour of Venus for one whole day to abandon their bodies to strangers. Among the Carthaginians31 also, as in Cyprus32, maidens had to earn their dowry, and the Tyrant Dionysius introduced the same custom, no doubt with a secondary design of a profit for himself, amongst the people of Locri.33

22

As to the reason for this custom, one might be found in the opinion that prevailed almost universally in Antiquity amongst the Asiatic peoples, that the first-fruits of everything were consecrate to the Deity, and accordingly the virgin’s hymen must be offered up to Venus. But this will not in any way explain why the self-surrender must nearly always take place with a Stranger (ἀνδρὶ ξείνῳ) of all people in the world. Heyne34 and Fr. Jacobs35, who paid special attention to this custom, are it is true agreed in thinking that a religious motive lay at the bottom of it, though they differ in their conception of what it was; but neither of them hit on the right explanation. A careful distinction must be made between the Ceremony and the Act of the self-surrender. The first was a matter of religion, the second not; for the women were conveyed at Babylon outside the Temple-precincts, in Cyprus to the sea-shore, for the purpose of yielding their bodies to strangers36.23 Had the act been regarded at that period as a religious one, it would of necessity have been practised, as was the case before and again later, in the Temple or at least within its precincts, and of course with fellow-countrymen, strangers not being allowed to take part in any native religious practice.

The discrepancies however soon disappear if it is remembered that in Antiquity, as to this day amongst many savage peoples, not only was the menstrual blood (of which more fully later) held to be impure, but also the blood that flowed, when a virgin was deflowered, from the rupture of the hymen, and consequently the act of defloration as well. The same held good in the case of coition with widows, because it was believed that with them the menstrual blood accumulated in greater quantity, then was discharged on occasion of the first coition, and must necessarily cause injury to the man. This also explains why Herodotus (loco citato) says γυναῖκες (women) and not simply κόραι or παρθένοι (girls, virgins); and removes at once Heyne’s doubts (p. 32) and the difficulties raised by Heeren37.

The dwellers on the sea-coast, who enjoyed more active intercourse with the rest of the world, left to strangers the polluting act of defloration, whilst among inland peoples this office was undertaken for those of the higher classes38 by the priests, or else an idol, specially appropriated for the purpose, a Priapus or Lingam (see later) was employed. Subsequently several mistaken reasons may well have been alleged for the custom; the only idea that continued to be24 consistently held was that defloration was not a proper function of the bridegroom. It was rather made a matter of honour, and accordingly brides offered themselves first to the wedding-guests, as among the Nasomonians in Africa39 and in the Balearic Islands40, where the right of preference went by age.

We must then take into consideration several causal factors to help us to an explanation of the custom in question. The original motive may very well have been in every case the consecration of the maiden’s virginity to the goddess,41—Hieroduli (Temple hand-maids) in the earlier meaning. Further again the maiden was bound to pay her tribute to the goddess of sexual Pleasure42, so as to co-operate with the husband with a view to the procreation of children. Little by little the custom lost its purer character. After a time it ceased to be any longer one of universal obligation, and became binding only for the poorer classes, who found in it an opportunity of earning a dowry43 for their daughters. Meantime the rich adopted the habit of presenting female slaves to the temple of the goddess, thereby giving occasion for the establishment of the regular25 Hieroduli,—who subsequently grew into filles de joie in the proper sense, and laying the foundation of the brothel system (see later). Out of the idea of consecration was subsequently developed on the one hand that of initiation for the married state,—an idea found again in the “proof-nights” custom of the Middle Ages, and on the other the idea of bondage that grew into the “Jus primae noctis” (Right of first night).

As second factor then must be reckoned the belief in the harmfulness of the blood resulting from rupture of the hymen at defloration; and connected with this the actual injury that the man’s genital organs are occasionally exposed to in deflowering a maid with narrow vaginal orifice, or at any rate the effort necessarily called for to perforate the hymen, a motive not without actual weight amongst indolent Asiatics44. To this day the bridegroom at Goa gives26 thanks to the Priapus (Lingam), that has loosed his bride’s virgin-zone, with marks of the deepest adoration and gratitude for having performed this honourable service and so relieved him of a heavy task45.

For the maid defloration is yet more painful, and as she had to go through it once and once only with a stranger, she might readily get the idea that it was the stranger alone that was to blame; consequently that every surrender to a stranger must involve the same sufferings. This would deter her from a second experience of the kind, and all the more so because the subsequent embraces of the husband stirred in her only pleasurable sensations. So the wife had no inducement to break the marriage vow.

When and under what circumstances the cult of Venus first came into Greece can hardly be discovered, though indeed Pausanias states in the passage quoted above that it was Aegeus (Erechtheus) who brought it to Athens. For a long period it played only a subordinate part, being kept under by the primeval god Eros (Love)46. No doubt the physical element may have come in early times from abroad47, but before long the stamp of the spiritual was strongly impressed upon it (the Graces were added as handmaidens to Aphrodité!),—so strongly that the idea of the procreating power fell henceforth into the background, to give place to that of Love, an idea that was entirely foreign to Asia. The amalgamation of Eros and Aphrodité, who was now first hallowed by him, or as the poet puts it, now first brought forward into the assemblage (Order) of the Gods,27 came about so gradually and imperceptibly that it would hardly be possible to obtain a clear conception of the views of the Greeks on the point. In consequence of the growing intercourse with the peoples of Asia, and particularly the Phoenicians48, foreign customs and usages came to be introduced and adopted with ever increasing frequency; and during the flourishing period of Greece we see the Asiatic character of the Venus ritual come into ever greater prominence, and the goddess herself in a sense re-introduced. Especially was this the case in the Islands and the seaport-towns, where as a rule the worship of Aphrodité first arose. Hence she was entitled the goddess “born of the (Sea) Foam”, and temples were built to her as “Protectress of Havens.”49

But the Greek genius found this physical Cult too strongly opposed to its own spirit. The Greek could not bring it into unison with his Eros-worship; and accordingly distinguished his goddess, under the name of Aphrodité Urania (Heavenly Aphrodité)50, from that worshipped by other Peoples as Aphrodité28 Pandemos51 (Aphrodité Common to all Men). The latter was relegated to the Islands52, and particularly Cyprus; and never properly speaking became a national Deity.

It is very interesting as a general fact that the Venus Urania always belongs, so it appears, to the inland regions, the Venus Pandemos on the contrary to the sea-ports and islands53; for it was as a rule from East to West along the coast-lines that the Asiatic form of the Cult spread, a thing that could not have happened except through the instrumentality of a people early practising navigation, such as the Phoenicians.

It cannot fail to have an important bearing on our subject to make a more precise acquaintance with the geographical distribution of the Venus-cult. We propose to give here a brief enumeration of the localities where she had her temples. The passages in evidence for this will be found given with tolerable completeness in Manso,—p. 46, also pp. 158 sqq.

In Cyprus: at Paphos, whither came yearly a great concourse of people at the festival time54; in Pamphilia; in Asia Minor; along the Coast-line of the Aegean; in Caria (Cnidos); Halicarnassus; Miletus;29 Ephesus; Sardis; Pergamus; Pyrrha; Abydos (Aphrodité πόρνη—harlot); in Thessaly; at Tricca; in Boeotia, (Tanagra—on the Sea); in Attica, (Athens, Colias, Pera55, on the Cephissus); in the Islands of the Aegean Sea, (Ceos, Cos, Samos, where the temple was built from the earnings of the Hetaerae); in the Peloponnese: at Argolis, Epidaurus, Troezen, Hermioné, (was visited by maids and widows before their marriage); in Laconia, (Amyclae, Cythera); Arcadia, (Megalopolis, Tegea, Orcomenus); Elis, (Olympia, Elis); Achaia, (Patrae, Corinth); on the Coast of the Corinthian Gulf. From Greece we come to Sicily, where the temple of Venus on Mount Eryx was hardly inferior to that of Paphos, also at Syracuse56.

Not without importance for our purpose is the statement of Strabo57, that in the island of Cos in the temple of Aesculapius was an effigy of Venus Anadyomené (coming from the bath), while according to Pausanias58 in a wood near the temple of the same god at Epidaurus was built a chapel of Aphrodité, since very possibly this may throw some light on the question of the knowledge of complaints of the genital organs possessed by the physicians of Cos. Böttiger59 is of opinion that it was from the infirmaries and lazarettos of the Phoenicians that the earliest medical science of the Greeks was introduced—to the island of Cos; to Aegina, on the30 Peloponnesian coasts, especially at Epidaurus. Probably these establishments were originally under the protection of the national deity, until the latter was superseded by the god Aesculapius.

As regards the cult of Aphrodité itself and the manner in which it was celebrated in Greece, there appears to be a great lack of particulars capable of supplying a general knowledge of the subject, and especially so where the Pandemian Aphrodité is concerned. Accordingly we will limit ourselves here to mentioning the female Hieroduli60 who as bondswomen of Aphrodité dwelt within the precinct of her Temple, and performed the necessary observances in her honour. These were, as already pointed out, of Asiatic origin, and to be found in greater numbers particularly at Ameria61 and Comana62 in Pontus, where they united with the temple-service the traffic of their bodies, (τῶν ἐργαζομένων ἀπὸ τοῦ σώματος—of women who traffic with their body), just as in later times male Hieroduli gave up their persons for Paederastia.

When the cult of Venus came into Greece, the31 Hieroduli were introduced along with it. But they stripped off in Greece their Asiatic character, which they assumed again only in particular sea-port towns at the period of the decline of the moral greatness of the Nation, in places where the temple of Aphrodité Πόρνη (Harlot) was found. Specially was this so at Corinth63, in which city were more than a thousand female Hieroduli, who were presented as slaves to the Temple. These attracted a great concourse of strangers to the place, and in particular used to prey upon sea-faring visitors. Possibly however in this case as in others a confusion took place between the Hieroduli properly so-called and the Hetaerae (Lady-Companions), who were euphemistically entitled Priestesses, Handmaids of Aphrodité, because they were under the patronage of that goddess, just as in a general way sexual enjoyment was called an offering to Venus.

This would offer the best solution of the question,32 early debated, of the morality of the Hieroduli. It was quite opposed to Greek feeling to worship Aphrodité after the Asiatic manner in her temples; and so the Greek distinguished his Venus Urania from the Venus Pandemos, and on the same principle separated her temples into two categories, and made the temples of Aphrodité Pandemos, Porné and Praxis (Common to All, Harlot, Sexual Intercourse) into the οἰκήματα τῆς Ἀφροδίτης (houses of Aphrodité) serving as ordinary brothels, the latter being only intended for Foreigners originally.

How and under what form the cult of Venus came into Italy is uncertain, but the legend represents Aeneas as having brought it from Troy to Lavinium and Laurentum64, and already in the time of Romulus a Venus Myrtea (Venus of the Myrtle) was venerated at Rome. In addition a Venus Cloacina, Erycina, Victrix, and Verticordia (Venus—the Purifier, of Mount Eryx, of Victory, the Turner of Hearts) are mentioned, as also a Venus Calva (bald), whose worship King Ancus is said to have introduced, at a time when the Roman women had lost their hair through a plague and it had grown again by the help of Venus65. Not only are the notices as to Venus worship in Italy very scanty, but everything on the subject points to the fact that what there was of it in later times showed little of the Asiatic33 impress; and we can conveniently leave the matter where it is. Some questions belonging to the subject will be discussed later under the heading Brothels. In Spain too the worship of Venus was so unimportant that there is no need to enter more closely into the point.

Whilst the cult of Venus sprang up in the interior of Asia and was disseminated from thence over other parts of the world, it is in India that the Lingam ritual took its rise, a ritual more closely corresponding with the egotism of man. The idea that was early formed as the result of observation, that the man’s genitals were the determining element in the process of generation, was bound to conceive these organs themselves as being, in the prevailing system of Pantheism, under the Government of a Deity, and therefore as specially holy66. Now how could this Deity be represented to the eyes of men otherwise than by that organ whereby he pre-eminently showed himself efficacious? The later legend it is34 true put the matter into another shape; and we find in Sonnerat67 the myth of the Lingam-ritual amongst the worshippers of Vishnu related in the following form:

“The Penitents had by means of their sacrifices and prayers attained great power; but their hearts and their wives’ hearts must ever remain pure, if they would continue in possession of it. Now Siva had heard the beauty of these latter highly extolled, and formed the determination of seducing them. With this aim in view he took on him the form of a young mendicant68 of perfect beauty, bade Vishnu transform himself into a fair maiden and resort to the spot where the Penitents dwelt, in order to make them fall in love with him. Vishnu betook himself thither, and as he passed through their midst threw them such tender glances that they were all enamoured. They left all their sacrifices to follow after the youthful fair one.6935

Their passions grew all the fiercer, till at last they seemed all lifeless and their languishing bodies resembled wax that melts near the fire.

Siva himself hied to the dwelling-place of the women. In mendicant guise he carried in one hand a water-bottle, and sang as he went, as beggars do. Now his song was so entrancing, that all women gathered round him, and thereupon under the gaze of the fair singer fell into complete distraction. This was so great with some that they lost their ornaments and clothing, and followed him in the garb of nature without noticing the fact.

When he had marched through the village, he left it, but not unaccompanied, for all followed him into a neighbouring thicket, where he had his will of them. Soon afterwards the Penitents became aware that their sacrifices no longer possessed their former efficacy, and that their power was no more the same as before. After a period of pious contemplation they now learned that it had been Siva who in the form of a Youth had seduced their wives into profligacy, and that they themselves had been led astray by Vishnu in the likeness of a Maid.

Accordingly they determined to slay Siva by means of a sacrifice.

(After many vain attempts), ashamed to have lost their honour without being able to avenge themselves, they made a last desperate effort; they united into one all their prayers and expiations, and directed them against Siva. It was the most terrible of their sacrifices, and God himself could not withstand the effects of its operation. They went forth like a flame of fire and fastened on Siva’s organs of generation and severed them from his body. Enraged with the Penitents, Siva now resolved to set the whole world in conflagration to punish them. The fire was already beginning to seize all around, when Vishnu and Brahma, on whom it was incumbent to save the living creatures in the world, thought of means to put a stop to it. Brahma took the form of a pedestal(?)36 and Vishnu that of the female organs of generation, and in this way copied Siva’s organs of generation, and thereby the universal conflagration was stayed. Siva suffered himself to be appeased by their prayers, and promised not to burn up the world, if men would pay divine honours to the dissevered organs.”

Now if we consider this myth, as related here, more closely, we can scarcely avoid the suspicion that it is one of those that in later times were fabricated in many forms and foisted in as genuine. For it is entirely adapted to explain the origin of the Venereal disease in a way that leaves little to be desired; for which reason it was used by Schaufus as the basis of his argument that the Venereal disease was introduced into Europe from India. But on the other hand this particular story is so accordant with the ancient creed of the Hindoos in general that, if it is of later origin, it must have been put together with the assistance of older legends. The continued union with the god, the power which the Penitents owed to him, was connected with purity of heart, with avoidance of sensuality70;37 directly they indulged in the latter, they were deprived of the divine influence, just as in the Mosaic legend resulted from the Fall of Man. This is one part of the legend,—manifestly a double one, while the other includes the punishment of the being who wrought this profanation. His genitals were destroyed by burning, which was attacking the World (i.e. men through the women seduced by Siva?), and ceased only through the prayers of the Penitents, which again became efficacious; thereupon the organs thus happily made sound again were suspended as thank-offerings in the temple of the god.

It would seem then that it was the sickness of the male genitals which gave occasion for their consecration and worship; and this is so far not inconsistent with reason, as the external position of the sexual parts in the male make every affection and injury perceptible at once with but little trouble, while the female organs lie in a more concealed situation. So that to the present day diseases of the male genitals are far more precisely known and appreciated than those of the female.

Should the enquirer push his search for an explanation further still, he might, arguing from what is said as to Vishnu’s having copied Siva’s sexual38 organs that had been blighted by the fire under the form of female genitals, allege a sort of natural cause for the conflagration, to wit the suggestion of a mode of cure which was frequently recommended and practised in the Middle Ages, when persons thought to drive away the clap by coition with virgins. But this is surely nothing else than an explanation of the Lingam71 superimposed on the symbol of the Juni, the feminine principle, in the form of the triangle, which Böttiger holds to be identical with the navel-stone of the Paphian goddess.

F. G. Klein72 professes to have proved from annals of Malabar that long before the discovery of the West Indies Venereal disease was known in the East Indies, for the Malabar physicians Sangarasiar and Alessianambi, who lived more than nine hundred years ago, and other physicians even before them, make mention he says of the Disease and its cure by means of Mercury. But in Antiquity affections of the genitals must have certainly been rarities amongst the inhabitants of India, for the Greeks73 count them amongst the longlived peoples, as owing to their moderation they were subject to few diseases. Again the climate of India is by no means to be39 considered as a factor favourable to the disease, Munro74 assuring us that simple herbs and moderate mode of life make the Hindoo recover, when no European could fail to succomb.

Whether the Phallus ritual in Egypt, where it is supposed to have arisen from the generative organs of Osiris cut off by Typho, have an Indian origin or no, it is impossible to decide75. But that it existed is certain, for not only are miniature Phalli often found with Mummies, but it was also portrayed in the Temple of Karnak76; and Herodotus77 mentions it, and adds at the same time that in the statutes the Phalli were movable. Perhaps from it was developed in part the cult of Mendes, of which40 we shall speak later. Although Herodotus78 declares that the Egyptians were the first people who had forbidden the accomplishment of coition in the temples, yet Strabo79 writes that they dedicated to Zeus the fairest and best-born maidens, whom the Greeks called Pallades, and compelled them to give themselves to men until their menstruation began for the first time, whereupon they were married.

As regards Greece on the contrary there is scarcely a doubt that the worship of Bacchus, and with it the Phallic ritual80, was transplanted to that41 country from India. To explain the occasion of this introduction there is a legend related in the highest degree worthy of attention in connection with the history of affections of the genitals. It is told by Natalis Comes81 in the following terms:

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“Fuerunt et Phallica in Dionysi honorum instituta, quae apud Athenienses agebantur, apud quos primus Pegasus ille Eleutheriensis Bacchi cultum instituit, in quibus cantabant quem ad modum Deus hic morbo Athenienses liberavit et quem ad modum multorum bonorum auctor mortalibus extitit. Fama est enim quod Pegaso imagines Dionysi ex Eleutheris civitate Boeotiae in Atticam regionem portante Athenienses Deum neglexerunt neque, ut mos erat, cum pompa acceperunt: quare Deus indignatus pudenda hominum morbo infestavit, qui erat illis gravissimus: tunc eis ab oraculo, quo pacto liberari possent petentibus, responsum datum est: solum esse remedium malorum omnium, si cum honore et pompa Deum recepissent; quod factum fuit. Ex ea re tum privatim tum publice lignea virilia thyrsis alligantes per eam solennitatem gestabant. Fuit enim Phallus vocatum membrum virile. Alii Phallum ideo consecratum Dionyso putarunt, quia sit autor creditus generationis.”

(There were Phallic rites too established in honour of Dionysus, (these were observed among the Athenians; for it was at Athens that the far-famed Pegasus first established the worship of Eleutherian Bacchus)82, at which men chanted hymns telling how the god freed the Athenians from a plague, and how he was the giver of many good gifts to mortals. For the story relates that Pegasus brought the images of Dionysus from Eleutherae, a city of Boeotia, to the land of Attica; but the Athenians slighted the god, and did not, as was the wont, receive him with a procession. Wherefore the god was wroth, and afflicted the men’s private parts with a disease that was most grievous to them. So they consulted the oracle, asking in what way they might be freed from the plague, and received the answer: there was one43 only remedy for all their ills, viz. that they should welcome the god with due honour and fitting procession. And this they did accordingly. And in commemoration thereof they used to bind virilia (male generative organs) of wood to the thyrsi (Bacchic staves), and carry them thus at the solemnity in question; and this was done both privately and publicly. For Phallus is the name given to a man’s privy member. Others again considered that it was consecrate to Dionysus for this reason, because he was deemed the author of procreation).

Still more striking is the legend which the same author, Natalis Comes83, gives of the introduction of Priapus worship into Lampsacus, though it bears so great a resemblance to the preceding that the one might almost be thought to have been taken from the other. Aphrodité, he says, on the occasion of Bacchus’84 progress to44 India was made pregnant by him, and on her return to Lampsacus was brought to bed of Priapus, whose deformity was caused by the goddess Juno85, who afforded succour to the mother at the time of his birth:

“Deinde, cum adolevisset (Priapus) pergratusque foret Lampsacenis mulieribus, Lampsacenorum decreto ex agro Lampsaceno exulavit.—Fuerunt qui memoriae prodiderint Priapum fuisse virum Lampsacenum, qui cum haberet ingens instrumentum et facile paratum plantandis civibus, gratissimus fuerit mulieribus Lampsacenis. Ea causa postmodo fuisse dicitur, ut Lampsacenorum omnium ceterorum invidiam in se converterit, ac demum eiectus fuerit ex ipsa insula. At illud facinus aegerrime ferentibus mulieribus et pro se deos precantibus, post cum nonnullis interiectis temporibus Lampsacenos45 gravissimus pudendorum membrorum morbus invasisset, Dodonaeum oraculum adeuntes percunctati sunt an ullum esset eius morbi remedium. His responsum est: morbum non prius cessaturum, quam Priapum in patriam revocassent. Quod cum fecissent, templa et sacrificia illi statuerunt, Priapumque hortorum Deum esse decreverunt.”

(Subsequently when he—Priapus—had come to man’s estate, and was now exceedingly pleasing to the women of Lampsacus, by a decree of the Lampsacenes he was exiled from the territory of Lampsacus.—Some there are to tell the tradition that Priapus was a man of Lampsacus who had a huge “instrument” ready and willing for the making of new citizens, and who on that account was most pleasing to the Lampsacene women. Wherefore it is said afterwards to have come about that he incurred the envy and hatred of all the rest of the men of Lampsacus, and eventually was expelled from the island altogether. But this was a disaster that the women most bitterly regretted; so they prayed to the gods to help them, and after some interval of time had elapsed a most grievous disease of the private parts attacked the men of Lampsacus. Then they reported to the oracle of Dodona, and enquired of the god if there were any remedy for this plague. The reply was to the effect that the disease would not cease till they had recalled Priapus to his native land. This they did; and furthermore built temples and established sacrifices in his honour, and decreed that Priapus should be the god of gardens).86

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Whatever interpretation we may give to these legends of Bacchus and Priapus, this much at any rate may be gathered from them without fear of contradiction, that affections of the male genitals at the time when they first became prevalent were taken to be the original cause of the introduction of Phallic worship,—in connection with the defloration of virgins mentioned in § 4. This is not without importance as bearing on the antiquity of the well-known Indian legend of the Lingam-ritual; and at the same time shows clearly that those affections of the genital organs must have borne a malignant character that men could not explain to themselves otherwise than as proceeding from the wrath of a Deity, a deity who on the other hand alone possessed the power to remove these ills. Another factor of great importance in connection with affections of the genitals in Antiquity, and of all the greater importance in as much as it leads us to the conclusion that resort was had for their cure not to human but to divine assistance, partly indeed depends on reasons which we shall discuss more exactly later on. However these reasons may in part be gathered at once from the following supremely important poem in the Priapeia87, to which de Jurgenew first called attention47 in his Dissertation, p. 11, but without communicating it in its entirety:

Voti solutio.

Paying a Vow.

(Why, you ask, is portrayed on the tablet the member whereby we are begotten? When, as it befell, my penis was damaged, and like a wretched coward I dreaded the Surgeon’s hand, I was afraid to entrust myself and the cure of my organ to the great official gods, that were too high for me, such I mean as Phoebus and Phoebus’ son. “To the member, I said, do thou, Priapus, give aid,—the member that thou art fashioned in the likeness of88. Then when48 it has been healed without the knife, a painted image of the part thou has relieved shall be dedicated to thee,—a match, a perfect match in form and in hue.” Thus he made his vow; the god nodded his penis in token of assent, and answered his prayers.)

This poem, whoever its author may have been89, testifies most explicitly that the Poet’s genital organs were seriously affected (by Phimosis and Ulcers?), that he from fear (timerem) of the Surgeon’s knife,49 from shame (verebar) before the regular physician in view of the part affected and of the way in which he had got the disease, had recourse to prayer and vow before the image of Priapus, and thereupon happily recovered without medical assistance!

The veneration of Priapus was pretty well universal in Italy, as the Roman poets teach us, and equally so the Phallic worship, of which the frequent representations of the Phallus that we find at Pompeii bear witness; in fact the latter, as Knight shows, maintained itself in connection with the veneration of Saints Cosmus and Damian down to the last Century at Isernia. The just quoted Poem from the Priapeia might perhaps serve to afford us an indication as to how the Phallus ritual has come to be connected with these Christian Saints; for probably patients attacked by the Venereal disease prayed to them, just as the Romans did to Priapus. Possibly examples of such cures by the saints in question are found in the “Acta Sanctorum Bollandi”. (Bollandist Lives of the Saints),—under Sept. 27.; but we are not able to consult the book. These Saints however were not the only ones that were venerated in the Middle Ages in the same way as the Priapus of the Ancients. In France unfruitful wives used to pray to St. Guerlichon, in Normandy to St. Giles, in Anjou to St. René, in connection with whom they practised rites which Stephanus declares himself ashamed to specify90.

Although the period at which the worship of Priapus was introduced among the different Peoples cannot be always definitely fixed, and although50 Classical Mythology invariably counts him as belonging to the newer91 gods, yet he appears in quite early times to have played a not unimportant part in Syria92,—if that is to say the conclusion93, pretty generally believed on other grounds, is well founded, that the god Baal Peor was a sort of Priapus, in whose temple, situated on Mount Peor94, young Maidens were offered up. The Rabbis95 derive the name from פְּעוֹר aperire sc. hymenem virgineum, (to open sc. the hymen of a virgin), as if it had sprung from the Phallus ritual, as still found in Italy. At Goa indeed a man’s member made of iron or ivory is fastened in the Pagoda, which in the case of every bride is pushed by the parents and relations into her vagina, until it brings away with it visibly the51 bloody traces of the rupture of the hymen96; a proceeding that is connected, as shown in § 4., with the belief in the malignity of the menstrual blood, and in that of blood coming from the ruptured hymen. On the Coromandel Coast likewise a wooden Priapus is to the present day most ardently venerated by the inhabitants97.

Here again we encounter a legend, which is not without importance for the history of the affections consequent upon the misuse of the genital organs, to wit the story of the Plague that broke out amongst the Jews at Shittim in consequence of their having taken part in the worship of Baal-Peor. Sickler98 was the first who, as a champion of the antiquity of the Venereal disease, made this the subject of a more precise examination. However, in order to obtain as clear an insight into the matter as possible, it will be needful to quote at length the52 passages of the Old Testament connected with the subject, according to the English Revised Version99:

Besides these passages in the Books of Moses we find the plague of Baal-Peor further mentioned in the following places in the Old Testament:

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We find the Jews on their march towards Canaan already arrived at the Jordan, from which river Shittim lay at a distance of 60 Stades or 2-1/2 leagues according to Josephus101, and the neighbouring Peoples in a state of terror at their near approach and at their victories. The King of the Moabites, Balak, had sent to the soothsayer Balaam, that the latter by his arts (his curse) might annihilate the threatening foe. Balaam however, inspired by the spirit of the Lord, blessed the sons of Israel instead of cursing them, but gave Balak counsel how he could in another way bring about the ruin of the Jews. This counsel is indicated in the passage quoted, Numbers Ch. 31, v. 16, without being explicitly stated; but what it was can indeed be partially gathered from the context of the whole passage, and was apparently so understood by the author of the Apocalypse, when he says:102 “But I have a few things against thee, because thou hast there some that hold the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to cast a stumblingblock before the children of Israel, to eat things sacrificed to idols, and to commit fornication.” Both Philo and Josephus, who perhaps lived only a little later, picture the course of events in full detail, though, it is true, from unknown authorities.

Philo103 writes as follows:

“Quae prius, inquit (Bileam), dixi oracula sunt omnia et vaticinationes: de reliquo quae loquar, animi mei coniecturae erunt.—Age vero praeclara eius monita videamus, quibus artibus instructa fuerint ad certissimam offensionem eorum, qui semper vincere poterant. Cum enim intelligeret56 Hebraeos una tantum ratione capi posse, violata facinore aliquo lege, per stupri libidinem et intemperantiam, magna mala, ad maius impietatis scelus inducere studebat voluptatis esca. Huius enim, aiebat, regionis, o rex, mulieres specie reliquis longe praestant: viri autem nulla re facilius quam mulieris forma expugnari possunt. Proinde si formosissimas quaestum facere prostareque permiseris, iuventutem adversariorum velut hamis capient. Ita autem doceri eas oportet, ne statim floris sui volentibus copiam faciant. Nam molestus ille aculeus simulatae recusationis libidinem acrius excitabit, et amorem accendet, actique libidine tanquam obtorto collo trahuntur, quidvis et facere et pati in animum inducent. Amatorem igitur ut quaeque sic affectum nacta erit, quae ad venationem illam subornantur, ferociter dicat: tibi consuetudine mea frui nefas est, nisi a patriis institutis desciveris, mutataque sententia eadem iuxta mecum colere coeperis. Huius defectionis fides ea demum mihi perspecta fuerit, si libamentorum eorundem et sacrorum particeps esse volueris, quae simulacris et statuis reliquisque signis ex ritu facere solemus.—Sic igitur ille tum consulebat: rex ista non abs re dici ratus, sublata de adulteris lege et abrogatis omnibus de stupro corruptelaque sanctionibus, proinde quasi nunquam rogatae essent, liberam facit mulieribus quibuscum vellent consuescendi potestatem. Illae vero licentia et impunitate data adolescentulorum multitudinem illiciebant, multo ante eorum animis circumventis et illecebrarum praestigiis ad impietatem impulsis: usque dum postremo pontificis filius Phinees, facta ista supra modum indignatus (teterrimum enim ei videbatur eodem tempore corpora et animos pro deditiis, illa voluptatibus, hos sceleri et impiae fraudi tradi iuvenilis audaciae memorabile facinus viroque dignum forti edidit. Nam quendam sui generis sacris operatum ad scortum ingredi conspicatus, neque submittentem in terram vultum, neque latere cupientem, neque, ut assolet,57 clanculum aditum suffurantem, sed inverecundam fiduciae intemperantiam prae se ferentem et in flagitio ridiculo velut in re praeclara magnifice se efferentem, exacerbatus indignitate rei et iusta repletus ira, cursu irrumpens adhuc in lecto iacentes amatorem et meretriculam confodit, genitaliaque eis praeterea desecat, quibus incestum satum patrarant. Istud exemplum aliqui continentiae et religionis studiosi iussu Mosis imitati, omnibus qui initiati fuerant simulacris manu factis, propinquis iuxta necessariisque occidione occisis, scelus gentis expiarunt inexorabili sceleratorum supplicio,—unoque die viginti quatuor millia hominum caesa sunt, et una statim sublata est communis labes, qua totus exercitus maculosus polluebatur.”

(All my words, said he (Balaam), thus far are dark sayings and prophecies; what I shall speak henceforth will be the counsels of my own mind.—But come let us look into his excellent advice, in what artful ways it has been framed for the sure and certain destruction of our ever-victorious foes. For perceiving that the Hebrews could be overcome in one fashion only, viz. through their violating the law by some terrible wrongdoing, he set himself, employing the bait of lust, to lead them on by way of fornication and incontinence, great offences in themselves, to the still greater crime of impiety. For this land, he said, oh! King, far excels all others in the beauty of its women; and by no other thing may men’s minds be so readily mastered as by a woman’s fairness. So if thou suffer the fairest amongst them to play the harlot and offer their beauty for a price, they will catch the young men of our enemies, so to speak, on their hooks. But they must be instructed not to surrender the enjoyment of their persons straightway at the first offer. For the sharp sting of a feigned refusal will, as thou knowest, excite their longing more keenly than ever, and inflame their passion, till driven on by lustfulness they are dragged along, as it were, by a halter round their58 necks, and there is nothing they will not consent to do or suffer. Accordingly the lover that each of the fair women who are set on to this task has won for herself and brought to this condition, must be bluntly told: It is impossible for thee to enjoy my love unless thou break with the customs of thy fathers, and change thy heart, and undertake the observance of the same rites as we. And this desertion of thy people’s faith will I then only hold as manifested, when I shall see thee willing to partake in those same libations and sacrifices that we are wont duly to pay to our idols and statues and other images.—Now such was the advice Balaam then offered; and the King deeming that he spake much to the purpose, repealed the law as to unlawful intercourse, and removed all punishments for fornication and licentious conduct, and made them as though they had never been, giving free licence to the women to lie with any man they pleased. And the latter, permission being granted and impunity guaranteed, soon ensnared a great number of the young Jewish warriors, whose minds indeed had long beforehand been entangled and by every trick and allurement impelled towards impiety.

At the last the high-priest’s son, Phinehas, above measure indignant at such deeds of shame, and convinced that both souls and bodies were at one and the same time being enslaved, the one by sensual pleasures, the other by wickedness and craft and impiety104, did a deed at once memorable for youthful daring, and worthy of a hero. For when he saw a kinsman of his own and one of the priestly order go in to a harlot, and this without any look59 of shame fixed on the ground, without any attempt at concealment, without any stealing up privily and making, as men are wont in such a case, a surreptitious entrance, but instead carrying it off with an air of shameless self-confidence and bearing himself proudly as though his act were one to merit renown and not ridicule, he was fired by the indignity, and filled with righteous anger rushes up and bursts in on the lover and his wanton actually lying on the bed. He pierces them through, and furthermore cuts away those organs wherewith they were satisfying their unholy passion. This example was followed, by command of Moses, by other zealous partisans of purity and religion; and those who had been initiated into the service of idols died the death at the hands of their family and kinsfolk, and so the wickedness of the nation was expiated by a merciless punishment of the wrongdoers;—and in one day four and twenty thousand men were slain, and thereby was straightway removed the common stain wherewith the whole host was spotted and polluted).

In much the same way, only still more fully, Josephus105 relates the circumstance. Licentiousness had laid hold of almost the entire host, and ancestral institutions were in danger of being abandoned altogether. Consequently, Josephus says, Moses appointed an assemblage of the People and in a speech drew attention to the perils that threatened. Sambrias (Simri) however made a defence, maintaining that they had long enough obeyed tyrannous laws and would fain live free henceforth. Hereupon he quitted the assembly, and was assassinated in his tent by the enraged Phinehas. Josephus (§ 12.) proceeds:

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“Iuvenes autem omnes, qui virtutis aliquid sibi vindicarent et honestatis studio tenerentur, Phineesis fortitudinis exemplo accensi, eiusdem cum Zambria criminis reos interfecerunt. Multi itaque illorum, qui leges patrias violarant, horum egregia virtute perempti sunt. Peste autem reliqui omnes perierunt, deo hunc illis morbum immittente. Et quotquot e cognatis, qui cum prohibere debuerint, eos ad haec impulerant, a deo pro sceleris sociis habiti, pariter sublati erant.”106

(But all the younger men who laid any claim to manly virtue and tried to live honorably, fired by the example of Phinehas’ bold deed, slew all that were guilty of the same crime as Sambrias. And so by their singular courage and patriotism numbers of the men who had broken their ancestral laws were destroyed. But all that survived perished by a plague, that God sent upon them. Moreover such of their kinsfolk as ought to have hindered them, but instead had urged them to these courses, these God deemed accomplices in the wickedness, and they also were cut off.) Philo and Josephus are not indeed to be regarded as authentic eye-witnesses of what they record; still the passages quoted from them prove this much, that in their time the opinions they express were generally held.

The Jews were thus led astray by the daughters of the Moabites, and both practised fornication with them and made sacrifice in their temples to the god of the country, whose priestesses, as Balaam declared, were conspicuous above other women for their beauty. The consequence of these excesses was an infectious disease, (according to Josephus it communicated itself, but, he says, only to kinsmen!), which cost many107 their lives. The number however fell61 far short of 24000, for these perished mainly by the sword of their brethren, as Philo and Josephus expressly remark, and the author of the Pentateuch intimates, when he says (Numbers Ch. 26. v. 5.), “And Moses said unto the judges of Israel, Slay ye every one his men that have joined themselves unto Baal-Peor.” The narrator declares that by this slaughter the plague was stayed for the sons of Israel; but it certainly cannot have ceased altogether, as is manifest from the passages quoted from Joshua, where Phinehas asserts: that to that day the people was not yet cleansed from the misdoing of Peor.

The disease therefore cannot have been merely some passing disorder. It must evidently have been somewhat widely disseminated by the Moabitish women, and have been of very common occurrence among them; and that it was readily infectious follows from the whole course of Moses’ proceedings. The latter was angry because the woman had been suffered to live, and commanded to put to death all of them that had known men in carnal intercourse, but to keep alive the young virgins,—and their number was, according to Ch. 31. v. 35., thirty-two thousand!—who were brought into the62 camp as prisoners and there divided amongst their captors. So we see the executions took place not in order that opportunity for intercourse with the heathen women,—a thing which might very well on its own account have been an abomination to the Lord,—might be altogether removed, (for how in that case account for the maidens being saved alive, brought into camp, and divided as booty?)108 but that by this means the risk of the further dissemination of the disease might be for ever prevented.

The imminence of this risk in Moses’ opinion is shown finally by the purification of the host which he had despatched for the massacre of the Moabites and their women. He made it, prisoners and all the spoil included, halt for a period of seven days outside the camp, and twice over submit to a thorough purification. The Jews had slain many thousands of men in their previous wars, nay! just before they marched against the Moabites, they had actually slaughtered 24000 of their own youth; yet they had never been ordered to leave the camp for seven days, and twice over during this time to purify themselves and all their possessions. Only after the annihilation of the Moabitish women (not of the Moabite men), from the accomplishment of which they had just returned, had this happened. All this points to some most cogent reason. Here comes into operation the same law which was enforced on63 occasion of purification after Leprosy and after foul discharge: and indeed also after contact with a dead person,—even where they had first caused the death of the said person! Thus no one can very well dispute the view taken by Philo,109 when he says with regard to the purification after the annihilation of the Moabites:—

“Nam ut legitima hostium caedes sit, attamen qui hominem interfecit quamquam iure, quamquam vim propulsans, quamquam coactus, non insons esse videtur nec extra noxiam, propter summam illam et communem hominum inter ipsos cognationem. Quo nomine piacula suscipienda fuerunt interfectoribus ad luendum scelus, quod conceptum censebatur.”

(For whereas the slaying of enemies is lawful, nevertheless whosoever has killed a man, whether lawfully, or whether initiating the violent act, or whether on compulsion, seems not to be innocent or free from responsibility; and this is owing to that supreme and general relationship of all mankind with one other. Wherefore certain expiations had to be undertaken by any man who had killed another, to wipe out the guilt that was deemed to have been incurred).

What was the precise nature of the disease that the Jews had brought on themselves by their intercourse with the Moabitish women cannot indeed be determined; but that it affected the genital organs can hardly admit of a doubt. The fact, if it is a fact, that not a few lost their lives owing to it, need be no objection, since the ulceration of the genitals that prevailed at the end of the XVth. Century caused similar fatalities, and as we shall presently see, the uncircumcised Apion met his death in some such way. Now the Jews were almost without exception still uncircumcised at that time,64 for it was Joshua110 who first on his arrival in Canaan, at the bidding of Jehovah, circumcised the children of Israel with stone knives on the hill Araloth. When the people adopted the worship of Baal Peor, we may be sure they ceased at the same time to observe the ancestral laws of purification,—if indeed these latter even as regards foul discharge and leprosy as well as intercourse with women during menstruation were not perhaps, as might almost be believed, first enacted in all their severity only in consequence of the plague of Baal Peor. Again it may well have been this experience that first taught the inhabitants of Palestine the necessity of circumcision, which was then laid down as an ordinance by command of Jehovah!

There is no doubt that it was in the Asiatic cult of Venus that the first elements were given for65 sexual excesses. It is hardly a matter of surprise therefore if these same elements came constantly, as has been shown above, into greater and greater prominence, and in this way pushed the original form of the Worship into the background. By degrees as enlightenment increased and the respect felt towards the gods diminished, Venus also soon lost her old character as goddess of procreation and sank into the patroness of sensual gratification. Her temples as well as her holy groves lost their exclusive title to bestow the blessing of fruitfulness on the embraces of the sexes, and came merely to serve as appointed trysting-places of carnal pleasures. The offerings made at her shrines were no longer to win an assurance of posterity; they became bribes paid to buy a free opportunity for the indulgence of sensuality. They degenerated into fornication-fees, as her temples did into brothels. The priestesses of Astarté or Mylitta stood at the beck and call alike of strangers and natives, and the opportunity was ever open for sexual enjoyment. Hence too it is that a special designation for the brothel will be looked for in vain in Asia. The thing existed there without the name being required; and the State found no need to establish an institution, which had long ago, without any intervention on its part, taken form under the cloak of religion.

Even amongst the Jews, who frequently enough, but always as a temporary aberration merely, adhered to the foreign cult, brothels in the strict sense seem never to have existed112. Although courtesans are66 frequently mentioned in the Old Testament, and even the dwelling of a Wanton as well as her behaviour pictured with considerable fullness of detail113, yet all this would seem to have had more of a private than of a public character,—due heed being given to the fact that not a few passages are to be taken only in a figurative sense. Prostitution as a regular calling was strictly prohibited114 to the daughters of Israel; and such women as practised it openly seem to have been mainly foreigners, perhaps natives of Phoenicia and Syria, who at the same time entertained with dancing and the music of stringed instruments115. But the attempt to draw a conclusion from this as to the pre-eminent chastity of the Jewish women, as e.g. Beer (on p. 25 loco citato) wishes to do, would be justifiable neither for earlier nor yet for later times. The passages of the Old Testament dealing with Sodom and with the dissoluteness under Mannasseh even in the very67 Temple at Jerusalem are sufficient by themselves to prove the contrary.

As to Macedonia there is a passage in Athenaeus, quoted from Hermesianax to this effect: ἀλλὰ Μακεδονίης πάσας κατενίσατο λαύρας (But he went through all the alleys of Macedonia), where Dalechamp translates the word λαύρα by brothel, but Casaubon even in his time threw doubt on this rendering.116 Possibly however this judgement is connected with similar licentious practises among the Macedonians to what we find among the Persians117, who indulged in sexual intercourse with their own mothers, daughters, etc., and begat children upon them,—a practice which Euripides118 makes the Barbarians generally guilty of.

But if there were actually brothels existing in Macedonia, this would be the less surprising, as its inhabitants may well be reckoned amongst Greeks in many respects.

The Greek knew perfectly the boundary between the physical and the ethical, and sought ever to subordinate the former to the latter. His whole life belonged in the first instance to the State, of it he68 was bound to be a citizen, and for it to endeavour to produce good citizens. Consequently polygamy early disappeared in Greece, and so too community of wives, a custom which prevailed down to historical times at Sparta only. Monogamy was the first law of marriage, and marriage was the bounden duty of every true citizen119, to save his family from dying out. But while the Asiatic prided himself on the number of his children, the Greek’s boast was of their excellence. Only with the object of procreating offspring was the Greek husband to rest in the arms of his spouse (ἐπ’ ἀρότῳ παίδων γνησίων—for the sowing, procreation of lawful children), and not to desecrate the holy Torus (marriage-couch) by mere lustfulness. Where this was stirred in him, he ceased to be free; a slave of lust, he must consort only with slave-women, and not with free citizenesses120. Nay! even this was permitted solely to avoid greater evils; and illicit coition never ceased69 to be held as something οὐ καλόν—unseemly121, particularly when it was indulged in by married men.

It has been shown how under the clearer skies of Greece the Asiatic worship of Venus took on a form more worthy of mankind, how the Greek distinguished his Venus Urania (Heavenly Venus) from the Venus of the rest of the world, the Pandemian (Venus common to all), and so set up a barrier to the flood of dissoluteness,—a barrier however that was little by little broken down in later times. Foreigners, especially the voluptuous inhabitants of Asia, when they saw that the Greek cult did not like their native worship abet their carnal appetites, imported slave-women. These were purchased by the Greeks, and handed over as offerings to the temple of Aphrodité under the title of Temple-servants or “Hieroduli”122; and acquainted as they were with the needs of their fellow-countrymen, sought in every way to supply them,—as was in particular the case at Corinth.

This example could not well remain without influence on private life. The Greek indeed took no part in the Asiatic form of the Venus-worship;70 all the same illicit connection grew more and more universally prevalent, and as it could not be gratified in any other way, wives123 and daughters of fellow-citizens were imperilled. To avert this danger Solon (B. C. 594) according to the statements of Philemon and Nicander124 introduced actual brothels, οἴκημα,71 πορνεῖον, (house, brothel) and public women, πόρναι (prostitutes), who were accessible at a trifling charge. The houses of ill-fame were situated, as Pollux informs us, at Athens in the neighbourhood of the Harbour125, and in the Ceramicus according to Hesychius126, in later times also in the city itself127. They72 were presided over by a Whoremaster (πορνοβοσκός, πορνοτρόφος—harlot-maintainer, harlot-keeper). As to the internal arrangements of brothels among the Greeks we have been unable so far to discover anything more precise, but in all probability the same conditions held good as among the Romans.

Besides the regular brothels, women were also kept at the taverns128 (καπηλεία, καπηλεῖον, καπήλιον, πανδοκεῖα,—tavern, inn), which likewise were situated chiefly near the Port. The women were bought slaves, as the passages quoted above (p. 70. note 2.) show; and even such free Greek women129 as at a later period undertook the calling, were then looked upon as slaves130. All women of this class, as well as the whore-masters, were professionally under the supervision of the Ἀγορανόμοι (Market Commissioners131, who fixed how much each was allowed to73 receive for her services. This fee was called μίσθωμα, διάγραμμα or ἐμπολή,—fee, scale, purchase). It varied in amount;—8 Chalci— = 1 obol, a little less than twopence (τριαντοπόρνη,—an obol, two-penny, girl)132, 2 obols— = about three-pence halfpenny (διωβολιμαῖα, χαλκιδῖτις,—a two obol, three-pence halfpenny, girl)133, a drachma—a franc, say ten-pence134, a Stater—= 4 drachmae, say three and three-pence (στατηριαία,—a stater, three and three-penny, girl).135

The Hetaera (Lady-Companion) seems in this respect to have enjoyed a greater liberty of choice, and a knowledge of their prices to have been regarded as something out of the common136. The well-known Gnathaena at Athens asked 1000 Drachmae for a night from a foreign Satrap137; Phryné a mina (= 100 drachmae, something over four pounds sterling). But the most notorious of all was Lais at Corinth for the high price at which she sold the marks of her favour, from which arose the proverb: Non cuivis homini contingit adire Corinthum,74 (It is not every man that can go to Corinth)138.

Licences to follow the calling were granted to the whore-masters, and also the women, on payment of a fixed duty, called “prostitute tax” (τέλος πορνικόν)139,75 which was leased out yearly by the Magistracy, and collected by professional farmers of the prostitution-tax or Collectors, known as πορνοτελώναι, who kept a complete list, in which were included even the “Pathici” (pathic sodomites), of all liable to the impost. From the proceeds of this prostitution-tax Solon would seem to have built a temple at Athens to Aphrodité Pandemos140. From this an idea may76 be formed, even if nothing more than a sort of brothel is to be understood by the term, of the large number of women of this character and of the considerable revenue of the city.

The public women were either such as lived in the brothels (πόρναι, αἱ προστᾶσαι τῶν οἰκημάτων,—harlots, prostitutes of the “houses”), where they used to stand at the doors, and that in rows (ἐπὶ κέρως τεταγμένας,—drawn up in column) more or less stripped, in almost transparent dresses (γυμναὶ, ἐν λεπτοπήνοις ὑμέσιν,—stripped, in fine-woven robes)141, or else they were kept partly as ἑταῖραι μουσικαί—“musical” hetaerae, like the harp-girls in German beer-halls, or with procurers (μαστροπός, προαγωγός,—bawds, procurers) in their taverns (προαγωγεῖα, μαστρόπιον, ματρύλλεια,—procurer’s house, bawdy-house, brothel). Or again they followed their trade in the Port-Market (the δεῖγμα) as δεικτηριάδες (Market-girls)142, in the στοὰ μακρὰ, (Long Portico), and generally in the Lanes of that neighbourhood (χαμαιτύπαι143, χαμαιευνάδες, χαμαιεύνης, χαμαιτηρίς, χαμεύνης,—all nick-names for common strumpets, “ground-thumpers,” “sleepers on the ground”), where they either surrendered themselves on the spot or hied to recognised harlots’ dens (χαμαιτυπεῖον) or houses of accommodation (τέγος)144.

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The place of their abode shows at once what class of men frequented “filles de joye” of the sort. It was foreign sailors145 in particular who here indemnified themselves for their compulsory continence at sea. Of Greeks only the dregs of the people and debauchees who had lost all self-respect came here; and even these used by preference the taverns146, where procuration was carried on as well147,—for which reason they had fallen into general disrepute. For as late as Aristophanes’148 time the lower class of citizens felt no hesitation about taking their pleasure along with their wives in inns. On the other hand persons of repute, prominent by office and dignities, were actually forbidden by law to visit such places. “Were an Areopagite to have been seen but once in an Inn,” says Hyperides149, “his colleagues would no longer have tolerated him as a member of the Areopagus.” Later, matters changed, for the moralizing Isocrates150 says, “Nay! no well-conducted slave dares even eat or drink anything in an Inn”; and Theophrastus, portraying the character of a madman quite devoid of shame gives this as a trait,—he would be quite capable of keeping an Inn!

The hetaera (female-companion) must be distin78guished from the πόρνη (harlot), though both were under similar conditions as to police surveillance. The hetaera was also strictly speaking a slave-woman, usually stolen as a child or otherwise obtained by procuresses, or bought by older hetaerae. They were educated151 in all that was understood by the Ancients under the name “Music”, that over and above their charms of person, they might especially captivate their lovers by their intellectual cultivation,79 who bought them to give them their freedom,—and then more often than not were presently abandoned by them. The great nursery of hetaerae was above all places Corinth, from which centre they travelled through all parts of Greece, as e.g. did Neaera, and frequently acquired enormous riches. The better class of them were everywhere held in high esteem; and many a hetaera, grown weary of her condition, gave her hand to a husband, in order to close her life as an honest wife152, or else retired so as at any rate to lead a blameless existence153. Frequently indeed they were also “Dames de Maison”, and often kept a considerable number of girls under the title of hand-maids. This was the case with Nicareta, just mentioned, at Corinth, as well as with the famous Aspasia at Athens, the latter of whom flooded all Hellas with her protegées154. Such as were held in less respect often put themselves under the protection of their more renowned sisters, or else carried on the calling on their own account, and this especially when they were not so well educated, not “musical” (πεζαι ἑταιραι—prose lady-companions)155, at Athens80 going to settle at the Peiraeus to entice the merchants who arrived in the port, whilst the more choice merely showed themselves there156. They often followed the troops on service in crowds, accompanying for instance the general Chares157 and Pericles to Samos, where they made so large an income that they even built a temple of Ἀφροδίτη ἐν Καλάμοις (Aphrodité at Calami,—the Reeds)158. For the remaining details as to the life of the hetaerae the classical Treatise of Friedrich Jacobs159 should be consulted.

Even these regular “filles de joie” at first existed almost exclusively for foreigners, who often squandered prodigious sums in their arms; the Athenians at any rate up to the time of Themistocles did not go with them160. But the example proved too strong to resist. Little by little the younger men acquired a taste for the freer society of the highly educated and luxuriously bedecked161 courtesans, who on their side were possessed of tact enough to subordinate the purely sensual to the intellectual, in order to81 captivate the Greek sense of beauty. Even older men might easily be seen at their feet, for the Greek ladies had but too little aptitude for stepping beyond the household sphere162. And so it was no longer matter for surprise when Chares took with him on his expedition, as stated above, a large number of hetaerae. The Athenian youth was already in the habit of killing time in their society163; and the important rôle they played in the time of Pericles needs to be no further insisted on. The Greek however never descended to the lowest level of shameless, brutal, coarseness. Before he threw himself into the arms of the foreign Wanton, he first raised her to some equality with himself; and of the handmaid and slave made a friendly companion or hetaera!

The account here given applies particularly only to Athens, for our efforts to discover anything more precise as to brothels and courtesans in the remaining States and Cities of Greece have not so far been crowned with success.

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With the Roman, who could spare hardly a thought to any other feeling than his pride, love played but an insignificant rôle in his existence. Even the deference he showed towards marriage and the married woman was not really so much the outcome of a pure morality as of the interest that the State must of necessity feel in the nursing-mothers of each succeeding generation; in fact it can scarcely be regarded as much more than a mere measure of policy. When a Censor like Metellus in a public Speech intended to encourage matrimony could say164: Si sine uxore possemus, Quirites, esse, omnes ea molestia careremus: sed quoniam ita natura tradidit, ut nec cum illis satis commode, nec sine illis ullo modo vivi possit, saluti perpetuae potius quam brevi voluptati consulendum. (If we could live without a wife, Quirites, we should all be free from such inconvenience; but since nature has arranged it in this wise that neither with women in any real comfort, nor without them at all, can existence be carried on, we ought to think of our life-long well-being rather than of a momentary gratification),—and when even the strict Cato declared165: In adulterio uxorem tuam si deprehendisses, sine iudicio impune necares: illa te, si adulterares, digito non auderet contingere, neque ius est. (If you should have detected your wife in adultery, you might kill her without trial and be scatheless; but she, if you were the adulterer, would not dare to lay a finger upon you, nor is it lawful she should),—it can hardly surprise us to find a complete lack of the ideal or intellectual element in the relations of the sexes. These never really rose among the Romans much above the level of the bestial; and harlots are found83 already in evidence at the very threshold of Roman history166, whilst association with them far from ever being a subject of blame, is rather represented as being a custom sanctified by immemorial usage that had never been forbidden167.

In spite of this however, and of the fact that the Etruscans168, at a time when Rome was hardly more than coming into existence, already led a life that84 was worse than licentious, while Messapians, Samnites and Locrians, as has been shown, habitually gave up their daughters to prostitution,—in spite of all this I say, the sexual excesses of the Romans were for the first 500 years on the whole insignificant. Their way of life as warriors and husbandmen hardly suffered them to sink into indolent sloth, the beginning of all vicious living, whilst the law of the XII Tables, “coelibes prohibeto” (be it forbidden to remain bachelors)169 forced men in the vigour of their powers to satisfy the impulse of nature in the arms85 of the lawful wife. But more and more did the Romans come into contact with foreign Peoples, and began to adopt more and more their customs and vices. In the year 513 A.U.C. (B.C. 240) the Floralia were introduced, which even granting they cannot have had the origin that Lactantius170 assigns86 them, yet by the very nature of the celebrations were an outrage on all good morals. Yet so universally popular were they that Cato could win no greater concession to his indignant zeal against them than that their closing scenes should be delayed until he had retired171.

The enormous wealth the Romans had won as booty in their continual Wars of spoliation, could not be hoarded unused, it must be enjoyed; and how enjoyed, the warriors knew already. The younger members of the Equestrian and Patrician orders went on travels, and learned in the arms of Greek and Asiatic wantons how to lavish their money secundum artem. Then on their return to Rome finding the native Scorta (common harlots) no longer to their taste, they brought home with them their freed-woman “Amica” (Mistress), who was a fair match for the Greek hetaera in greed, if not in refinement. It was not long before the old-fashioned Roman matron succumbed in the struggle with her for supremacy, and by dint of her only too successful endeavours to outdo the foreign courtesan in recherché vice and effrontery, became but the more despicable in the eyes of the proud Roman. She had indeed learned to be a mother, but not to love. At the same time the Roman himself, surrounded as he thus was by no softening influences, ceased not only to be a citizen of the state, but even to be a man at all; and the Ruler of the World sank at last to such a depth of exaggerated viciousness that it became his glory and boast to be without a rival in its enormity.

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The conclusion then is indisputable that only subsequently to the Wars in Asia was Roman morality undermined172. At the same time it is impossible from the information given above to assign any definite point of time at which brothels and public women came into vogue at Rome, or at any rate when their existence as such was officially recognized by those in charge of the police super88vision of the city. With the regulations and arrangements however we are more precisely acquainted. The brothels, lupanaria173, fornicas174, were situated chiefly in the Second District (Secunda Regio) of89 the city175, the Coelimontana, particularly in the Subura (Suburbana) that bordered the town-walls, lying in the Carinae,—the valley between the Coelian and Esquiline Hills. In the same district was the Macellum magnum, or Great Market, for all sorts of provisions176 along the banks of the Tiber, as well as the Cookshops, Stalls or Shops (Tabernae)—of the Barbers, even of the Public Executioner177, and the Castra peregrina, (Foreign Camp), barracks for foreign troops quartered in Rome under the Emperors as a garrison,—all circumstances that occasioned a great concourse of men178. To the North the Subura marched with the “Isis and Serapis”,—the Third District (Tertia Regio), where was situated the temple of Isis with its gardens and groves. The regular brothels are pictured to us as being in the highest degree uncleanly and dirty179, so that their frequenters carried away the smell with them. They possessed a definite number of “chambers”, Cellae180, and above the90 door of each of these was inscribed the name of the girl, that which she had adopted on her first admission181, and the price of her embraces182. In91 each “chamber” was to be found a bed (pavimentum, cubiculum, pulvinar,—pavement, sleeping-place, couch), which was spread with a particular kind of coverlet, lodix, lodicula, (blanket, little blanket)183, and a lamp, lucerna184.

As for the brothel-keeper, the Romans seem to have had no special word to express this; they use in fact leno in this signification, though the word properly means the Procurer who merely offers his house for the purpose, but does not keep women, giving them board and wage. Perhaps this arose from the fact that in earlier times no regular brothels existed in Rome; the women merely hired a lodging, and the owner of the house had nothing at all to do with their business, whilst the match-maker or pandar confined his efforts to procuring girls for his patrons and letting out his “chambers” for a fixed charge merces cellae (hire of the chamber)185, paid by92 each visitor. Only when the business became more profitable, did Lenones or Lenae (Procurers, Procuresses), for women also carried on Lenocinium (procuration), actually keep girls, whom they bought, as slaves186. The Leno had his Villicus puellarum (Superintendent of the Maids), who assigned name and price, provided the girls with clothes187, and94 kept a list of them and what they earned188. In fact such of the women as were bond-servants were obliged,—and this applied equally to those that were not slaves,—to deliver up not merely the As for the hire of the chamber, but the whole fee as well, according to the amount fixed by the brothel-keeper (Leno)189, though much underhand trickery of various95 sorts occurred in connection with this regulation190.

The brothels were not allowed to be opened before the ninth hour (four o’clock in the afternoon), so as not to draw young men away from their duties191. The girls either stood (Prostibula—women who stand in front)192 or sat (Proseda—women who sit in front)193 before the “chambers” or Lupan96aria (brothels), to call the passers-by to them. Did a lover make his appearance, then the door of the “chamber” was carefully fastened194, and “occupata” (engaged) written over the door195, an unoccupied “chamber” being called nuda (naked)196. Towards morning the “chambers” were opened, and the Leno (brothel-keeper) let the girls go197. It would seem to follow from this that these either did not live in the brothel-keeper’s house at all, or that the “chambers” were situated somewhere else, away from head-quarters. From a passage in Juvenal198 it has, perhaps wrongly, been concluded that these “chambers” were at the Circus Maximus. Such places are at any rate mentioned by Dionysius of Halicarnassus as existing at the Portico above the97 shops199; and without doubt several passages are to be found in Latin authors to prove that the women plied their trade even after the close of the Representations200, and we know that besides the regular Ludi Circenses (Games of the Circus) other performances of a similar kind were held in the Circus.

Besides the brothels, we find, particularly in the Taverns (cauponae, tabernae—inns, taverns) and Cookshops (popinae, ganea—cookshops, eating98houses201, women kept by the hosts for the gratification of their patrons. As a rule these also were bought slave-women, who served the guests, entertained them with dance and music, and surrendered their persons on desire. The hostesses themselves devoted their attention to both trades, as e.g. is shown by the “Copa” (Mine Hostess) ascribed to Virgil; and hence they, and their husbands with them, stood in the eye of the Magistrate on the99 same footing with Lenones and Meretrices (Brothel-keepers and Prostitutes)202.

Now who frequented these places? Down to the time of the Empire only the lowest class of the people, particularly Sailors203, Freedmen and Slaves204, though indeed later, when Claudius and Nero205 set so eminent an example, high and low equally might be found both in brothels and in Taverns and Cookshops. The bakers, envious of the profits made by the inn-keepers, organized their tabernae (bread-stalls or shops) in the mills in such a way that they too could provide their customers with what they wanted206. This appears to have been done first in100 Campania207. But not solely in regular Houses and “Chambers” were “filles de joie” to be met with. They carried on their trade also as Scorta erratica (wandering whores, street-walkers) the commonest sort, in all public places, at the corners of streets208, round the tombs and monuments209, in out-of-the-way nooks of the town and the surrounding plantations in its neighbourhood210. In these places they101 carried on their trade, some no doubt on their own account, other perhaps as slaves working for their masters and mistresses and bound to deliver in a fixed sum daily.

The different kinds of “filles de joye” so far particularized were all of them slave-women, but over and above these there were in Rome a large number of Gay Women who carried on their profession entirely on their own account, either merely as a second string to their bow, like the Mimes, Dancers, Harp-girls, Ambubaiae211, or else as sole aim and object of their lives, in the character of Scorta nobilia (noble whores) or bonae meretrices (good harlots) to use Plautus’ expressions. They were all of them102 foreigners, and generally freed-women212, and were distinguished not only for their more elaborate dress213, but also on account of their education, which far and away surpassed that of the Roman ladies. In this respect however they fell short of the level reached by the Greek hetaerae in the best times of Greece, and for this reason never obtained the influence at Rome on the life of the city and of the State which the former possessed at Athens. They were not so much friends (Amicae) as mistresses (Dominae) of their Roman lover, and their relations with him bodily only and not intellectual. For the rest this class yet awaits a Friedrich Jacobs to be its historian. They were either kept by an individual lover, or else gave themselves only to rich admirers at their own private lodgings,214 that lay perdu far from the bustle of street and market; but no doubt descended, when the time of youth and beauty was over, to the condition of common courtesans or even of mere street-walkers.

Just as happened in Greece, immodesty spread not a little among the daughters and wives of the Roman citizens also, and already in the reign of Germanicus, Tacitus could report215:103 “Eodem anno gravibus senatus decretis libido feminarum coercita, cautumque ne quaestum corpore faceret, cui avus aut pater aut maritus Eques Romanus fuisset.” (This same year severe decrees of the Senate were passed to restrain unchastity on the part of women, and it was forbidden for any to give her person for hire, whose grandfather, father, or husband had been a Roman knight). So it cannot cause any great surprise to find Martial216 declaring:

“Quaero diu totam, Sophroni Rufe, per urbem:
Si qua puella neget; nulla puella negat.”

(I have long been searching the city through, Sophronius Rufus, if there is e’er a maid to say no; there is not one!) To this result the introduction at Rome of the worship of Isis had contributed not a little217. Under pretence of serving Isis, the matrons found an opportunity of wantoning unhindered in the arms of paramours218, for the husbands dared not enter the temple precincts while their wives offered were performing their ten days’ devotion there. Probably in cases of disease of the genitals Roman women offered their prayers to Isis, as the men did to Priapus, for the temples of the goddess were full of images of parts of the body that had been healed and of maimed organs219, and contained numer104ous establishments for the care of sick persons of this particular character.

But of more influence than all the rest was the example which the Emperors Tiberius, Nero, Caligula and the infamous Messalina220 gave. Not contented with the possession of a Harem, they set up actual brothels in their palaces,—a practice the aristocracy105 soon copied, organizing similar establishments on their estates, to be able to wallow indisturbed in the mire of bestial lusts221.

Of vice as practised in the Baths and of male whores in the brothels we shall speak later.

Now how were Brothels and Courtesans affected in connection with the police of the State in Rome? It has been shown already that no penalty whatever attached either to illicit intercourse or to prostitution in general, because the disgrace to individuals involved in the commission of such offences in the eyes of their fellows was thought sufficient to ensure at any rate the daughters of citizens against unchastity. But the case was different with married women who were guilty of a breach of marriage honour. Of the manifold punishments we will mention only one here: the offender was imprisoned and obliged to surrender her person to all comers, whilst each time this took place a notification was given by the ringing of a bell;—a procedure that continued till finally abolished by the Emperor Theodosius222.

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They sought indeed to avoid the punishment by declaring themselves engaged in Lenocinium (Procuration) as a calling, or by joining the ranks of the the actresses; but the Lex Papia included provisions to put a stop to this irregularity223.

Lenocinium (Procuration) in fact as well as the licentia stupri (fornication permit) had to be notified before the Aediles224, whose especial duty it was to107 see that no Matron became a prostitute225. With this object they were bound to frequently search all such places as have been specified above (loca aedilem metuentia—places that fear the aedile)226; but dared not themselves indulge in any immorality there227. When that pure-minded prince Caligula became Emperor, he introduced the Whore-duty (vectigal ex capturis—tax on prostitution-fees) as a State impost228. This, Alexander Severus retained, it is true, but assigned the revenue from it to the maintenance of the public buildings, that it might not contaminate the State Treasure.108229

The information here collected, imperfect as it may be in many respects, is yet sufficient to throw some light on the external relations of brothels and courtesans. It shows convincingly that in the entire absence of police supervision on the sanitary side, such diseases as arose generally in Antiquity consequent upon coition must have had their especial home and chief focus in the brothels and their denizens. But of what nature these diseases were, and what parts of the body they attacked, we shall only then be able to determine, when we come to consider more precisely the actual excesses that led to them, whether within or without the walls of the brothels.

In the preceding investigations we have shown how the natural aim and object of coition, viz. procreation of children, fell more and more into the background, in order to make way for sensual gratification; and we have made acquaintance with the establishments that grew up in course of time for its indulgence. The facility with which the bestial instinct could be satisfied and the titillation109 of carnal pleasure procured, was bound to rob the customary manner of sexual indulgence of the charm of novelty, and to set the depraved imagination of the voluptuary at work to solve the problem of how to import manifold variations into the simple act of copulation. This stage reached, it inevitably followed that the natural ways of union of the sexes began to appear insufficient, and the methods of so-called unnatural Love (Venus illegitima) grew up, wherein at last almost every trace of the specific purpose of the genital organs was lost sight of.

The “figurae Veneris legitimae” (modes of natural Love) are not altogether without interest for the physician230, but their study is less necessary for our particular purpose. The modes of “Venus illegitima” (unnatural Love) are what concern us here. The major part of these have unfortunately never been included by writers on the history of Venereal disease within the range of their enquiries. Hence it has come about that while on the one hand they have given quite false interpretations of various morbid affections, they have on the other mistaken for the names of diseases expressions signifying nothing more than forms of the unnatural sensual indulgence alluded to. The historical enquirer into these subjects must indeed tread very slippery ground. Supposing him to rise superior to the possible reproaches of morality, fortified by the words of St. Paul231, still he can110 find absolutely nowhere in his investigations any secure stopping-place, he must make up his mind to dispense with all external help and to be thrown utterly on his own resources. Not only do the best and fullest Dictionaries of the Greek and Latin languages leave him almost completely in the lurch, but above and beyond this he has very often to struggle with positive errors both in the Dictionaries and on the part of the professional Philologists in their annotations to the writings of the Ancients. These mistakes he must first of all discover, and afterwards correct. What such an undertaking involves, what powers it demands, will be obvious to anyone who is in any degree conversant with the systematic study of Antiquity. Nevertheless the task should not remain unattempted, if that is, we wish ever to come to a clear understanding of the relations of words and things in this connection; and on this ground the following researches no less than others find a legitimate place here. These we offer as the best that the limitation of our powers allowed,—at the same time gladly acknowledging the no small assistance we have received from the Treatises of Forberg and Meier232.

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Paederastia appears, as is the case with all sexual perversions, to owe its origin to the stimulation of the Asiatic climate, the mother of exuberance and voluptuousness. The primary condition of its genesis may be easily traced, if side by side with the dictum of Forberg (loco citato, p. 235): “Et voluptas quidem paediconis facile intelligitur, cum omnis voluptas mentulae pendeat ex frictione” (And the pleasure indeed of the sodomite is readily intelligible, since all voluptuous pleasure depends on friction of the penis), we take into consideration the fact that the genital organs of Asiatic women,—a fact true also of Italian and Spanish women233—like their whole bodies, exhibit great looseness, and further note that the “Sphincter ani”234 muscle far and away surpasses112 the “Constrictor cunni” in strength. So it is by no means improbable that the Apostle Paul is accurate when he says235: “Wherefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts unto uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonoured among themselves; for their women changed the natural use into that which is against nature: and likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another, men with men working unseemliness.”

In Asia natural copulation formed a part of the Temple service of Venus, and in course of time Paederastia as well was joined with it, as is seen from the following passage of St. Athanasius236:113 “Sane olim Phoeniciae mulieres in idolorum templis prius prostabant, suique meretricii quaestus primordia diis, qui illic colebantur, consecrabant, suam deam stupris propitiam reddi, benevolamque hoc pacto effici ratae. Viri quoque propriam ementiti naturam, nec amplius mares se esse patientes, in feminas se converterunt, pergratum et honorificum matri deorum se ita facturas arbitrati. Omnes denique una cum perditissimis vivunt, et secum ipsi pugnant ut peiores quotidie evadant, atque ut dixit sanctus Christi minister Paulus:—(Here follows the passage just quoted from the Epistle to the Romans.)—Haec autem et similia agendo, fatentur certe et arguunt deos, quos ipsi colunt, huiusmodi vitam duxisse, scilicet ex Jove puerorum corruptiones atque adulteria, ex Venere meretriciam vitam ... ex aliis alia didicere, quae quidem cum leges puniunt, tum probi homines abhorrent.”

(Indeed the Phoenician women used in former times to prostitute themselves for hire in the temples of their idols and to offer up the gains of their fornication as first-fruits to the deities that were worshipped therein, deeming that in this way they won the favour and goodwill of their goddess. Moreover men, perverting their own proper nature, and no more enduring to be males, turned themselves into the likeness of women, supposing that by so doing they rendered a service most grateful and honourable to the Mother of the Gods. In one word they all consort with the most abandoned of mankind, and strive one with the other how they may grow worse and worse day by day; and as St. Paul the Apostle of Christ says:—(Here follows the passage just quoted from the Epistle to the Romans.)—By such and such-like acts they verily confess and show forth that those gods that themselves worship led lives of a like kind. Thus from Jupiter they learned to seduce boys and to commit adultery, from Venus harlotry, and so on from the114 other gods other vile practices,—practices which are at once punished by the laws and abominated by every honourable man). The same passage explains also how the Old Testament comes to designate Cinaedi (on pathic Sodomites) by the expression קָדֵשׁ (kadêsh, sanctus,—holy, consecrated). This originally implied nothing more than a person who devoted himself for the glory of a God as a servant in his Temple; and we have good reason for believing we can establish the conjecture that the whole cult of the Priests of Cybelé, etc., who had to practice emasculation and who were known by the name of Galli, rests originally on a simple misunderstanding of the expressions εὐνοῦχοι and ἀνδρόγυνοι (eunuchs, men-women),—expressions which will be discussed later on,—these words having meant at first nothing more than Cinaedi (sodomites). It was only in later times that Paederastia became a motive for Castration, as by this means the body of the male could be made to preserve for a longer period the youthful boyishness that approximated it to the female form. This is shown in the following passage of Lucian237, a passage of special interest for the history of Paederastia:

“So at first when men still lived the old heroic life and reverenced virtue that brought them nearer the gods, they obeyed the laws that nature had laid down and marrying in due proportion of age became the fathers of noble children. But little by little the age degenerated from that high level115 to the pit of sensual indulgence, and struck out new and abnormal modes of gratification. Soon a reckless licentiousness broke the very laws of nature; and for the first time a lover looked on a man as on a woman to lust after him, and worked his wicked will either by superior force or by dint of artful persuasions. So in one bed came together one and the same sex. And each seeing himself in the other, took no shame in anything they did or in anything they suffered to be done. Wasting their seed on barren238 rocks, as the saying goes, they bought a brief pleasure at the cost of deepest infamy. Indeed with some to such a height of overmastering force did their reckless passion rise that they actually violated nature with the knife; and only when they had emptied men of their manliness did they attain the summit and acmé of their gratification.

“But the wretched and unhappy creatures, that they may remain longer boys, suffer themselves to be no more men,—an ambiguous riddle midway between the sexes, neither preserving the sex they were born to, nor yet having any other to belong116 to. The bloom that was kept a while in youth withers in old age and makes them wither with it in premature decay. At one moment they are counted as boys, then lo! they are old men; there is no middle time of manhood between the two. Thus wanton luxury, the foul mother of every evil thing, contriving shameful pleasures one to cap the other, fell into the slough of that disease that cannot even be named with decency, (μέχρι τῆς οὐ ῥηθῆναι δυναμένης εὐπρεπῶς νόσου) that no province of impurity might remain unexplored.”

In later times indeed castration was resorted to after the attainment of man’s estate, in order that the Eunuchs might be able to appease the titillation of sensual desire in the women without fear of impregnating them239.

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In Syria, where this vicious practice of paederastia was especially in vogue, the Jews also appear to have been acquainted with it240. From Asia, whether through the instrumentality of the Phoenicians, or as Welcker241 maintains, through that of the Lydians, Paederastia came in the first instance to Crete, and spread from thence over the whole of Greece242.

Just as was the case with the cult of Venus in that country, so the “love of boys” assumed quite a different form in Greece. As Paedophilia (Affection for boys) it took rank as one of the means of118 education, being consecrate to the heavenly Eros, while Paederastia (Carnal love of boys) fell to the province of the common Eros. Down to quite modern times Paedophilia has been confounded with Paederastia, and in this way a shameful stigma attached to the Greek nation,—a stigma that Meier, following the initiative of Jacobs and K. O. Müller (loco citato), was the first to free the Greeks from. Granted, the two things approached very near each other; still Paederastia was never approved by the Greeks243. At Sparta the violation of boys was119 punished by loss of civil rights, exile or death244, and it was the same at Athens, as Meier (loco citato) pp. 167 sqq. has sufficiently proved. The fact that the laws relating to this offence were promulgated at Athens only after the time of Solon shows that paederastia, as well as brothels, did not come into use there till about that time. True Athens in later times was quite as notorious for the prevalence there of paederastia as Corinth was for its Gay Women245; and Aristophanes’ Comedies120 show only too abundantly how much occasion he could find for scourging the “Pathics”, and how the Gymnasia and Palaestrae (Wrestling-grounds) also were responsible for a great deal of the harm done.

For, as Aristophanes246 says:

(Of old when boys sat at the trainer’s, they were bound to throw out the thigh, so as not to expose to the spectators’ gaze anything unbecoming; then again when they got up again, they had to scrape out the mark in the sand, and take care not to leave behind a model of their youthful shape,—an incitement to lovers).

Besides the Gymnasia and Palaestrae, the barbe121r’s shops (κουρεῖα)247, perfumers’ shops (μυροπωλεῖα)248, Surgeries (ἰατρεῖα)249, Money-changers’ counters (τράπεζαι)250, bath-houses251, and to a greater or less extent all kinds of workshops (ἐργαστήρια)252, particularly when in situations handy to the Market, served as trysting-places of the paederasts and pathics. Here the former sought victims for their vicious desires, and the latter opportunities to sell their persons; while many of the proprietors of such places may well have acted as Procurers (προαγωγοί, μαστροποί,—Procurers, Pandars) for this purpose. The vice itself was chiefly practised in lonely, obscure parts of the town, and particularly on the Pnyx hill253.

The Eleans and Bœotians are not only reproached with paederastia, but the violation of boys is alleged to have been allowed among these peoples254. Megara122 it is true is charged with ὕβρις (shameful violence), a common designation for paederastia255, but we may certainly doubt whether the temple of Ἀφροδίτη πρᾶξις there, which Pausanias256, mentions, had anything to do with this vice. The author in question says: “After the sanctuary of Dionysus is shown a temple of Venus. The image of Venus is of ivory, and is called Aphrodité Praxis. It is the most ancient image in the temple.” No other author however mentions any such cult as existing in Megara, and even though the word πρᾶξις (intercourse), as Meier (loco citato p. 153, note 49) has shown by examples, is used specially of paederastia, yet at the same time the passage of Euripides, Ion 894.

(Thou, god, partner of my bed, didst lead me, in shamelessness doing favour to Cypris—Love), clearly proves that πράσσειν (to do, to have intercourse) was used of coition generally257.

Moreover in the passage of Plutarch quoted a123 little above paederastia is called χάρις ἄχαρις (a grace that is without grace) and further down Ἔρως, Ἀφροδίτης μὴ παρούσης,—Ἔρως χωρὶς Ἀφροδίτης, (Love—Eros—where Aphrodité is not, Love without Aphrodité); so how can it have been regarded by the Greeks as under the patronage of Venus? Undoubtedly πρᾶξις is here synonymous with πόρνη (harlot), and the Ἀφροδίτη πρᾶξις at Megara is nothing else than the Ἀφροδίτη πόρνη of other cities.

Chalcis had gained such notoriety for paederastia258, that χαλκιδίζειν (to act the Chalcidian) was said proverbially for παιδεραστεῖν (to practise paederastia). It was the same with Chios and Siphnos, as the expressions χιάζειν and σιφνιάζειν (to play the Chian, the Siphnian) in Hesychius prove. Hesychius says indeed σιφνιάζειν: i.e. to finger behind; for the Siphnians are ill-spoken of as enjoying boy-lovers. To act the Siphnian then means, to poke with the finger. But the first explanation by καταδακτυλίζειν (to finger behind), as well as the gloss of Suidas259, show clearly that the inhabitants of the island of Siphnos,—one of the Cyclades, practised a species, if we may use the expression, of Onania postica (back-door, posterior masturbation),—like the cobbler at Vienna, who to allay the Prurigo ani (itching of the anus) pushed his hammer up his posterior, and then alas! could not pull it124 out again. In the same way the Siphnians used the fingers260.

The inhabitants of Italy were according to Suidas (under the name Θάμυρις—Thamyris) inventors of paederastia; and Etruscans, Samnites and Messapians, as well as the Greeks dwelling in Magna Graecia, lay under the reproach of practising the most vicious forms of love with men and violation of boys261. In all probability the vice spread from here to Rome, where it is found as early as the year 433 A.U.C.262. To such an extent did it increase that in 585 A.U.C. (B.C. 169), as Meier has demonstrated, the Lex Scantinia had to be passed against it. Yet all this amounted as yet to nothing in comparison with the scenes of horror that were enacted under the Emperors Tiberius, Caligula, etc., of whom Martial263 says:

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(As though it were a small wrong done our sex to make males prostitutes264 to be debauched by the crowd, cradles now became a part of the brothel-keeper’s stock in trade, that the baby-boy torn from126 the breast might solicit a sordid wage by his wailing, and immature bodies paid horrible penalties. Horrors such as these the great Father of Italy (Domitian) would not suffer: that same good Emperor who of late came to the rescue of tender youths, that raging lust might not make men unfruitful. Heretofore boys loved him,—and young men and old; now the very infants too love thee, Caesar).

Yet this was of little avail; the vice descended from generation to generation, and passed on to the Christian nations, just as the Roman punishments did in their legal codes.

If we consider, first that the contractile power of the Sphincter ani muscle offered great resistance to the paederast, a resistance only to be overcome by the exertion of considerable force, secondly that the glands of the rectum exude a malodorous secretion, which under the influence of climate,—a subject to be dealt with more precisely later on,—assumes a more or less acrid quality, it will not surprise us to find that manifold forms of disease showed themselves in Ancient times both among paederasts and cinaedi (pathics). These were no doubt all the more serious in cases where the one set of organs or the other was already morbidly affected. As to the paederast indeed the direct evidence is scanty, yet it is not entirely wanting, as may be seen from the following Epigram of Martial265:

In Naevolum.

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(To Naevolus.—When I see pained and sore the boy’s penis and your posterior, Naevolus,—I’m no wizard, but I know what it is you do). Here we see both parts suffering from disease, the paederast in his penis, the pathic in his posterior: and Martial concludes Naevolus was a cinaedus.

But more especially must phimosis and paraphimosis have had a tendency to be set up in the case of the paederast. These at first, because the continuous state of erection of the penis which is a feature of these affections was obviously the most visibly conspicuous symptom, were designated by the name Satyriasis, the usual appellation of the latter condition. This will also give a probable explanation of the mortality from this cause observed by Themison in Crete266,—a locality notorious, as we have seen, for the dishonouring of boys,—and generally for the frequency of Satyriasis, which often took an almost epidemic character in that island. Paraphimosis it should be noted in passing had already been only too frequently noted as affecting masturbators. Physicians indeed say nothing as to the predisposing causes, and explain the disease as arising from an Acrimonia humorum (Acridness of the humours) or from drinking a Philtre (Love-potion). Naumann267 appears to wish to make the Satyriasis that prevailed in Crete some form of leprous affection, but for this view we can find absolutely no ground.

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Much more frequent mention is found of affections of the rectum among the pathics as consequences of paederastia. First come fissures, and in their train ulcers of the rectum; whence the expressions sectus, percisus (cut), and the like are applied so often in Roman writers to the pathic, and to his vice generally. So Martial268 says:

In Carinum.

(To Carinus. —Carinus has no relics left of his fundament, cut up to the very navel; and yet he itches with desire up to the very navel. Oh! what a vile itch torments the unhappy man! He possesses no posterior, and nevertheless is a cinaedus (pathic).)

In Lesbiam269.

(To Lesbia.—As oft as you rise from your chair, Lesbia, I have many a time noticed the fact, your undergarments, poor lady, play the paederast with you. You endeavour to pluck them away first with the right, anon with the left hand; finally you release them with tears and groaning. So drawn together are the twin Symplegades of your fundament, and enter in between Minyan and Cyanean buttocks. Would you fain129 cure this ungraceful defect? I will tell you how: I think, Lesbia, you’d better not get up, nor yet sit down!)

Usually indeed the Pathic tried to conceal his complaint, and to make it pass under some other name, as does Charisianus:

De Charisiano270.

(On Charisianus.—Charisianus says, Lupus, that for many days he has been unable to indulge in paederastia. When his comrades asked the reason; his bowels, he said, were relaxed!)

But most frequently of all are the fig-like swellings on the fundament (Ficus, Mariscae,—figs, large figs) mentioned by Ancient authors as a consequence of paederastia.

De se Priapus271.

(Priapus on Himself.—I am not hewn of fragile elm, nor is my pillar that stands bent back with penis stiffly erect of any chance wood, but born of the living cypress.—Beware this image, thief, whoe’er thou art; for should you damage with plundering130 hand the tiniest clusters of this stem, there shall grow a fig, deny it if you will, of cypress-wood inserted up your fundament.)

De Labieno272.

(On Labienus.—To buy boys Labienus sold his gardens; nought but a fig-garden does Labienus now possess.)

Ad Caecilianum273.

(To Caecilianus.—When I have said ficus, you laugh, Caecilianus, as though I had committed a solecism, and declare ficos should be the word. We will say ficus, meaning the figs that we know grow on the tree, but your figs, Caecilianus, we will call ficos).

Now too we shall understand the medico ridente (the doctor grinning) in the following passage of Juvenal (II. 12):

(But from your smooth posterior are cut, the doctor grinning the while, the bloated swellings).131 Just as it admits of no doubt that in the passage of Horace274:

(For as loud as a burst bladder sounds, I farted my swellings (ficos—figs) away, splitting the rump), ficos and not as commonly ficus must be read.

That these morbid growths were not entirely free from contagious matter seems to be indicated by the following passages. In the Priapeia (Carm. 50) we read:

(A certain girl, if it please you to listen, Priapus, is playing with me. Most sorely afflicted is she with swellings; and she will not give herself to me, yet does not say she never will, and ever finds excuses for putting off and putting off. Now if ever she shall be mine to enjoy, I and my comrades with me, will wreath all thy penis, Priapus, with garlands). The girl, who was badly affected with these swellings, and that presumably in the secret parts, refuses her lover coition. The latter does not insist, but prays to Priapus, as was habitually done in all cases of affections of the genitals (see p. 74 above) and vows to deck his penis with garlands. It follows that the lover was aware these swellings would be injurious to him, if he should constrain the girl, of whom the poet says, nec negat daturam (yet does not say she will not give herself), to lie with him. Still clearer evidence of this may be132 found in the following Epigram of Martial, where a whole family is affected with these swellings or tumours:

(On a tumourous household.—The goodwife is tumourous, tumourous the goodman her husband, tumourous the daughter of the house, and the son-in-law and the grandson. Neither house-steward nor factor is free of the foul ulcer, nor the rugged ditcher, nor yet the ploughman. Now when all alike, young and old have tumours (ficos, ficus), the strange thing is, not a single field has fig-trees (ficus)). For the rest the words ulcere turpi (foul ulcer) show that ficus, like σύκος and σύκωσις (fig, fig-like swelling) in Greek, signifies not only a fig-shaped swelling, but also an ulcer with granulous surface, like a fig cut in two. Or possibly it would be better to understand here swellings that have passed into the ulcerated stage276.

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Seeing how plainly the passages just quoted from non-medical Writers point to these swellings being a consequence of paederastia, it is surprising that not one of the Ancient physicians, spite of Juvenal’s medico ridente (the doctor grinning the while), ever so far as we know, alleges this form of licentiousness as cause of affections of the sort. On the other hand we cannot help remarking that the frequency of these swellings in the time of Martial and Juvenal can hardly be explained as arising solely from the general prevalence of paederastia. More probably, then as now, the Genius epidemicus (Epidemic influences) bore no unimportant share in bringing about the result, just as was the case (see later) with Mentagra (Eruption of the chin).

However not merely primary affections of the posteriors were the punishment of the Cinaedus, but also secondary ones of the mouth and throat. First and foremost was hoarseness of the voice, to which Martial277 alludes, when he makes the champion of the baths the cinaedus Charinus speak raucidulo ore (with a weak, hoarse voice). This we find, following134 Reiske’s278 indication, more explicitly dealt with in Dio Chrysostom279:—

“But this is surely worth mentioning, and it is a thing no one can deny. I mean the noteworthy fact that a disease has attacked so many in this city,—one which I used to hear of as prevailing much more frequently with others than amongst you. What is it I mean? Even though I could explain myself no more clearly, yet you might easily guess the answer. Do not think I am speaking of secrets, of hidden doings, when the astounding fact itself speaks plainly enough. For there are many in this city that are asleep, even while they walk and stand and speak; though they may appear to most observers to be awake, yet it is not really so.

“Now they give, in my opinion, the clearest proof that they are asleep,—they snore (ῥέγχουσιν). I cannot, by heaven, express myself more clearly with decency. True only a few of the sleepers135 are suffering from the complaint I mean, and of the others it affects only the drunken, the overfed and such as have lain ill. But I maintain this vicious practice (ἔργον) shames the city and brands it publicly. The grossest ignominy is brought down upon their native city by these sleepers by day, and they ought, I say, to have been expelled your borders, as has been their fate everywhere else. For it is not now and then, nor here and there, they are met with; but at all times and in all places in the city occasion may be found to threaten, scorn or deride them. For the rest the practice has actually penetrated now to boys still young, and adults that yet would fain be reputable, suffer themselves to be led away into regarding the matter as a trifle, and if they refrain from the decisive step, yet it was their wish to take it.

“If there were a city in which wailing were to be heard all day long, and no one could walk about in it, no! not one minute, without listening to the sound of lamentation, tell me, what man would willingly stay here? Now wailing, as all agree, is a sign of unhappiness; but that other sound is the sign of shamelessness and lewdness the most scandalous. Surely one would much rather choose to associate with unhappy men than with paederasts280. I might avoid listening, if a single man were to be blowing the flute everlastingly, but if in a particular place there is an everlasting noise of flutes, singing or guitar-playing,—such as might be where the rocks ever ring with the Syrens’ song,—I could not, having arrived there, endure to remain. And this unmusical and harsh tone of voice281, what man of any virtue can abide it?136 If a man passes in front of a home in which he catches the sound, he says, “Of a surety there is a brothel there!” Now what shall be said of a city where nothing but this tone of voice prevails universally, so that no exception can be made of time or day or place whatever? For in streets and houses, in public places, in the theatre and in the Gymnasium, paederastia is rife282.

“Again I have never yet heard a flute-player of a morning in the city, but this horrible sort of din is raised283 from earliest dawn.

“I do not indeed shut my eyes to the fact that it will be said I am talking silly nonsense most likely, in making such allegations, and that there is nothing in it. Nay! but surely you are only carrying pot-herbs in your cart, and behold with indifference profusion of white bread on the road, as well as salt and fresh meat. But just consider the thing (πρᾶγμα i. e. paederastia) in this way too: If any one of these objectors should come into a city, where all men, when they point to a thing, point at it with the middle finger284, when any one gives137 the right hand, gives it with this same gesture, and when he stretches out the hand, as the people does in voting or the judges in giving decisions, does so in the same way, what, pray will he think of such a city? What, if further all men walk in this city with skirts up-raised, as if wading in a quagmire? For do you not really and truly know what has given occasion to the defamation you suffer; what it is has offered matter to such as are unfriendly disposed to you for censure on our city? Tell me, what is the reason they nickname you “hawks” (κερκίδες)285?

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“Well, but you opine the question is not what others say of you, but what you really do yourselves? Good; but if a single disease of such a sort attacks a people that they all of them acquire women’s voices, and no man, neither stripling nor grey-beard, can utter a word in a man’s voice, is not this a horrible thing, and harder to bear, I should suppose, than any Plague? For it is not shameful to have a fever, nor even to die.

“Nay! but to speak with women’s voice is after all to speak with human voice, and no one is filled with aversion when he hears a woman. But, tell me, whose is this voice; does it not belong to the Androgyni (men-women), the Cinaedi? or to such as have had the genitals amputated? True it is not invariably found with all such, but it is characteristic of them and a sign of what they are.

“Well then! suppose a stranger from a distance to judge from your voices, what kind of men you are, and what are your pursuits (πράττειν,—what it is you do). You are not fit, I tell you, to be neatherds or shepherds. I wonder would any one take you for descendants of the Argives, as you profess to be, or indeed for Greeks at all,—you who outdo the Phoenicians in lubricity? At any rate I do think it would behove a man of any morality in such a city to close his ears with wax far more than if he were sailing past the Syrens’ shore. There he would run the risk of death, but here of foulest licence, of violation, of the vilest seduction.

“Once Ionic harmony was in vogue, or Doric, or yet another sort, the Phrygian and Lydian, now it is the music of Aradus and the Phoenician modes that please you; you love this rhythm 139 par excellence, as others do the Spondaic. Was ever a race of men that were good musicianers—through the nose?!

(p. 409). “But such a rhythm must needs have something to follow. You would seem not to know what; just as with other nations the wrath of the gods overtook some single part, the hands, the feet or the face286, in the same way among you an endemic disease has attacked the nose. Just as the angry Aphrodité they say made the Lemnian women’s armpits abominable, know now that the gods in their anger have played havoc with the noses of most of your fellow citizens, and that is why they have this characteristic voice of their own. Indeed from where else could it have come?

“But I say this thing is the mark of most infamous lewdness, of most infamous madness, of contempt for all decency (all morality), and (a proof) of the fact that there is no more any single thing held to be disgraceful. Their speech, their gait, their look, proclaim it.”

From this passage of Dio Chrysostom, who lived at the end of the First and beginning of the Second Century A.D., we see that at that period the vice of paederastia prevailed at Tarsus to an appalling extent; and very possibly it is this circumstance that gave occasion to the declaration of the Apostle St. Paul287, whose native town of course Tarsus was, when he says:

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“Wherefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts unto uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonoured among themselves.... For their women288 changed the natural use into that which is against nature; and likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another, men with men working unseemliness, and receiving in themselves that recompense of their error which was due.” This recompense was no doubt the ῥέγχειν (snoring), which according to Reiske was the consequence of an affection of the throat and nose in which the breath was exhaled with a characteristic noise. To corroborate this view he quotes in his edition of Dio Chrysostom the following passage from Ammianus Marcellinus289, who picturing the habits of the Romans in the middle of the Fourth Century, wrote thus: “Haec nobilium instituta. Ex turba vero imae sortis et pauperrimae, in tabernis aliqui pernoctant vinariis: nonnulli velabris umbraculorum theatralium latent, quae Campanam imitatus lasciviam Catulus in aedilitate sua suspendit omnium primus; aut pugnaciter aleis certant, turpi sono fragosis naribus introrsum reducto spiritu concrepantes.” (Such are the usages of the nobles. But of the masses, those of lowest and poorest lot, certain spend the night in wine-taverns, some lurk under the curtains of the theatre awnings,—which Catulus in his aedileship, imitating Campanian luxury, was the very first to erect; or quarrel and fight at dice, 141 making an ugly rattling sound the while by drawing in the breath through their rough nostrils).

Now we know that paederasts had foul breaths, as Martial290 indeed noted, consequently the mucous membrane of the mouth was morbidly affected in its action, and further that they spoke raucidulo ore (with hoarse voice)291, which must have been with many the ordinary consequence of a thickening of the tissues by previous ulceration; and at this fact this Speech of Dio Chrysostom, as Reiske understands it, may very well hint. But to take the main gist of his speech, the author of the “Tarsica” signifies142 by ῥέγχειν (to snort) something quite different from this, as the whole context shows clearly.

It was in fact a signal or mode of solicitation, by which the pathics sought to allure the paederasts to them and invited them to lewdness, as comes out more plainly in the following passage of Clemens Alexandrinus292: Αἱ δὲ ἀνδρογύνων συνουσίαις ἥδονται· παρεισῥέουσιν δὲ ἔνδον κιναίδων ὄχλοι, ἀθυρόγλωσσοι· μιαροὶ μὲν τὰ σώματα, μιαροὶ δὲ τὰ φθέγματα, εἰς ὑπουργίας ἀκολάστους ἠνδρωμένοι, μοιχείας διάκονοι, κιχλίζοντες καὶ ψιθυρίζοντες, καὶ τὸ πορνικὸν ἀναίδην εἰς ἀσέλγειαν διὰ ῥινῶν ἐπιψοφοῦντες ἐπικιναίδισμα, ἀκολάστοις ῥήμασι καὶ σχήμασι τέρπειν πειρώμενοι, καὶ εἰς γέλωτας ἐκκαλούμενοι, πορνείας παράδρομον· ἔστι δ’ὅτε καὶ ὑπεκκαιόμενοι διὰ τὴν τυχοῦσαν ὄργην, ἤτοι πόρνοι αὐτοὶ ἢ καὶ κιναίδων ὄχλον εἰς ὄλεθρον ἐζηλωκότες, ἐπικροτοῦσι τῇ ῥινὶ, βατράχων δίκην, καθάπερ ἔνοικον τοῖς μυκτῆρσι τὴν χολὴν κεκτημένοι. (But they delight in the assemblies of the Androgyni (men-women); and crowds of pathics hurry along to join them within, everlasting chatterers, abominable in person and abominable in voice; reared up to manhood for unchaste ministrations, servants of adultery; tittering and whispering, and sounding though their nose the debauched cinaedus’ call to shameful licentiousness, striving to please with indecent words and gestures, and challenging to laughter, a race and competition in harlotry. Then again at times kindled by some chance gust of anger, whether debauchees themselves or roused to a fatal emulation with the crowd of pathics, they make a rattling sound with the nose, like frogs, as though they kept their stock of gall up their nostrils).

But possibly the Tarsians were also Fellatores (ii qui penem alienum in os admittunt, ibique eo sugunt ut voluptas quaedam libidinosa paretur,—those who allow another’s penis to be put in their143 mouth, and suck it) (see later), and snorted as fellatores did at their task,—for the word ῥέγχειν (to snort) is manifestly used in several different senses. It only remains to mention that a pale complexion was also reckoned one of the signs of a Cinaedus, a fact to which Juvenal’s (II. 50.) words refer: Hippo subit iuvenes et morbo pallet utroque. (Hippo submits to men, and is pale with two-fold disease). Of these marks of the Cinaedus we shall speak in greater detail directly.

The passage of Dio Chrysostom discussed in the preceding section brings us, in virtue of a variety of hints it contains, to the much canvassed Νοῦσος Θήλεια (feminine disease) of the Scythians. Stark has collected with the greatest care everything that has so far been adduced by different authors in144 explanation of the subject; and on his Work we must base our own efforts in the investigations that follow.

Herodotus294 relates how the Scythians had made themselves masters of all Asia, and how some of them on their homeward march had plundered the very ancient temple of Venus Urania at Ascalon, a town of Syria; and then proceeds as follows:

“On such of the Scythians as plundered the temple at Ascalon, and on their posterity for successive generations, the goddess inflicted the θήλεια νούσος—feminine disease. And the Scythians say themselves it is for this cause they suffer the sickness, and moreover that any who visit the Scythian country may see among them what is the condition of those whom the Scythians call Ἐναρέες”. (a Scythian word, probably having the same meaning as Greek ἀνδρόγυνοι—men-women).

The different views that have been formulated at different times as to the nature of the νοῦσος θήλεια may be readily classified as follows. It was regarded as:—

1. a Vice, this vice being,

a) Paederastia; manifestly the oldest explanation,—already alluded to by Longinus, but specially championed by Bouhier295, also entertained by the interpreters of Longinus, Toll and Pearce, as well as by Casaubon (Epistolae) and Costar296;

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b). Onanism (Self Masturbation),—a view Sprengel297 is inclined to decide in favour of.

2. a bodily Disease,—to wit,

a). Haemorrhoids (Piles); an opinion maintained by Paul Thomas de Girac298, Valckenaar in his Notes to Herodotus, Bayer299, and the authors of the “General History of the World”300;

b). actual Menstruation, for which le Fèvre and Dacier would seem to have declared;

c). Gonorrhoea (Clap), which Patin301, Hensler302 and Degen303 understood to be meant;

d). actual loss of the Testicles, true Eunuchs, Mercurialis304 considered must have been implied; and with this view Stark’s conclusion in part coincides, who understood a disease involving complete loss of virile power, both corporeal and mental, and producing an actual metamorphosis of the male type into the female.

(3). a mental Disease, in fact a form of Melancholia. This is the view adopted by Sauvages305, Heyne, Bose, Koray306 and Friedreich.

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It would naturally be our task to examine the reasons alleged for and against these separate views. Supposing however we succeed in satisfactorily proving one of them to be the right one, then ipso facto all the rest come to nothing; and so we propose here to essay the advocacy of the oldest of them,—the view that makes the νοῦσος θήλεια to be the vice of paederastia. En passant we must call attention to the fact that under the name of paederastia must be understood not only the vicious habit of the paederast pure and simple, of the man that is who practices the act, but also of the pathic, who offers opportunities for its commission. This is a point which above all others has been quite left out of sight by the adversaries of the view in question.

The next question we have to answer would seem to be this: Could paederastia be regarded as a consequence of the vengeance of Venus? As it is the Scythians that are in question, the first thing would naturally appear to be to determine what conception the Scythians had of Venus. But inasmuch as the data are lacking for any demonstration of the sort, while the Scythians themselves ascribe the νοῦσος θήλεια to the vengeance of Venus, we may very well refer for a reply to this first question to the general character of the cult of the goddess307 and what has been said on the whole subject above; and herein there seems to exist no reason why we should not answer the query asked above in the affirmative. Granted that Venus was regarded as goddess of fruitfulness or as dispenser of the joys of Love, then in either aspect it was but natural she should withdraw the147 marks of her favour from the culprits (the paederasts). These neither wished for posterity nor enjoyed the delights connected with natural coition, but were equally indifferent towards the one and towards the other308; and the first sign of the vengeance of the goddess consists in the withdrawal of her benefits.

How Stark, following the lead of an anonymous French author quoted by Larcher309, can maintain there is no question of punishment here, as in that case Venus would be acting against her own interest, we fail to understand; and Larcher himself calls this unknown writer un homme d’esprit, mais peu instruit (witty but superficial). This is proof sufficient in our opinion that only a jest is intended, but one that Stark, p. 7 (notes 19 and 20.), has taken with the utmost seriousness.

However our view is directly supported by another myth, which Dio Chrysostom mentions, speaking of the sweating at the armpits with which the Lemnian148 women were afflicted. According to this legend Venus punishes the women of Lemnos310:

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“Haec Dea veluti etiam ceteri, sua sacrificia praetermitti non aequo animo ferebat: quae cum Lemniae mulieres Veneris sacrificia sprevissent, Deae maxime iram in se concitasse creditae sunt, quod150 etiam non impune putantur fecisse. Nam tantum foetorem illis excitasse feminis Dea perhibetur, ut a suis maritis contemnerentur.” (This goddess, no less than other deities, could not bear the neglect of her proper sacrifices with equanimity. Thus the women of Lemnos, having omitted to perform these sacrifices of Venus, are believed to have brought down on themselves the most serious anger of the goddess, and this they are accounted not to have done with impunity. For the goddess, as is related, caused such a foul odour to arise among the women, that they were scorned by their husbands.) If the view mentioned just above as taken by the Apostle Paul and by St. Athanasius is the right one, it would seem that the Lemnian women had suffered themselves to be used by their husbands for purposes of paederastia; then as a consequence there had been set up the evil odour of the mouth and breath, and this had driven the men to desert their wives to live with the captive Thracian slave-women (Apollonius).

But indeed the Ancients generally, or at any rate the Greeks and Romans, seem to have always held the opinion that unnatural coition, as well as all the similar forms of indulgence taking its place, were a consequence of the wrath of Venus, against whom the individuals had offended311. This appears152 also from the play of Philoctetes, of whom the Scholiast to Thucydides312 says: “Moreover Philoctetes, having on account of the death of Paris fallen sick of the feminine disease, and being unable to bear the shame of it, left his country and founded a city, which in memory of his misfortune he named Malacia—Effeminacy.” Martial313 had the same myth in his mind when he wrote:

(To Sertorius.—The Hero, son of Paeas (Philoctetes), was effeminate and easy of access to men; in this way Venus is said to have avenged the murder of Paris. Why should Sicilian Sertorius lick the pudendum of women? this is why, because it would appear, he was the slayer, Rufus, of a man of Eryx.) Of course there can be no question here of the disease which detained Philoctetes at Lemnos and prevented his taking part in the expe153dition to Troy; and if the older legend says nothing as to the νοῦσος θήλεια of Philoctetes, it is clear from this (as Meier, loco citato, has shown) that only in times when paederastia was becoming prevalent, were all these legends invented, to get as it were a sort of excuse by alleging a distinguished predecessor in the practice. So Martial says, addressing Gaurus:314

(That you love to prolong the night with excess of wine, I can excuse; you have the vice, Gaurus, of Cato. That you write verses with no inspiration of Muses and Apollo, for this, you should be praised; it is a fault of Cicero’s you have. That you vomit, well! ’twas a habit of Antony’s; that you are a gourmand, ’twas Apicius’ weakness.—That you suck (as a fellator), whose vice have you here, pray tell me!) The above Epigram of Martial’s (To Sertorius) shows very clearly how the poets represented each form of unnatural indulgence of the sexual impulse as vengeance of Venus. It is a cunnilingus that is in question here, and his vice is accounted for in this way:—just as Philoctetes on account of the slaying of Paris had been punished by Venus with paederastia, so the Sicilian Sertorius probably became a cunnilingus because he had killed an inhabitant of Eryx, where was situated a famous temple of the goddess. Similarly it will not surprise us if besides paederastia Philoctetes was saddled with the vice of Onanism at a later period, as is implied in the following poem of Ausonius:154315

Subscriptum picturae Crispae mulieris impudicae

(Inscribed beneath a Portrait of Crispa,—an immodest woman.—Over and above the natural modes of intercourse in legitimate coition, vicious lust has discovered impure ways of love: the way that his loneliness at Lemnos taught the heir of Hercules (Philoctetes), that which the comedies of eloquent Afranius displayed on the stage, and that which deadly luxury branded on the men of Nola. But Crispa practises them all in her sole person: she skins, she sucks, she works by either aperture, that she may not leave anything untried, and so have lived in vain!)

No doubt Stark, p. 19, is quite right in saying this passage has nothing to do with the θήλεια νοῦσος; but the poet has by no means, as he puts it in his note, temporum ordine lapsus,—committed an anachronism. He makes no mention whatever of any vengeance of Venus, saying nothing more than that loneliness led the inheritor (of the arrows) of Hercules to Onanism. This is not merely advancing a conjecture, as Stark does, but (to say nothing of the Lemnia egestas—Lemnian loneliness), admits of being legitimately developed from the whole sequence of thought in the Epigram. Crispa’s vices are mentioned in the order of their shamefulness. The least disgraceful is Onanism, such as Philoctetes155 practised, next comes the vice of the cinaedus and of the pathic, for which Afranius serves as example, and lastly fellation. Thus it shows a complete want of comprehension, when the commentators quote the scholion to Thucydides given a little above as an explanation. Had Philoctetes been referred to as a pathic, the succeeding verse would be entirely superfluous; which verse does not receive a word of notice from the expositors, presumably because they failed to understand the allusion. The true explanation is afforded by a passage in Quintilian:316 “Togatis excellit Afranius, utinamque non inquinasset argumenta puerorum foedis amoribus, mores suos fassus.” (Afranius excels in fabulae togatae (polite comedies), and it were to be wished he had not defiled his plots by disgusting intrigues with boys, thereby discovering his own morals). Forberg, loco citato p. 283, quotes this passage indeed, but explains (both here and on p. 343) the libido (lust) of Philoctetes as being that of the pathic.

To prove that Venus manifested her wrath in the way specified, we may further cite the race of the daughters of Helios, whom she punished by the infliction of licentious love. Thus Hyginus says:317 Soli ob indicium (concubitus cum Marte) Venus ad progeniem eius semper fuit inimica, (Because of the Sun’s revelation (of her intrigue with Mars) Venus was ever a bitter enemy of his posterity); and Seneca:318

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(Venus, loathing the posterity of the hated Sun, punishes on us the fetters that bound her lover Mars and her. With abominable and disgraceful practices she afflicts the whole race of Phoebus).

An example of such vengeance is afforded by Pasiphaë, of whom the Scholiast on the passage of Lucian cited below relates how, Ἡλίου οὖσα ἐκ μήνιδος Ἀφροδίτης ταύρου ἠράσθη, (being a daughter of the Sun, she became enamoured of a bull through the influence of angry Aphrodité), a fable which might very well be explained—for ταύρος (a bull), like κένταυρος (a Centaur), occurs in the sense of paederast—as meaning that she had become a female pathic. So Theomnestus says in Lucian:157319 “So lecherous a look resides in the eyes, that compelling all beauty to its will, it can find no satiety. And often was I uncertain whether this were not some spite of Aphrodité. Yet am I none of the children of Helios, neither a natural heir of the Lemnian women, nor puffed up with the scornful insensibility of Hippolytus, that I could have provoked against me such an implacable hatred on the part of the goddess)”. Philo Judaeus320 also represents paederastia as a punishment of such men as married a woman legally repudiated, and the like: πρὸς δὲ συμβάσεις εἴ τις ἐθέλοι χωρεῖν ἀνὴρ τῇ τοιαύτῃ γυναικὶ, μαλακίας καὶ ἀνανδρίας ἐκφερέσθω δόξαν, ὡς ἐκ τετμημένος τῆς ψυχῆς τὸ βιωφελέστατον μισοπόνηρον πάθος.... δίκην οὖν τινέτω σὺν τῇ γυναικί. (But if any man should wish to enter into contracts with such a woman, let him bear the ill-repute of softness and effeminacy, as having eradicated from his soul that158 sentiment of hatred for ill-doers which is most useful for life,—So let him pay his penalty along with the woman). In Athenaeus one of the speakers exclaims (Deipnos., XIII. p. 605 D.): Ὁρᾶτε οὖν καὶ ὑμεῖς, οἱ φιλόσοφοι παρὰ φύσιν τῇ Ἀφροδίτῃ χρώμενοι, καὶ ἀσεβοῦντες εἰς τὴν θεὸν, μὴ τὸν αὐτὸν διαφθαρῆτε τρόπον. (Beware then ye too, philosophers who indulge the pleasures of Aphrodité against nature, and act impiously towards the goddess, that ye be not destroyed in the same way).

According to Diodorus (V. 55) the sons of Neptune in consequence of the wrath of Venus plunged into such madness that they violated their mother. The Propontides, who had denied the godhead of Venus, were cast by her into such an amorous phrenzy that they publicly gave themselves to men, and they were subsequently turned into stones.321 Myrrha, whose mother proclaimed herself to be fairer than Venus, was driven by the goddess into unchastity with her own father.322

In later times this idea was even transferred to the Star of Venus. The following appears in Firmicus “In octavo ab horoscopo loco, Mercurius cum Venere, si vespertini ambo, inefficaces et apocopos reddent, et qui nihil agere possint.” (In the eighth place of the horoscope, Mercury in conjunction with Venus, if both are evening stars, will make men impotent eunuchs and such as can effect nothing.)—a notion that first arose perhaps from the name Hermaphroditus323.

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Thus there would be nothing inconsistent with the views universally held in Antiquity in considering the νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease) of the Scythians, and equally that of Philoctetes, as consequences of the wrath of Venus. That paederastia was invariably regarded as a Vice by the Ancients (and particularly by the Greeks) we have already, following the lines laid down by Meier, we think sufficiently proved. Stark, who repeatedly (pp. 12, 16, 20.) denies this, has been led into error merely by the mistake that was generally prevalent in his time of confusing paedophilia and paederastia; and it is on this misapprehension he bases his argument. How the Scythians came to hold this belief that the wrath of Venus was to blame for what they suffered, must indeed be left an open question. But it should be remembered it was not the pathics themselves who advanced this opinion, but only the rest of the Scythians; for Herodotus says expressly, λέγουσί τε οἱ Σκύθαι διὰ τοῦτο σφεας νοσέειν (and the Scythians say that for this cause they were afflicted). Again it was only ὀλίγοι τινὲς αὐτῶν ὑπολειφθέντες (a few of the Scythians who were left behind), a few of the stragglers, who would seem to have plundered the temple of Aphrodité; and it certainly was only later that this act of impiety was brought into connection with the vice,—in the same way as the killing of Paris by Philoctetes was with the legend of his lewd practices.

The second question we have to answer will be this: how could Herodotus write that the descendants of these few stragglers alive in his time suffered from the νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease)? From160 the fact that, while descendants are named, strictly speaking only male descendants can be in question, it is clear the statement is only a general one, and must not be understood to imply more than that certain members of these families were Cinaedi, not of course that the whole posterity was afflicted with the νοῦσος θήλεια. We see at the present day how the impurity of the father passes on to the son; so it need be matter for no surprise whatever to find the vice of the cinaedi descending in the same way among certain members of a family. As a matter of fact these Scythian temple-robbers are by no means the only examples Antiquity holds up to us of such a thing, for the Orator Lysias324 says of the family of Alcibiades, that most members of it had become prostitutes.

What is more, the opinion was avowedly and directly held by the Ancients, that pathics were born with the predisposition to the vice. In particular Parmenides (509 B.C.) expressed this view in a Fragment, which Caelius Aurelianus325 has preserved in a chapter of his Work. This chapter treats solely of the vice of the pathic, and is of the greatest importance for our subject. We could not161 forgo quoting it in full, particularly as it is the sole authority for the views held by physicians on this vice, and up to now appears to have been entirely overlooked.

De mollibus sive subactis; quos Graeci μαλθακοὺς VOCANT.

“Molles sive subactos Graeci μαλθακοὺ vocaverunt, quos quidem esse nullus facile virorum credit. Non enim hoc humanos ex natura venit in mores, sed pulso pudore, libido etiam indebitas partes obscoenis usibus subiugavit. Cum enim nullus cupiditati modus, nulla satietatis spes est, singulis Sparta non sufficit sua. Nam sic nostri corporis loca divina providentia certis destinavit officiis. Tum denique volentes alliciunt veste atque gressu, et aliis femininis rebus, quae sunt a passionibus corporis aliena, sed potius corruptae mentis vitia. Nam saepe tumentes [timentes], vel quod est difficile, verentes quosdam, quibus forte deferunt, repente mutati parvo tempore virilitatis quaerunt indicia demonstrare, cuius quia modum nesciunt, rursum nimietate sublati, plus quoque quam virtuti convenit, faciunt et maioribus si peccatis involvunt. Constat itaque etiam nostro iudicio, hos vera sentire. Est enim, ut Soranus ait, malignae ac foedissimae mentis passio. Nam sicut feminae Tribades326 appellatae, quod utramque Venerem162 exerceant, mulieribus magis quam viris misceri festinant et easdem, invidentia pene virili sectantur, et cum passione fuerint desertae, seu temporaliter relevatae, ea quaerunt aliis obiicere, quae pati noscuntur, iuvamini humilitate [iuvandi voluptate ex] duplici sexu confecta, velut frequenti ebrietate corruptae in novas libidinis formas erumpentes, consuetudine turpi nutritae, sui sexus iniuriis gaudent, illi comparatione talium animi passione iactari noscuntur. Nam neque ulla curatio corporis depellendae passionis causa recte putatur adhibenda, sed potius animus coercendus, qui tanta peccatorum163 labe vexatur. Nemo enim pruriens corpus feminando correxit, vel virilis veretri tactu mitigavit, sed communiter querelam sive dolorem alia ex materia toleravit. Denique etiam a Clodio historia curationis data ascaridarum esse perspicitur, quos de lumbricis scribentes vermiculos esse docuimis longaonis327 in partibus natos. Parmenides328 libris quos de natura scripsit, eventu, inquit conceptionis molles aliquando seu subactos homines generare. Cuius quia graecum est epigramma et hoc versibus intimabo [imitabo]: Latinos enim, ut potui, simili modo composui, ne linguarum ratio misceretur.

Vult enim seminum praeter materias esse virtutes, quae si se ita miscuerint et [ut] eiusdem corporis [vim unam] faciant, unam congruam sexui generent voluntatem. Si autem permixto semine corporeo virtutes separatae permanserint utriusque Veneris natos adpetentia sequatur. Multi praeterea sectarum principes genuinam dicunt esse passionem et propterea164 in posteros venire cum semine, non quidem naturam criminantes, quae suae puritatis metas aliis ex animalibus docet: nam sunt eius specula a sapientibus nuncupata: sed humanum genus, quod ita semel recepta tenet vitia, ut nulla possit instauratione purgari, nec ullum novitati liquerit locum, sitque gravior senescentibus mentis culpa, cum plurimae genuinae, seu adventitiae passionis corporibus infractae consenescant, ut podagra, epilepsia, furor et propterea aetate vergente mitiores procul dubio fiant. Omnia et enim vexantia validos effectus dabunt firmitate opposita subiacentium materiarum, quae cum in senibus deficit, passio quoque minuitur, ut fortitudo; sola tamen supra dicta, quae subactos seu molles efficit viros, senescenti corpore gravius invalescit et infanda magis libidine movet, non quidem sine ratione. In aliis enim aetatibus adhuc valido corpore et naturalia ventris [veneris] officia celebrante, gemina luxuriae libido non divititur, animorum nunc faciendo, nunc facie iactata [animo eorum nunc patiendo nunc faciendo iactato]: in iis vero qui senectute defecti virili veneris officio caruerint, omnis animi libido in contrariam ducitur appetentiam, et propterea femina validius Venerem poscit. Hinc denique coniiciunt plurimi etiam pueros hac passione iactari. Similiter enim senibus virili indigent officio, quod in ipsis est nondum, illos deseruit.” (On effeminate men or subservients, called μαλθακοὶ—soft, effeminate, by the Greeks.—Effeminate men, or subservients, were called by the Greeks μαλθακοὶ. A man finds it difficult to believe in the existence of such creatures. For it was not nature prompted the introduction of this as part of human habits; rather was it lust that, expelling shame, subjected to foul uses parts of the body that should never have been so employed. For no limit being set to passion, and no hope of satiety being entertained, the several members find each its own realm insufficient; whereas divine providence destined the different portions of the body to perform definite165 functions. In fine they go out of their way to allure by dress and gait and other feminine attributes, things unconnected with bodily emotions, being rather due to a corrupted mind. For often, moved by fear, or (however difficult to believe) by shame, towards persons whom they happen to respect, they change of a sudden and for a brief space seek to show marks of manly power; but not knowing where to put the limit, they are again carried away by excess, and going beyond what is fit for an honest man are involved in yet greater offences. Thus it is evident, in our opinion, that such men have a sense of the true state of things. For theirs is, as Soranus declares, the passion of a corrupt and utterly foul mind. For as women that are called Tribades, because they practise the love of either sex, are eager to have intercourse with women more than with men, and pursue these with a jealousy almost as violent as a man’s, and when they have been deserted by their love or for the time being superseded, seek to do to other women what they are known to suffer, and winning from their double sex a pleasure in giving pleasure, like persons deboshed by constant drunkenness, being nurtured on evil habitude, delight in wrongs to their own sex,—even so these men (pathics) are seen by a comparison with women of this sort to be tormented with a passion that is of the mind. For no bodily treatment it is rightly deemed should be adopted to expel the passion, rather must the mind be disciplined which is afflicted with such a pollution of vices.

For no man ever remedied a prurient body by foul practices as a woman, nor got mitigation by contact of the male member, but concurrently he suffered some complaint or pain from a different (material) cause. So in fact the history of a cure given by Clodius is found to be really a case of recovery from “ascaridae”, which writers on intestinal worms have shown are a kind of worm born in166 the region of the rectum or straight gut. Parmenides in his books on natural science says “Effeminate men or subservients occasionally bring forth as a result of conception.” But as his Epigram is in Greek, I will imitate it in verse; so I have composed Latin lines like the original so far as I could make them, that there might not be a mixture of the two languages:—“When a woman and a man together mingle in the veins the seeds of love, the formative virtue that moulds of the diverse blood, if it keep due proportion, makes well-framed bodies. But if the virtues are discordant in the commingled seed, and have no unity, in the commingled body furies will torment the nascent sex with two-fold seed.” He means that over and above the material seed there are certain virtues residing in it; and if these have commingled in such a way as to have one and the same operative force in the same body, then they produce one single will that tallies with the sex. But if when the bodily seed was commingled, the virtues remained separate, the appetite for love of both kinds must pursue the offspring.

Many leading doctors of the schools moreover declare that the passion is innate, and therefore passes on with the seed to descendants, not indeed hereby incriminating nature, which teaches men the bounds of its purity by the example of other animals (for animals are called by wise men nature’s mirrors), but rather the human race that retains so obstinately vices once adopted, that by no renewal can it be purified, and has left no room for change. Similarly a mental depravity grows graver as men advance in life, whereas most affections of the body, whether innate or adventitious, get weaker as men get older, for instance gout, epilepsy and madness, and so as age advances undoubtedly grow milder. For all troublesome factors will produce strong effects in proportion to the firmness to resist possessed by the affected parts, and as this firmness is deficient in old men, so the complaint or passion diminishes167 in intensity, as does the general strength. But that passion which makes men subservient or effeminate, grows stronger and more serious as the body grows old and stirs the sufferers with yet more abominable lustfulness,—and not without a reason. For at other ages, the body being still strong and capable of performing the natural offices of love, there is no division of lust into double forms of wantonness, through their mind being tossed to and fro now by passive now by active lewdness. But in such as have failed from age, and become incapable of the manly office of love, all the wantonness of the mind is directed on the appetite for the opposite form of gratification; and for this cause a woman demands love more strongly than a man. In fact many conjecture it is for this reason that boys also are tormented by this passion. For they resemble old men in lacking power for the virile function. It is not yet born in boys; old men have lost it.)

To leave on one side for the present the many inferences of various sorts that this passage of Caelius Aurelianus must necessarily lead us to, as they will find a more suitable place later on, and to return to our question,—the mere fact of Herodotus mentioning posterity at all ought of itself to be sufficient to negative any idea of actual eunuchs, of loss of the generative power. For had the Scythians returning from Ascalon lost this power, they could have had no more descendants, and therefore the νούσος θήλεια could not have passed on to these, but must have become extinct with the original sufferers. On the other hand children already begotten by them before that period could have been in no way influenced by a disease communicable through the act of generation. Accordingly the νοῦσος θήλεια cannot possibly have affected these Scythians so as to annihilate the power of generation. Both must have co-existed side by side; and the contrary can never be proved from anything Herodotus says. As to another passage of Herodotus168 that might seem to demand some notice here, where the expression ἀνδρόγυνος (man-woman) is put side by side with ἐνάρεες, we will speak subsequently.

But, it is maintained by those who take a different view,—the individuals who suffered from the νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease) could be recognized as doing so by their looks; thus it cannot have been a mere vice, it must have been an actual bodily complaint. We will not say a word more insisting on the declarations general amongst ancient writers, for example the words of Ovid: Heu! quam difficile est crimen non prodere vultu (Alas! how difficult it is not to betray a vice by the look), but will simply ask the question,—had the Ancients really no bodily marks of identification by which they could recognise in an individual the vice of the pathic or cinaedus? On this point we must look to the Physiognomists for information, and as a matter of fact they supply it in considerable completeness. First of all Aristotle329:

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“Distinguishing Masks of the Cinaedus:

“An eye broken-down, as it were, knees bent inwards, inclination of the head to the right side; movements of the hands always back downwards and flaccid, the gait double, as it were, one leg being crossed over the other in walking, the gaze wandering; such a man for example was the Sophist Dionysius.” Polemo enters into greater detail330:

“Distinguishing Marks of the Androgynus (Man-woman): “The man-woman has a lecherous and wanton look, he rolls his eyes and lets his gaze wander; forehead and cheeks twitch, eyebrows are drawn together to a point, neck bent, hips in continual movement. All the limbs twitch spasmodically, knees and hands seeming to crack; like an ox he glares round him and fixes his eyes on the ground. He speaks with a thin voice, at once croaking and shrill, exceedingly uncertain and trembling.” In very similar terms the pathic is sketched by Adamantus331. Dio Chrysostom in his170 speech cited a little above332 relates how “a physiognomist had come into a certain city, in order to give an exhibition of his art there, and declared he could tell by looking at any individual whether he were brave or timid, a boaster or a debauchee, a cinaedus or an adulterer. A man was brought to him who had a meagre body, eyebrows grown together, a dirty look, who was in evil condition, with callosities on his hands, and dressed in coarse gray clothing, one that was overgrown with hair to the knuckles, and ill-shaved, and the physiognomist was asked, what sort of a man he was. When he had looked at him a considerable time, and at the end was still uncertain, as it seems to me, what he should finally say, he declared he did not know and ordered the man to go. But when the latter sneezed, just as he was going, he cried out instantly he was a cinaedus. Thus the sneeze betrayed the man’s habits, and prevented them, in spite of all the rest, from continuing hid.” No doubt the man’s walk had already given the Physiognomist an indication, and the gesture he made when he sneezed,171 quickly confirmed his Diagnosis. In fact the cinaedus probably made a grip at his posterior as he sneezed, so as to close the orifice, the weakened or possibly ruptured Sphincter ani no longer being able to perform this office (χαυνοπρώκτος,—wide-breeched, in Aristophanes!). Indeed with a healthy Sphincter it is often hardly possible during a sneeze to keep back the out-rush of wind and even of the more liquid faeces.333

Further the following passage of Lucian should be quoted in this connection:334

“But I tell you, pathic,—your habits are so obvious that even the blind and the deaf cannot fail to recognise them. If you only open your mouth to speak, only undress at the baths, nay, if you do not yourself undress, but only your slaves put off their garments, what think you,—are not all your secrets of the night at once revealed? Now just tell me, if your Sophist Bassus, or the flute-player Batalus, or the cinaedus Hemitheon of Sybaris, who wrote your beautiful laws, how you must polish the skin, and pluck out the hair (with tweezers), how you must submit to the performance of paederastia, and how yourselves perform it,172— now if one of these men should throw a lion’s skin round him, and enter with a club in his hand, what would the spectators really believe?—that it was Hercules? Surely not, unless they were utterly blear-eyed. A thousand things betray such a masquerade,—gait, look, voice,335 the bowed neck, the ceruse, the mastich, the paint on the cheeks that you make yourselves up with; in a word it were easier, as the proverb says, to hide five elephants under your armpit than to conceal one cinaedus!”

Now if the natural marks of identification that have been specified were sufficient to betray the cinaedus, even when he was devoid of all external adornment from art,336 how much more readily recognizable must the pathic become, if he arranged his get-up and costume to match his shameful practices,173337 and that this was so Martial affords evidence in countless places. In fact these male whores used to have the beard quite clean shaven (ἐξυρημένοι close-shaven) and not merely on the posteriors but generally all over the body, with the exception of the head, carefully removed the hair, so as make themselves more like women.

(Directly, if a man play women’s parts, the body must have its share in the characterization), Aristophanes makes Agatho say at the Thesmophoria, where Mnesilochus has been transformed into a woman by means of depilation, so as to be able to back up the women in opposition to Euripides in their attacks on him at that festival.

On the other hand cinaedi let the hair of the head grow long338 (comae,—long locks), and dressed altogether like women. Hence the reply of the Cynic Diogenes339 to a young man clothed after this fashion, who had asked him a question on some subject or other; he would not answer, he said,174 till his questioner had lifted up his clothes, and shown him his sex! Equally important is the conversation of Socrates with Strepsiades in the “Clouds” of Aristophanes:340

(Strepsiades.—Now tell me, how comes it that, if these are really and truly clouds, they resemble women? Common clouds are not like that.... Socrates.—They can easily make themselves anything they please. And so, if they but catch sight of one of those long-haired, ruffianly, shaggy fellows, such a man as Xenophantus’ son for example, straightway in derision of their folly they change into Centaurs. And now when they beheld Cleisthenes, see you? they became women!) Cleisthenes was a notorious cinaedus at Athens, whom Aristophanes had made a special butt for his wit; for example, he makes Mnesilochus, mentioned just above, after his transformation into a woman, say,—he looks just like Cleisthenes now.

The evidence adduced will, we think, be sufficient to show that the Scythians had good reason for saying, that with persons in this case (cinaedi) it was easy to recognise by looking at them what stamp of men they were: and that Juvenal341 was right when he wrote:

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(More truly then and more candidly Peribomius says: the man I consider a victim of fate, who in face and gait betrays the disease he suffers from.)—a passage that strongly confirms what has been advanced. Peribomius is quite candid, he confesses to being a pathic, for in any case his appearance would betray the fact. He finds the less reason to deny it, as he regards the vice which has mastered him as an infliction of providence (fatis imputo). Here is proof that the opinion of the Greeks as to the pathic’s being one who had incurred the anger of the gods, was still commonly held in Juvenal’s time, though perhaps less as a matter of conviction than in order to provide an excuse for indulgence. So we must further read hoc for hunc in the passage (hoc ego fatis imputo,176— this I regard as an infliction of fate); unless indeed we construe thus, ego, qui morbum vultu incessuque fatetur, hunc (sc. morbum) fatis imputo. “I in truth,—as for the man who confesses by look and gait his disease, this disease I regard as an infliction of fate.” The words are obviously Peribomius’ own expression of opinion; and directly afterwards the poet goes on:

(These men’s simplicity moves our pity; their very infatuation craves pardon. But worse are they who enter such courses with Hercules’ words on their lips, and prating of manly virtue, heave the wanton buttocks.)

But the passage just quoted from Juvenal is of still greater importance for another reason. In it the vice of the cinaedus is called morbus (a disease); and in virtue of its explicitness it is sufficient by itself to settle all doubts as to this being a usual mode of expression with the Romans, who ordinarily designated any vice by this name342. The only 177 question remaining will be, Did the Greeks also use180 this form of expression? Any scholar possessed of a special acquaintance with the Greek language will most certainly not hesitate an instant to answer this question in the affirmative, the Lexicographers having long ago collected an exhaustive list of examples of such use343.

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Plutarch344 says, comparing the action of the Sun with that of Love:— Καὶ μὴν οὔτε σώματος ἀγύμναστος ἕξις ἥλιον, οὒτε Ἔρωτα δύναται φέρειν ἀλύπως τρόπος ἀπαιδεύτου ψυχῆς· ἐξίσταται δ’ ὁμοίως ἐκάτερον καὶ νοσεῖ, τὴν του θεοῦ δύναμιν, οὐ τὴν αὑτοῦ μεμφόμενον ἀσθένειαν.—(ch. XXIII.) Τὴν μὲν πρὸς ἄῤῥενα ἄῤῥενος ὁμιλίαν, μᾶλλον δὲ ἀκρασίαν καὶ ἐπιπήδησιν εἴποι τις ἂν ἐννοήσας,

Ὕβρις τάδ’ οὐχ ἡ Κύπρις ἐξεργάζεται.

Διὸ τοὺς μὲν ἡδομένους τῷ πάσχειν εἰς τὸ χείριστον τιθέμενοι γένος κακίας, οὔτε πίστεως μοῖραν, οὔτε αἰδοῦς.... Ἀλλὰ πολλὰ φαῦλα καὶ μανικὰ τῶν γυναικῶν ἐρώτων· Τὶ δὲ οὐχὶ πλείονα τῶν παιδικῶν; Ἀλλ’ ὥσπερ τοῦτο παιδομανία τὸ πάθος, οὐδέτερον δὲ Ἔρως ἔστιν. (And in fact neither can an untrained body bear the sun, nor can any fashion of uneducated soul bear Love (Eros) without pain; but each equally is disorganized182 and grows sick, having to blame the power of the god, not its own weakness.—ch. XXIII.—Now intercourse of male with male one would rather call, after due reflection, incontinence and violent assault.

“’Tis overmastering insolence works this result, not love (Cypris).”345

Wherefore such as take pleasure in pathic lust, devoting themselves to the vilest kind of wickedness, have no portion in honour or in modesty.—Indeed much there is base and insane in amours with women; how much more so in those with boys! Now the name of the latter passion is paedomania—346madness for boys,—but neither kind is Love—Eros).

These passages are of the highest importance in connection with our subject, as confirming in the most distinct manner what has been said above as to the wrath of Venus; but for the sake of greater clearness they had to be held over for discussion till now. It is clearly stated in them: that paederastia is no work of Venus, i.e. not an expression or consequence of the customary activity of the goddess, but a ὕβρις (act of insolent violence) and the consequence of ὕβρις i.e. of some act that has roused the anger of the gods. Here we have the oldest view of all: that paederastia is a consequence of the vengeance of Venus, arising in consequence of a ὕβρις, and again in turn itself constituting a ὕβρις.183347

But besides this the later view of a more enlightened time is also implied. According to this it was not any δύναμις τοῦ θεοῦ (operation of a god’s might), but simply an ἀσθενεία or ἀκρασία348 (weakness,184 incontinence) of the individual that was in question, (and it is for this reason Plutarch quotes the line of Manetho, an old and obscure poet, in this sense);185 Paederastia was called a πάθος, a form of insanity (παιδομανία—madness for boys), and was not looked upon in any sense as a consequence of the power186 of Eros—Love. That the vice was also called νόσος (a disease) is shown,—not to mention the expression νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease), which we have yet to fully explain,—by the Speech of Dio Chrysostom cited above, as well as by a number of passages quoted in the course of our investigation,—e.g. on p. 125. In the “Wasps” of Aristophanes, Xanthias relates how a son had confined his father and put him under surveillance, and then goes on (vv. 71 sqq.):

(For his father is sick of a portentous sickness, one that no one would ever know or conjecture the nature of, unless he should have learned it from us; for if you doubt me, guess yourselves.)

Love of play is suggested, and love of drink, love of sacrifice and finally love of winning guests and seeing them at his house (φιλόξενον—lover of guests), which last conjecture Sosias understands in an obscene sense as implying a cinaedus, and (vv. 84 sqq.) says:

(No! no! by heavens! Nicostratus, not a lover of guests (φιλόξενος) for our friend Philoxenus is a man given to unnatural lust,) where φιλόξενος and καταπύγων are explained as being synonymous. Now if paederastia had not been a disease, how should they have come to call a man φιλόξενος, when guessing the form his sickness took? For the rest there was a well-known cinaedus Philoxenus, to whom allusion is made. The scholiast quotes a very noteworthy line from Eupolis (in the “Urbes”) or else from Phrynichus (“in the Satyrs”) as follows:

ἔστι δέ τις θήλεια Φιλόξενος ἐκ Διομείων.

(And there is a certain female Philoxenus of Diomeia);

187

The healthy good sense of the Greeks could not possibly regard the vice of the Pathic otherwise than as a deviation from Nature, an unnatural appetite; and every unnatural appetite (ἀκολασία—“intemperance”) was a νόσος or πάθος (disease, or suffering, passion), or a consequence of these, as the passages quoted from Aristotle and elsewhere show conclusively. From the point of view of the paederast reasons perhaps were to be discovered, that appeared to justify his peculiar taste; and the mode in which he obtained the titillation of sensual pleasure was looked upon merely as one way of getting rid of the semen, as a figura Veneris (mode of Love) standing in close relationship with Onanism. The paederast was relegated to the category of voluptuaries, but without his incurring any special condemnation. On the other hand for the pathic who lent himself as subject of the vice, no excuse of this sort was forthcoming. His lust was not seen (this was impossible at the time) to have a bodily origin in “prurigo ani” (itching of the anus), and could only be regarded as springing from a depraved imagination (ἀνίατον νόσον ψυχῆς ἡγούμενος—deeming it an incurable disease of the soul); it must be that a demon had dragged him along irresistibly in his train, and drove his victim who was incapable of helping himself (ἀσθενής—“weak”) to degradation.

All men thus held in thrall by evil demons were supposed to have offended against the gods, to have roused their anger, and were avoided and shunned by their fellows. If in addition they showed any traces of mental aberration, madness, epileptic convulsions, or the like, rude peoples saw in these the manifestation of a god’s influence, and took the victim’s sayings and dreams for oracles. So Herodotus relates (IV. 67.) that the Scythians considered the ἐναρέες to have received the gift of prophecy from Aphrodité,—οἱ δὲ ἐναρέες οἱ ἀνδρόγυνοι, τὴν Ἀφροδίτην σφισι λέγουσι μαντικὴν δοῦναι (now the ἐναρέες, the men-women, declare that188 Venus brought madness on the object of her anger), and held the vice of the pathic to be due to the goddess’s wrath, or at a later time to be an (incurable) disease of the soul (ψυχή),—as is proved again by the passage of Caelius Aurelianus already quoted; but they did not ascribe to such men the power of prophecy, though in a certain sense every actual madman was supposed to possess it349. For the vice of the pathic was not in the eyes of the Greeks actual madness, but rather a vice (νόσος—disease) that robbed the sufferer of the power of governing himself350, in the same sense as they called sexual love a madness. From this point of view therefore the commentators who saw in the νοῦσος θήλεια a mental affliction, had some grounds for their view; but should not have lost sight of the fact of its being a vice at the same time.

But why did the νοῦσος (disease) receive the epithet θήλεια (feminine)? Taking the word to be used passively,—as obviously is done by those who make out the νοῦσος θήλεια to have been an affection similar in character to menstruation,—we might find its explanation in the dictum of Tiresias, who, as189 is well known, ascribed to the woman the greater pleasure in the act of coition. From this fact,—if it is a fact,—a greater longing on the part of the woman for coition may be deduced; for which reason Plato compared the uterus (womb) to a wild beast. Thus the νοῦσος θήλεια would be feminine concupiscence. Just as the woman longs intensely for natural coition with the man, in the same way and with a like intensity does the pathic long after unnatural351. Thus the punishment inflicted by Venus would have consisted in the goddess having implanted in the man the concupiscence of a woman.

If on the other hand θήλεια (feminine) is taken in an active sense, as it is by Stark and other interpreters,—and with greater correctness, then the νοῦσος θήλεια is a form of lust that transforms men into women,—and this can be said of paederastia in several senses, as is manifest from what has been said already on preceding pages. The Pathic becomes a woman, because he renounces his man’s prerogative, as being the stronger, to play the active part352, and assumes instead the190 passive rôle of the woman353, Entering into compe191tition as he does with the ladies of pleasure in courting the favour of men, he has recourse to all the arts they invoke to gain their object; and seeks by artificial means to bring his body into as close a resemblance as possible to the female form. He dresses himself out like a woman of pleasure, adopts female dress, and lets the hair of the head grow long, whilst at the same time he carefully eradicates by the process of dropacismus (use of pitch-ointment as a depilatory) every trace of hair on other parts of the person, even sacrificing what was the chief ornament of a man in Ancient192 times,—his beard354. All this was done by the hero of Aristophanes’ “Thesmophoriazusae”, and without a doubt an underlying irony à propos of the pathics was at the bottom of the poet’s conception. Care of the skin, such as women adopt, by means of baths, friction with pumice-stone, etc. complete the feminine appearance355,—hence the expressions μάλακος, μαλθακός (soft or effeminate) for the pathic, μαλακία, μαλθακία (softness, effeminacy) for the pathic’s vice; and outraged Nature avenges herself by seconding his endeavours. In consequence of the stretching of the fundament, the buttocks become broader towards the lower part, and the space between them wider, causing the hips to take more the shape they have in a woman,193 the pelvis itself seems to be enlarged, while the legs lose their straightness and the knees bend more and more inwards (γονύκροτος—knock-kneed,)—in short the whole of the lower half of the body assumes the feminine type.

Deterioration of body is followed by deterioration of mind, and the character also grows womanish.356 The pathic despises intercourse with women, and will not enter into marriage, so long as he continues to find his lust satisfied. When this ceases to be the case as years advance, Nature herself forbids his propagating his race; the genital organs that have withered through disuse and refuse their office.357 Driven from194 the society of men, he takes refuge, neither woman nor man himself, with the women, who in contempt use him as a slave, and like Omphalé of old with Hercules, put the distaff into his hands! Thus from the νοῦσος θήλεια, the vice, an actual disease has sprung; and we can now see that Longinus358 was surely right in calling the expression of Herodotus ἀμίμητος,—an inimitable one, for certainly in no more concise or better way can the facts and the consequences of the vice of the Pathic be characterized.

However if any one should consider all this still insufficient to prove the case, and regard the indication given by Longinus as not explicit enough, he may learn from Tiberius the Rhetorician359 that as a matter195 of fact the Ancients understood the νοῦσος θήλεια in Herodotus in this and in no other sense. He says:

“Now a paraphrase is when authors alter a simple, straightforward statement of fact that is complete, for the sake of style or effect or sublimity of phrase, and express the matter in other words, and these more forcible and suitable; as e.g. in Herodotus, when he wrote ἐνέσκηψεν ἡ θεὸς θήλειαν νόσον (the goddess afflicted them with feminine disease) instead of “made them men-women or cinaedi”. The word ἀνδρόγυνος (man-woman) is used here in the same way as in another passage where Herodotus says360, οἱ δὲ ἐνάρεες, οἱ ἀνδρόγυνοι (and the ἐνάρεες, the men-women). The false interpretation of this word has more than anything else led to misunderstanding as to the νοῦσος θήλεια, for it was supposed that by ἀνδρόγυνοι (men-women) actual eunuchs were intended, whereas pathics are meant and nothing more. How the case really stood might have been seen from Suidas, who tells us: ἀνδρόγυνος· ὁ Διόνυσος, ὡς καὶ τὰ ἀνδρῶν ποιῶν καὶ τὰ γυναικῶν πάσχων· ἢ ἄνανδρος καὶ Ἑρμαφρόδιτος· καὶ ἀνδρογύνων, ἀσθενῶν. γυναικῶν καρδίας ἐχόντων. (man-woman: Dionysus, as both performing a man’s part and suffering a woman’s. Synonyms, “unmanly”, and “Hermaphrodite”. Also of men-women, weakly men, having the hearts of women.) Dionysus361 then performed196 the act of coition as a man, and suffered himself to be used as a woman, and for this reason was called ἀνδρόγυνος (man-woman). We find the word used198 in the same way in Plato362, in the passage of Dio Chrysostom quoted a little above, in various places in the Writers on Physiognomy, in Philo, loco citato,199 and in Artemidorus363. From the last we quote a passage highly interesting for our purpose:

“A man saw in a dream his penis covered with hair to the extreme tip, shaggy with very thick hair that grew all of a sudden on it. He was a notorious cinaedus, indulging in every abominable pleasure, effeminate and a man-woman; only never using his member as a man does. In this way it happened that that part was so little employed, that through not being rubbed against another body hair actually grew on it.” The same author relates in another place364:201 “A man saw in a dream the rôle365 of a man-woman played on the stage; his privy member fell sick. A man thought he saw a priest of Cybelé (a castrated man); his privy member fell sick. This happened in the first instance because of the name, in the second because of the coincidence of the fact with the spectator’s condition. And indeed you know what κωμῳδεῖν (to represent in comedy) signifies in dreams, and what it means to see a priest of Cybelé. You remember too that if any one dreams he sees a Comedy or Tragedy and remembers it afterwards, the event can be predicted according to the plot of the piece dreamed of.”

The passage affords us yet another proof as to the causes that were supposed in Antiquity to condition the rise of diseases of the genitals, and we need certainly feel no surprise if we find the ætiological relations of these complaints even in professional writers wrapped in all but impenetrable obscurity.

Now what is the word ἐναρέες? Some scholars take it to be Greek; and accordingly would read202 ἐναγέες (persons who have sinned against the godhead), as Bouhier did, and perhaps Caelius Rhodoginus even in his time, or else ανάριες (imbelles, ad luctum veneream inepti,—unwarlike, i.e. unfit for the struggle of love), which was Coray’s emendation. Stark does not believe in any corruption of the word, but thinks it should be derived from ἐναίρω (spolio,—I rob, spoil), ἔναρα (spolia,—spoils), making it signify virilitate spoliati,—men robbed of their virility. But ἐναίρω according to Buttmann’s Lexilogus, p. 276., means “to send down to Hades”, to slay, ἔναρα the spoils taken from the slain, and from this comes the idea of spoliation, deprivation. The word undoubtedly occurs (Homer, Iliad XXIV. 244.) in the sense of “to be slain”, but the meaning virilitate spoliari (to be deprived of virility) without the addition of some supplemental word can certainly not be authenticated in old Writers. Supposing this derivation to be correct, ἐναρέες might signify simply (Temple) robbers, and as a matter of fact the glosses give ὁπλίται (warriors) as an explanation. It is a surprising thing that those who make out the νοῦσος θήλεια to have been gonorrhœa (clap), should not have derived the word from ἐάρ, the sap, the seed, with inserted ν.

However a Greek origin of the word is rendered unlikely by one simple circumstance. Herodotus writes τοὺς καλέουσι Ἐναρέας οἱ Σκύθαι, (whom the Scythians call Ἐναρέες,—which is obviously the same thing as saying, “in the language of the Scythians they are called Ἐναρέες”. And again why should Herodotus have explained it by ἀνδρόγυνοι (men-women), if it was a word that every Greek could understand. In this view moreover Wesseling and Schweighäuser, scholars possessing a special, critical knowledge of their Herodotus, concur. We do not indeed know to what family of speech the Scythian belongs; but it may be assumed that the word signifying the disease took its origin from the same country where the νοῦσος θήλεια itself arose.203 We believe ἐναρέες366 to have been originally a Syrian word, which the Scythians, or more likely the Greeks367, first adopted into their own idiom. The Greeks were particularly good at the transformation or, if you please, distortion, of foreign names! The word which we think must be claimed as the original is the Semitic נַעֲרָה (naãrâ),—the girl, the woman in the abstract; and we conjecture Herodotus wrote ναρέες, a form which is actually found according to Coray in one Manuscript. The meaning then would be the womanish man, and this gives a complete correspondance with νοῦσος θήλεια and ἀνδρόγυνος. Another conjecture is based on the name of the Babylonish Praefect or Ἄνναρος, to which Coray calls attention, adding: mais qui pourroit bien être un surnom altéré par les copistes, et relatif à sa vie effeminée et au milieu des femmes. (but which might very possibly be a surname204 changed by the transcribers and referring to his effeminate life and his living surrounded by women.) In Athenaeus368 we read in fact: Κτησίας δ’ ἱστορεῖ, Ἀνναρον τὸν βασιλέως ὕπαρχον καὶ τῆς Βαβυλωνίας δυναστεύσαντα στολῇ χρῆσθαι γυναικείᾳ καὶ κόσμῳ· καὶ ὅτι βασιλέως δούλῳ ὄντι κ. τ. λ. (Ctesias relates in his History that Annarus, the King’s Praefect and Governor of Babylon wore a woman’s robes and ornaments; and that being a slave of the King, etc.) Still as a matter of fact it is difficult to see why the transcriber should have introduced the name as Ἄνναρος, the whole form of the sentence demanding a proper name. Coray refuses to admit that ἐναρέες is a foreign word at all, for he says, “cette manière de s’exprimer n’est souvent qu’une version littérale du mot étranger dans la langue de l’écrivain qui l’emploie”. (such a mode of expression is very often nothing more than a literal translation of the foreign word into the language of the writer using it). But if this were the case, and the word one that a Greek would have understood, why did Herodotus go out of his way to explain it by ἀνδρόγυνοι? Supposing a transcriber to have inserted Ἄνναρον into the text, yet even then the word must have been familiar to him in the sense of womanish, unmanly. But if it has this meaning, Coray’s conjecture,—to read ἀναρέες for ἐναρέες, should be unhesitatingly adopted,—if that is (a point to which Prof. Pott has drawn attention) the derivation is taken from Sanskrit or Zend.

In Zend in fact man is nara, woman narî; in Sanskrit nrî is the stem, nom. nâ, pl. nar-as,—or else nara the stem and nom. naras, from which has come the Greek ἀνήρ (man) by addition of the prosthetic, (not privative), α. Now from nara, by prefixing α privative, which exists both in Zend and Sanskrit, may be formed a-nara, with the meaning of not-man, unmanly,—a meaning which is preserved205 in the name Ἄναρος (the doubling of the ν is undoubtedly wrong); and so ἀναρέες would be literally the same by etymology with Hippocrates’ ἀνανδριεῖς (unmanly men), occurring in a passage to be presently discussed. This, and equally ἀνανδρία, ἀνάνδρος (unmanliness, unmanly) are all expressions for the pathic and his vice, as is shown again and again by passages quoted in the course of our investigation.

But again, if with Coray an actual verbal translation of a foreign word is supposed, then ἀνανέρες (ἀ-ν-ἀνέρες) might be read,—a word which though quite legitimately formed, was not in actual use by the Greeks, and for this reason Herodotus naturally enough explained it by ἀνδρόγυνοι. In any case the remarkable fact remains that no one of the ancient Lexicographers, Suidas for instance or Hesychius369,206 should have thought the word, in whatever form it may have been read, worthy of notice in his Dictionary.

We have now, we think, adequately discussed the νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease) in the preceding Sections, and proved that the oldest view of all, viz. that the vice of the Pathic must be understood by that term, may be justified from every point of view. It only remains to subject to examination passages from such other authors as have employed the expression. These Stark, §§ 11-18., has most carefully collected. In this way we shall see how far they may be brought into harmony with the view adopted.

Philo370 relates among a number of other evidences207 of the outspokenness of Diogenes the Philosopher, when he was a captive and exposed for sale as a slave, how his fellow-prisoners all stood sad and cast down, but he again and again gave free course to his witty humour. “For instance when he cast his eye on one of the buyers, who suffered from the feminine disease, he would seem to have gone up to the man, whose outward appearance announced him to be an unmanly man, and said: ‘Do you buy me, for you seem to be in want of a man!’ The buyer, conscious and ashamed, slunk away among the crowd, whilst the bystanders marvelled at Diogenes’ wit and boldness.”

In another place371 Philo says, after having spoken208 of the Laws of Moses against harlotry: “Yet another evil much more serious than the one mentioned, has crept into states, paederastia to wit, the bare naming of which was formerly an outrage. But now it is a matter of boast, not only with those who practise it, but also with the pathics, the men of whom it is customary to say,—They suffer from feminine disease. In fact they are effeminated in body and soul, and not one spark of manliness do they suffer to appear in them. They braid and deck their hair to look like women, they smear and paint their faces with ceruse and cosmetics and such like things, anoint their persons with fragrant ointments,—for a fragrant smell is an attraction much sought after by such. Expending every possible care on their outward adornment, they are not ashamed even to employ every device to change artificially their nature as men into that of women. Against such it is right to be bloodthirsty,209 obeying the Law, which commands: to slay,—and fear no penalty,—the man-woman who transgresses the law of nature, to let him live not a day, not an hour,—shaming as he does himself, his family, his country, nay! the whole race of mankind. The paederast must endure the same penalty, for he pursues after a pleasure that is contrary to Nature, and, so far as in him lies, makes States desert and empty of inhabitants, annihilating the begetting of children. More than this he endeavours to entice others and lead them away into two most abominable vices, unmanliness and effeminacy, bedizening youths (like women), and womanizing men in the vigour of their age, just at the time when they ought rather to be roused to aim at strength and hardihood. In a word, like a bad farmer, he lets the rich and fertile ploughland lie untilled, and makes it unfruitful, but labours day and night where he can expect no harvest whatever. Now this comes, I think, from the fact that in most States prizes are really offered for incontinence and effeminacy,—the vices of the paederast and the pathic. At any rate these men-women may be seen constantly strutting in the agora at the hour of high market, walking in procession at the sacred festivals, sharing, unholy as they are, in holy offices, participating in mysteries and sacrifices, even engaging in the rites of Demeter. Some of them have brought the charm of their youth to such a pass that craving a complete transformation into women, they have amputated their generative members; and now clad in purple robes, as if they had wrought some great benefit to their country, and surrounded by a body guard, they enter in state, all eyes fixed on them. Now if only such indignation as our Lawgiver has expressed, were generally entertained against those guilty of such effrontery, and if they were banished, as expiating the common guilt of their country, without appeal, this would do much to improve many of their companions. The punish210ment of such as had been condemned, if in no possible way to be shirked, would contribute no little to checking any imitation of these lusts on the part of others.”

In the third passage, Philo372 is speaking of the difference between the symposia (banquets) of his time and those of the Greeks, and says:—“The Platonic banquet has to do almost entirely with Love, but not the love of men for women, or of211 women for men,—for these are passions that are satisfied conformably with the law of Nature,—but the love of men whose affections are directed to youths. For all the noble things that are said besides about Eros (Love) and the heavenly Aphrodité are to be taken as mere fine talk. By far the most part in fact concerns Ἔρως κοινὸς and Ἔρως πάνδημος (Common Love, Public Love), which destroys all manliness, the virtue that is most needful in war and peace, infecting the mind with the “feminine disease”, and turning men into men-women, whereas they should be equipped with everything conducive to manly vigour. Instead of this it ruins young men’s manliness, and gives them the nature and character of a wanton; also inflicting injury on the Lover in the most important factors of life,—body, soul and property. For the thoughts of the paederast must needs be all centred on the boy he loves, and his gaze quick to see that object only: while for all other concerns, private or public, his eyes are blinded and useless, and this especially if he is unhappy in his love. His worldly condition takes hurt in two ways, partly through neglect, partly through expenditure on the loved one. Associated with this is yet another, and a greater because general, mischief. Such men bring about the depopulation of Cities, and cause a lack of a good, sound strain of men, producing barrenness and unfruitfulness. They resemble those that are unskilful in husbandry, etc.”

In a fourth passage again, one overlooked however by Stark, Philo373 says, speaking of the inhabitants of212 Sodom and their unbridled dissoluteness and vice:—

“For not only being mad after women did they form disgraceful unions with strange women, but actually, men as they were, they had intercourse with males: they that practised the vice had no shame for the sex they shared in common with those that suffered it, but were guilty of wasting their seed and disdaining the generation of offspring. But conviction of guilt was of no avail to restrain men mastered by an overpowering lust. Later, learning by degrees the custom for such as were born men yet to endure the treatment proper to women, they brought upon themselves feminine disease, a curse they could in no wise contend against. For not merely womanizing their bodies by effeminacy and wanton luxury, but utterly unsexing their very souls, they destroyed, so far as in them lay, all the manliness of their sex. In fact, if Greeks and Barbarians had been unanimous and had all been eager at once after such intercourse, the consequence would have been to make every city desolate, as though wasted by some pestilential sickness.”

In the fifth and last passage of all Philo374 is speaking of those whose entry into the sanctuary213 was interdicted by the Lawgiver: “He forbad all that were unworthy to frequent, the Temple, beginning with the men-women, those that are sick of the true (the feminine) disease, who transgressing the established law of Nature, annex the lust and looks of incontinent women. He expelled all eunuchs, those with strangled testicles and those with amputated, who carefully safeguard the bloom of youthfulness against decay, and transform the manly type into a womanish shape. He expelled not only harlots, but harlots’ children as well, etc.”

If we review systematically and in detail these passages of Philo, given by Stark only in fragments, any unprejudiced reader must see that there is not one of them that does not refer to the vice of the Pathic. As to the second and third passages Stark himself (pp. 13 and 22.) admits this, while as to the fourth we do not know what he thought, it having been unknown to him: thus it is only in relation to the first and fifth passages that we have to examine his reasons for supposing this not to be the case. After quoting the text and Mangey’s Latin translation, Stark remarks à propos of the first passage,—that dealing with Diogenes:214—“Quin hic verum corporis, nec animi vitium seu morbum indicetur, quo laborantes virilitate orbarentur et hanc suam impotentiam corporis habitu atque oris specie proderent, nullus dubito. Nam hoc et verborum series aperte declarat et ex eo colligi potest, quod ille, qui hoc crimine tactum se sentiret, pudore movetur.... Si vero Pathicorum labes, quam ab interpretibus quibusdam hic suspicari video, ita intelligenda esset, haec neque ex vultu coniici poterat neque a Graecis tam turpi macula notabatur, ut huic vitio deditis causa esset, quam ab rem eius opprobrium effugerent. Tantum enim abfuit, ut Pathici dedecus suum occultarent, ut potius multo fastu atque pompa prae se ferrent.... Verum autem Eunuchum genitalium exsectione redditum his verbis significari, non crediderim, quia hi neque inter licitatores, sed potius inter vendendos reperiri, neque ob harum partium defectum pudore tangi solerent.” (I have no doubt whatever that a real fault of body, and not of mind, in other words a disease, is intended here,—a disease that robbed the sufferers of virility, who then betrayed this impotence by the condition and appearance of body and countenance. This indeed is fully shown by the context, from which it may also be gathered that the sufferer who felt himself touched by this vice, has a feeling of shame.... But if it is the taint of the pathics that is to be understood here, as I see is conjectured to be the case by some commentators, this taint could not be guessed at from the face; nor yet was it marked by the Greeks with so strong a stigma of disgrace, as to cause those who were given to it to strive to escape the opprobrium. For so far were pathics from wishing to conceal their shame, that they actually made a point of displaying it ostentatiously.... On the other hand I should not be inclined to suppose that a Eunuch, an actual Eunuch by amputation of the genitals, is meant by these words. These were hardly likely to be found among the bidders, but rather with the slaves for sale: nor were eunuchs accustomed to feel shame on account of the loss of these organs.)

In § 16 above it has been abundantly proved that the recognition of a pathic ἐκ τῆς ὄψεως, ex voltu, (by the look), was a simple and familiar thing with the Ancients, and especially so if we understand, as is only reasonable, by ἐκ τῆς ὄψεως not merely by the face, but by the whole appearance of the person as well. We can only wonder at Stark’s repeated denials of the existence of such external marks of recognition, and all the more so, as every215 Text-book of Medical Jurisprudence making any pretensions to complete detail (e.g. Masius, Mende) gives information on the point. Again, it is proved that paederastia was always regarded by the Greeks, till the time when they lost their independence, as a disgraceful vice,—the reason why the buyer spoken of slunk away with a blush. As for the ostentatious show of pathics, and particularly their importance and the power they acquired, to which Stark refers (p. 12. in his Note—28), this is only true for times as late as Philo’s own, (he lived 40 A.D.), whereas Diogenes appears in History in the middle of the 4th. Century B.C. Stark, again, cites as evidence the words from the second passage: Puerorum amor, de quo vel loqui olim probrum fuit maximum, nunc laudi ducitur, (The love of boys, merely to speak of which was formerly a deep disgrace, but which now is made a boast),—without observing that his contention as to paederastia not being held disgraceful in Antiquity is most obviously contradicted by it. Undoubtedly actual castrated eunuchs were not meant, but the reasons Stark brings forward to show this are without force, for he will hardly be able to prove that in Asia the Castrated never acquired importance and wealth, so as to be in a position to buy themselves slaves. Further it may be gathered that the man Diogenes addressed was rich or held an important station from the fact that the bystanders marvelled at Diogenes’ boldness and outspokenness, a point that Stark indeed has forgotten to mention. For Philo’s own times the second passage is evidence enough. Equally do we fail to see why a castrated eunuch would be unlikely to blush, when the fact is thrown in his face. Stark (p. 22) explains the νοῦσος θήλεια as vitium corporis or effeminatio interno morboso corporis statu procreata, (a fault of body, condition of effeminacy produced by an internal morbid state of body). Now if it were really this, how could he possibly speak of the sufferers as crimine tactos, (touched by216 his vice)? They had nothing to be ashamed of, unless indeed they had acquired the disease in a shameful way, but this was not the case according to his original assumption. This is confirmed by Clement of Alexandria.375

So far as the fifth passage is concerned, Stark declares castrated eunuchs to be certainly intended, and blames the editor of Philo (Mangey) for wishing to read for ἀπὸ τῶν νοσούντων τὴν ἀληθῆ νόσον ἀνδρογύνων (with the men-women, those that are sick of the true disease) τὴν θήλειαν νόσον (the feminine disease). He says in his note 30.: “Mangetius (a mistake for Mangey) reponit θήλειαν. Quare hoc fieri, non dicam debeat, sed ne oporteat quidem, non video. Nam νόσος ἀνδρογύνων idem est, quod νόσος θήλεια. Si igitur haec vox verbis superioribus adiiciatur, iners atque inutilis appareat et pleonasmum vanum efficiat, necesse est: τὸ ἀληθῆ contra, quod ille demit, non vacuum ceteris additur verbum, ut eo perspicue demonstraretur, hic verum morbum seu illud corporis vitium esse intelligendum, quod viros exsecando paritur, nec hanc animi labem, qua contaminati solum muliebria patiuntur, quaequae iisdem verbis nuncupatur, ut loci mox laudandi docebunt.” (Mangetius restores θήλειαν—feminine.217 I cannot see why he should do this; in fact he had no business to do so whatever. For νόσος ἀνδρογύνων (disease of men-women) is the same thing as νόσος θήλεια (feminine disease). So if this expression is added on to the preceding words, it can only appear redundant and useless and make a silly pleonasm. Τὸ ἀληθῆ (the word true disease) on the other hand is not otiose when added to the other words. It shows distinctly that the true disease or notorious vitiation of body was meant to be understood, that which arises from castrating men, and not merely the taint of mind that makes the men whom it affects endure the treatment proper to women, and which is called by the same name,—as will be shown in passages to be cited presently.)

These last words evidently refer to the third passage, where we read: Θήλειαν δὲ νόσον ταῖς ψυχαῖς ἀπεργαζόμενος καὶ ἀνδρογύνους κατασκευάζων (infecting the mind with feminine disease, and turning men into men-women), for Stark himself explains the νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease) as being identical with the ἀνδρογύνων νόσος (disease of men-women). So he is bound to explain this sentence too as a Pleonasmus vanus (silly, useless, pleonasm), for as a matter of fact those suffering from νοῦσος θήλεια are men-women (ἀνδρόγυνοι). But if a pleonasm is found in these latter words, it is difficult to see why there should not be one equally well in the fifth passage.

Yet for all he says, it is far from being demonstrated that this pleonasm is useless and silly. The sequence of thought is evidently this: Common Eros (Love) infects the soul (ψυχή) with the νοῦσος θήλεια, rousing the insatiable craving to play the part of the woman, to be pathic in fact; and then, this craving being indulged, the man becomes a man-woman (ἀνδρόγυνος). As long as he goes on practising the vice of the pathic, he is sick of the νοῦσος θήλεια, and so it is perfectly correct to speak of the νοῦσος θήλεια ἀνδρογύνων (feminine218 disease of men-women). A man-woman, that is a person who suffers coition to be consummated with him as with a woman, and concurrently also consummates coition with women as a man, or at any rate has the ability to do so,—this anyone may quite well be, without suffering for all that from the νοῦσος θήλεια. For instance he may be constrained by force to be a pathic, or may regard it as a way of earning money, like the male prostitutes of Greece and Rome; and in that case has no interest further in the vice of the pathic as such. On the other hand if he is urged to it by prurigo ani impudica (lascivious itch of the anus), this is sheer lubricity, not to be expected in a sensible, healthy-minded man. It can only be the consequence of a morbid condition of temperament and body. Such a man is the victim of νοῦσος θήλεια, the craving to be a woman! This is just the position taken in the fifth passage, as the subsequent words show quite plainly.

But granted that Philo actually wrote in this fifth passage τὴν ἀληθῆ νόσον ἀνδρογύνων (the true disease of men-women), would a bodily defect, castration, be signified by the expression? Certainly not. We could then take it in no other way but this, “he began with the men-women, who suffered from the true disease,” and should be constrained to ask, “what disease?”,—a definite disease being manifestly intended, as the addition of the definite article (τὴν) shows. But this would imply that men-women who were not suffering from this particular disease were not excluded from visiting the Temple. Yet most certainly Philo would never make any such statement. However Stark translates with Mangey: Exorsus a vero semivirorum morbo laborantibus that is, “he began with those suffering from the true disease of men-women”, from which it would follow that there were other persons who suffered from the apparent disease of the men-women, or no reason exists for the special emphasis the definite article gives.

219

Really the question all along is not of castrated persons at all, and cannot be, if the sense of the whole passage is taken into account; for these (castrated persons) are specially and separately forbidden access to the Temple in the next sentence,—a fact which nothing but the introduction into the text of the conjunction γὰρ (for) by Mangey, (following a MS. it is true), has obscured. The words as they stand are Θλαδιὰς [γὰρ] καὶ ἀποκεκομμένους τὰ γεννητικὰ ἐλαύνει, (he expells all eunuchs, those with strangled testicles, and those with amputated). So if the men-women who suffered from the νοῦσος θήλεια were actual eunuchs, this would indeed be a Pleonasmus vanus et ineptus (silly and idle pleonasm). Stark has evidently been led to maintain the opinion he does, and to blame Mangey’s emendation, which is in any case justified, by a mistake as to the construction of the sentence. Stark construed νοῦσον ἀνδρογύνων (disease of men-women), whereas the construction requires: τὴν ἄρχην ποιούμενος ἀπὸ ἀνδρογύνων, τῶν νοσούντων τὴν θήλειαν (ἀληθῆ) νόσον (beginning with men-women,—those that were sick of the feminine—true—disease), the latter words being simply in apposition to ἀνδρογύνων.

We now proceed to consider the passages from the historian Herodian (170-240 A.D.). He relates376:

220

“Now he (Antoninus) had two generals, of whom the one, an oldish man but stupid and quite unacquainted with state affairs, was yet held to be a good soldier; his name was Adventus. The other who was called Macrinus, was not inexperienced in forensic practice and possessed besides some knowledge of law. Now the latter Antoninus frequently assailed in public with gibes, saying he was neither a soldier nor a man, going so for as positive insult. For having heard that he led a somewhat free life, and abominated scanty, rough eating and drinking (in which Antoninus as a hardy soldier took a pride), and wore a woman’s cloak or other elegant raiment, he accused him of ἀνανδρία and θήλεια νοῦσος (unmanliness and feminine disease), and was constantly threatening to put him to death. Macrinus could not endure such treatment and was very much exasperated. And this was the result ... etc.” Here ἀνανδρία and θήλεια νοῦσος (unmanliness and feminine disease) are laid to Macrinus’ charge by Antoninus by way of insult, but it is not in any way stated that he had become actually impotent or Pathic. True ἀνανδρία (unmanliness) is frequently used of the Pathic, but here it refers simply to a womanish way of life in connexion with eating and drinking, whilst the θήλεια νοῦσος (feminine disease) is inferred from the female costume, a thing in which, as we have seen, the Pathics delighted377.

221

Stark indeed gives the following note on the passage: “Ego quidem impotentiam virilem et illam morbosam in sexum sequiorem degenerationem, quae per animi mollitiem aeque ac per corporis mutationem se prodit, hic accipiendam esse credo, nec video, cur interpres labem illam qua muliebris tolerantiae viri maculantur, intellectam velit.” (In fact I consider we must take to be here meant impotence and that morbid degeneration towards the inferior sex which betrays itself at once by effeminacy of mind and bodily deterioration; at the same time I see no reason for a commentator thinking that specific pollution to be signified whereby men are affected who suffer themselves to be treated as women.) However if only Stark had chanced to read through the succeeding 13th. chapter of Herodian as well, he would have found Antoninus only meant to put upon the man an ordinary coarse jest; for he there makes the very same reproach against the Centurion Martialis, whose brother he had had executed a few days previously; 222αὐτῷ τε τῷ Μαρτιαλίῳ ἐνύβρισεν, ἄνανδρον αὐτὸν καὶ ἀγεννῆ καλῶν καὶ Μακαρίνου φίλον, (And he insulted Martialis himself, calling him unmanly and ignoble and a friend of Macarinus.) In any case the passage shows that even at that period Paederastia was held to be dishonourable and the name of Pathic involved an insult.

The Church Historian Eusebius Pamphili (264-340 A.D.) relates in his Life of Constantine378 that on a part of the peak of Mount Lebanon stood a Temple of Venus: “Therein was a school of vice for licentious persons of every description, for all such as dishonoured their bodies in various ways; womanish men, that are no men at all, abrogated their natural dignity and propitiated the goddess by θήλεια νοῦσος (feminine disease); and again unlawful unions of women, lecherous embraces, abominable and abominated acts, were indulged in in this Temple, as in a spot where neither law nor religion held good. And there was no one to overlook their doings, for no respectable man dared go near the place.” Now to any one examining the whole drift of the passage, it cannot for a single moment remain doubtful that by θήλεια νοῦσος is here meant some particular form of vice; and the words of the text are such that, even if the expression only occurred here and nowhere else at all, absolutely no other meaning could be assigned to it but that of the vice of the Pathic. We have already shown that the words ἀκόλαστος (licentious person), πράξις,223 πράττειν (action, to act) are used of the Pathic, whilst the phrase τὸ σεμνὸν τῆς φύσεως (natural dignity) finds its explanation in the τὸ φύσεως νόμισμα (custom of nature) of Philo, and γύννιδες (womanish men) is interpreted in Zonaras379 by ἀνδρόγυνος (man-woman), μαλακός (soft, effeminate), and in Eustathius380 by 224θηλυδρίας μὴ εὖ διακέιμενος πρὸς τὰ ἀφροδίσια (womanish man, one not properly behaved with regard to love),—meanings the real force of which we have elsewhere verified, but which most certainly are not to be taken as implying actual castration, as Stark (§ 16) thinks. Indeed the last named says, commenting on the passage of Eusebius: “Haec verba non solum de mera morum atque cultus mutatione muliebri rationi magis congrua, intelligi posse, sed etiam per veram evirationem genitalium truncatione confectam aptissime explicanda esse, cum verborum series et Eustathii, Hesychii ac Zonarae atque Valesii auctoritas me suadet, tum multo magis illud monet, quod in cultu Veneris virorum exsectionem solemnem fuisse compertum habemus. Sin autem contenderis, viros tales exsectos et effeminatos etiam muliebria passos esse, ego quidem non repugno, exploratam vero rem esse atque ratam, ex ipsis auctoris verbis non liquet.” (That these words may be understood not merely of a simple change of mode of life and habit to one more closely assimilated to the female type, but that they are most suitably to be explained as implying an actual effemination of the individual produced by amputation of the genitals, both the context of the passage and the authority of Eustathius, Hesychius, Zonaras and Valesius induces me to believe, and still more am I led to this view by the fact we already know, viz. that the castration of men was customary in connection with the cult of Venus. But if you further maintain that such men so castrated and effeminated submitted to the treatment proper to women, I do not deny it; I only say that this point is not duly ascertained and certified on the showing of the Author’s own words.)

Certainly we have already seen from the passage of Lucian and from Philo that Paederastia supplied a motive for the making of Eunuchs; but the passages quoted from Athanasius and other Authors have also taught us that the pollution of boys was carried out in honour of Venus in her temples. As for the225 auctoritas Valesii (authority of Valesius), Stark adds in his notes (49): “Eandem vim his verbis tribuit, ut ex interpretatione ejus Latina Eusebii videre est. Histor. scriptor. ecclesiast. Paris 1677. fol. p. 211. B.” (He assigns the same force to these words, as may be seen from his Latin translation of Eusebius). To our regret we are unable to refer to this edition,—which it appears to us would have been a highly desirable precaution; for the one which lies before us,381 a word for word, only more correct, re-impression of the Paris edition, gives the version of Valesius entirely in our sense: “Quippe effeminati quidam et feminae potius dicendi quam viri, abdicata sexus sui gravitate, muliebria patientes, daemonem placabant.” (Whereas certain effeminate men, that should rather be called women than men, abrogating the dignity of their sex, and suffering treatment proper to women, used in this way to propitiate their deity.) The same holds good of the translation given by Stark: “Viri effeminati et non viriles, naturae dignitatem ultro exuentes, morbo muliebri deam placabant.” (Effeminate men and unmanly, of their own will putting off their nature226 dignity, used to propitiate the goddess with feminine disease.) Ought this to be taken as implying a claim on his behalf to the translation generally as adduced by him or merely to the rendering of the word γύννιδες by viri effeminati? The previous authorities, Eustathius, Hesychius and Zonaras, at any rate refer only to γύννιδες, while Stark himself assigns it the meaning of the Vice of the Pathic in the last words quoted.

Bishop Synesius (378-431 A.D.) in his Speech De Regno382 addressed to the Emperor Arcadius exhorts the latter to set bounds to the insubordination in the army, and for the foreign subject peoples, that are continually meditating treason, to attack them and really conquer them, rather than wait till their hostile temper break out in open revolt. That the renown of the Romans stood fast, that they were victorious, wherever they came and marched through the countries of the world, like the gods, supervising men’s insolence and government.227 “But those Scythians, Herodotus tells us so, and we see it for ourselves, are all fallen under the νόσος θήλεια (feminine disease). And it is they of whom the subject peoples mainly consist, etc.” He goes on to say how they had submitted only in appearance, while secretly they laughed at the folly of the Romans, who took their submission seriously, etc. Now in the first place we must remember the fact that Synesius, like all Greek Orators and Fathers of later times, considered it his special duty to cite the Classical Greek authors as frequently as possible, and with this object made almost any peg do to hang a quotation on. He says of the Romans that they, ὡς Ὅμηρός φησι τοὺς θεούς

Ἀνθρώπων ὕβριν τε καὶ εὐνομίαν ἐφέποντες

(as Homer says of the gods, “visiting the insolence and good government of men”), and to explain this ὕβρις (insolence), he recalls the statement of Herodotus to the effect that the Scythians suffered from the νοῦσος θήλεια, a statement which, he adds, still holds good of them; that the vice had prevailed amongst them from the earliest times, that it was quite inveterate, and that accordingly men of such abandoned character could never be trusted, trained as they were to dissemble; all this Synesius is specially anxious to enforce strongly upon Arcadius! In this sequence of thought we find a sufficient explanation of the καὶ ἡμεῖς ὁρῶμεν (and we see it for ourselves); this refers not so much to the ocular recognition of the νοῦσος θήλεια, the possibility of which however we have demonstrated elsewhere, as to the fact that the disease was still to be met with among the Scythians, in order to show which Synesius laid special stress on the phrase, and added—undoubtedly to the sacrifice of truth—the word ἅπαντας (all of them). Besides which, Dionysius Petavius reminds us in his notes on this passage that the name “Scythian” is used here, as it is in Strabo, in its widest signification, and includes228 Goths, Alani, Vandals, Germans, Huns, in fact all the Northern peoples. This is the more interesting as Sextus Empiricus383 relates of the Germans that they practised Paederastia, Prof. Meier (loco cit. p. 131. Note 20.), who cites the passage, doubted the truth of the statement, on the ground that Sextus Empiricus is the only author, and even he does so only as a matter of hearsay (ὡς φασιν—as men say), to lay this vice to the charge of the Germans, whose purity of morals is not impugned229 by any other Writers. But surely he did not take into consideration that Sextus Empiricus lived about 200 years after Christ, and is speaking of the Germans of his own times, not of the old Germans such as Tacitus and Caesar knew them. It is hardly likely the Germans of Sextus’ and Synesius’ day should have entirely escaped the universal degeneracy of all Nations; and again, with what object did German Emperors at a later date promulgate laws against the vice of Paederastia, Sodomy, etc., if it did not exist among their people?

Clement of Alexandria, after speaking of the objectionable character of the worship of the different gods of the Heathen, goes on to relate as follows384:

“All blessings befall that King of the Scythians, whatever his name may have been, who when one of his subjects copied the service of the Mother of the gods usual among the people of Cyrené, beating the drum and clashing the cymbals hung at his neck, and dedicating himself as a Menagyrtes (Priest of Cybelé), shot him dead, as a man who had been made no man (ἄνανδρος) among the Greeks, and as a teacher of the feminine disease (νόσος θήλεια) to the rest of the Scythians.” Herodotus385 who tells the same story, calls the King Saulius and the offending citizen Anarcharsis386, but makes no mention,230 any more than do Diogenes Laertius and Philo387, of the θήλεια νοῦσος (feminine disease). Accordingly we must evidently regard this as an addition on the part of Clement of Alexandria, who judging from his own times, when the Priests of Cybelé universally practised paederastia with each other, and in order to further lay stress on the fact that the Scythian king had done right in killing the man who was introducing a heathen, and besides an exceedingly licentious, form of worship, felt no hesitation in making the addition. And as a matter of fact, how widely paederastia prevailed in the time of Clement of Alexandria, and how intimately he was acquainted with it, is proved by the passages quoted on previous pages from his writings. Stark prefers here also to understand a vera eviratio (true effemination), i.e. that they were actually castrated, maintaining that this was the case with the priests of Cybelé, whilst Larcher considers merely the womanish cult of the Dea Mater (Goddess Mother) to be indicated.

The last passage in which the expression θήλεια νοῦσος (feminine disease) occurs, is a scholion on the word γαλλιαμβικὸν (viz. μέτρον—galliambic metre) in Hephaestion388. The Scholiast says: Γαλλιαμβικὸν δὲ ἐκλήθη, ἐπεὶ λελυμένον ἐστὶ τὸ μέτρον· οἱ δὲ231 Γάλλοι, διαβάλλονται ὡς θήλειαν νόσον ἔχοντες, διὸ καὶ σώματα φόρον ἐτέλουν Ῥωμαίοις εἰς τοῦτο· οἱ τοιοῦτοι δέ ἱερεῖς εἰσὶ Δήμητρος. (Now it was called galliambic, because the metre is loose; and the Galli are evil spoken of as having feminine disease. Wherefore also they used to pay their bodies as tribute to the Romans—or, their bodies used to pay tribute to the Romans—to this day; and such men are priests of Demeter.) Stark gives (p. 21.) the following translation of this. “Galliambicum vocabatur, quod solutum est metrum; Galli enim utpote morbo muliebri laborantes inculpantur, quod Romanis corpora ad hoc (tanquam) tributum persolverent,” (It was called galliambic, because the metre is loose; for the Galli are accused as suffering from feminine disease, inasmuch as they used to pay their bodies to the Romans to this day as it were a tribute),—but without committing himself to any more precise explanation of the words. The meaning of the first two sentences is plain enough: The metre is called the galliambic, because it is loose, resolved, i. e. instead of long syllables short are used, and so the metres changed from masculine to feminine. Now the Galli are charged with practising θήλεια νόσος (feminine disease) (as Homer, Odyssey I. 368., says: ὑπέρβιον ὕβριν ἔχοντες—having, practising very audacious insolence). But what do the words that follow mean: διὸ καὶ σώματα φόρον ἐτέλουν Ῥωμαίοις εἰς τοῦτο? The tanquam (as it were) added in the Latin translation shows that the translator took the sentence in a figurative sense. But what is the subject of the sentence? is it σώματα or Γάλλοι—ἔχοντες? The translator must necessarily have taken the latter as the subject: “wherefore they paid or offered up their bodies to the Romans as it were for tribute”; and this could imply nothing less than that the Galli232 gave themselves up to the Romans as Pathics. Now does the arrangement of the words admit of this? We think not; for in that case the Scholiast must needs have put ἑαυτῶν with σώματα or at any rate the article τὰ.

Therefore if we take the sentence literally and regard σώματα as being the subject, it reads: “wherefore also the bodies (of the Galli) were subject to tax to the Romans to this day.” We have seen already how the word τέλος signified among the Greeks the “prostitution tax,” and how the Septuagint translators rendered the Hebrew קְדֵשָׁה (Kêdeshah) and קָדֵשׁ (Kâdesh), by which names the Priests of Cybelé were understood, by τελεσφόρος and τελισκόμενος (subject to tax, paying tax), how the Priests of Cybelé are characterised by other writers as men who were Pathics in honour of their goddess, and how as a matter of fact the Cinaedi or Exoleti at Rome in the time of the Emperor Severus had to pay an impost similar to the prostitution-tax. The scholion then shows us that the Galli also were subjected to this impost payable to the State. Were it a question merely of Castrated persons or indeed of anything else but actual Paederastia, the whole scholion would be unintelligible; yet Stark maintains that simply Eunuchs are intended, and this because of the words that are appended, to the effect that the Galli were Priests of Demeter. No doubt they may have been castrated, but this is a side issue; the important point is, that they were Pathics.

Finally we have still a passage from Dio Chrysostom389 to mention, in which however the hitherto233 almost stereotyped expression θήλεια νόσος (feminine disease) is exchanged for γυναικεία νόσος (womanly disease). The author is here expounding how all acts are under the governance of a definite Genius or Spirit, and says: “for a weakling and faint-hearted Spirit of this sort leads readily to the γυναικεία νόσος (womanly disease) and other shames, to which is attached punishment and disgrace.” Then in the following sentences the life and appearance of one governed by this Spirit are more exactly described, in such a way that there can be no possibility of supposing anything else to be intended than the vice of the Pathic, and even Stark (p. 12.) admits this much.

On reviewing once again what has been said, we find that the Scythians in Asia became acquainted with paederastia, when Pathics returned from foreign lands, and henceforth practised the vice at home as well. Their fellow-countrymen could only suppose an evil demon animated them. So when at length as a natural result of their vice they fell sick in body and in mind, when nervous disorders and imbecility visited the unfortunates, they never for a moment ascribed this to the vice these men practised, but rather regarded their condition as a consequence of the avenging wrath of Venus, whose temple they had robbed, and thus brought into connection an earlier incident and a later.

When the Greek became acquainted with the vice,234 he of course shared at first the notion of the avenging action of a deity, but he directed his attention less to the consequences of this vice, which in Greece were generally slighter, than to the Vice itself, which robbed the man of his manly characteristics and normal activity, and drove him to take on him the rôle of the woman in exchange for that of the man. But to be a woman was invariably among all nations a disgrace for the man, whom Plato (Timaeus 42.) considered the γένος κρεῖττον (superior sex), while Aristotle not merely represents the woman as owing her existence to an ἀνάγκη (unavoidable necessity), but calls her an ἄῤῥεν πεπηρωμένον (crippled male), an ἀναπηρία φυσική (natural crippling), even a παρέκβασις τῆς φύσεως (aberration of nature)390. But no man of sound intellect could possibly suffer himself to be used as a woman; therefore he must needs be sick, be afflicted with a disease that assimilated him to a woman (θήλεια—feminine). When Herodotus wrote, the Greeks to be sure knew the vice which was practised with boys (Paederastia) or youths, who had not yet reached man’s estate, but these were always first corrupted by adults; they did not practise the vice of their own impulse and could not as a rule be held accountable. When however they saw adults, men who were already in possession of manly prerogatives, appear as Pathics—not merely boys and youths not yet capable of the procreative act,—they could in no way explain the phenomenon to their satisfaction except by supposing them to have been attacked by a disease that changed them into women391. This also gives235 the reason why the expression νοῦσος Θήλεια (feminine disease) occurs so seldom in the Greek writers, for it was the violation of boys, not the236 violation of men, that was a familiar fact to them. For in the fact that the beautiful form of a boy was capable of firing a sensual longing to enjoy it,237 the Greek saw nothing at all unnatural; and he found excuses for the momentary forgetfulness of self-respect on the part of the paederast, as he did238 in the case of the boy or youth. But if there had been seduction, then the offence was strongly reprobrated, unless the Pathic had been a slave.

Neither bodily nor psychical consequences of the vice of the Pathic ever attained in Greece, as has been said, any very high degree of development; and most of the characteristic marks of the Cinaedus were regarded as artificial, worn half intentionally by him for show. Even in his peculiar gait, voice and look, the Greeks saw more an invitation to the perpetration of the vice than anything else; and if Plato denies to this class of persons the wish for natural coition, this is rather a sign how completely the vice mastered them than a proof of the annihilation of their power to procreate at all.

Even when positive diseases did actually occur in consequence of the vice, public opinion was far from ascribing these to the vice itself; nervous and mental affections were regarded as a punishment from the gods, or else they were treated according to their several symptoms without any examination into the original cause. Bodily ailments, especially if they did not affect the posterior or penis, were set down to any cause but the true one, often to quite ridiculous ones. The νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease) was invariably thought of merely as a form of vice dependent on a morbid imagination, while its consequences as such were left entirely out of consideration. Nam neque ulla curatio corporis depellendae passionis causa recte putatur adhibenda, sed potius animus coercendus, qui tanta peccatorum labe vexatur, (For the right opinion is this: no bodily treatment should be applied in order to expel the239 complaint, rather should the mind be disciplined that is vexed by so foul a stain of sinful indulgences), are the words of Coelius Aurelianus in the passage quoted on page 159.

From this it is evident the later enquirers quoted above could take the νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease) for a purely mental affection, and be right in a sense,—but a sense that certainly never entered into their heads to consider. For they looked upon the intellectual imbecility that resulted from the vice of the Pathic as being the essence of the νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease), and the bodily derangements as merely secondary and dependent on the psychica disturbances. Thus to some extent they confounded cause and effect, putting one for the other; yet without hitting on the true explanation, against which the meritorious Stark has tried so hard not perhaps to shut his eyes, but rather to forcibly remove it in any possible way out of the range of his ideas. For this very reason it has pursued him from beginning to end of his investigations, and in spite of all his struggles has found at last a reluctant and partial recognition from him.

As to the remaining views cited above, no attentive reader surely needs any further confutation of these.

We have now, we think sufficiently, proved that Herodotus as well as the other writers who use the expression νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease), denoted by it merely a Vice, which lent a feminine character to the behaviour and indeed to the whole look and mode of life of a man, assimilating him equally in body and in mind to the woman. Throughout the enquiry we have kept our eyes fixed on the cause of this transformation; and we shall now find it easy to estimate the value of a passage of Hippocrates, originally brought forward by Mercurialis (loco citato,240 p. 143. Note 10.) later by Zwinger392 and others, but which Stark in particular has characterised as a more complete delineation of the disease, merely pointed out and named νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease) by Herodotus. On the other hand Bouhier specially and strenuously denies the identity of the two, yet without accurately recognising the true relationship.

Hippocrates in his well-known Work on Air, Water and Environment, describes the country of the Scythians as a bare but well-watered tableland, with so cold and damp a climate that a heavy mist covered the fields all day long and only a short summer was enjoyed. The inhabitants he says are arrogant, puffed up and exceedingly idle creatures, in outward look and mode of life having little distinctly marked characteristics of sex, the men having only very moderate desire for coition, and the women, whose menstruation is less frequent, possessing little capacity for conception. Then he goes on393: “Moreover there are very many men amongst the Scythians resembling Eunuchs (εὐνουχίαι); these not only follow women’s occupations (show feminine inclinations, behave as women?—γυναικεῖα ἐργάζονται) just like the women, but also bear a name signifying this, for such men are called No-men (ἀνανδριεῖς). The natives ascribe the cause to a deity; they are afraid of these men, and show them a slavish respect (προσκυνέουσι394), though each individual dreads such a fate for himself. It seems to me that affections of this sort may241 be said to have come from a deity to exactly the same degree as all other diseases,—no single one is more than any other in a sense of divine origin. Each one of them has its own peculiar nature, and nothing happens outside its nature. Now how these affections arise in my opinion, I will proceed to state. From constant riding they get κέδματα242395 (varicose dilatations), because their feet always hang away from the horse. Hence they become lame, and get, those that are seriously ill, ulcers on the hips (in the region of the ischium, festering of the cotyla or joint-socket?396). Then they treat themselves with a view to cure in the following fashion. So soon as the complaint breaks out, they open their veins on either side of the ear; then when the blood has flowed, they fall asleep from weakness, and go on sleeping till they wake, some of them cured and some of them not. But it appears to me that by such a treatment they ruin themselves397. For there243 lie near the ears certain veins, and when these are severed, the men so cut become seedless (unfruitful); and it is these veins that, as I think, they sever.244 But when subsequently they approach women, and find themselves in no condition to use them (to consummate coition with them), at the first they are not discouraged, but keep quiet. However later, after they have tried twice, three times, or oftener, with no better success, they believe themselves to have sinned against the deity, whom they hold to be to blame, put on a woman’s frock, and acknowledge their unmanliness (ἀνανδρίην), behave as women, and in company with the women perform the same tasks as they do. The like of this however happens only to the rich Scythians, not to the poor, in fact to the nobler classes and such as have attained to some considerable wealth, to a smaller degree to those of lesser position, because these latter do not ride.

But surely the complaint, since it is above all others of divine origin, must attack not solely the noblest and richest Scythians, but all equally,—or even to a greater extent those who possess little, and therefore fail to make offerings; if that is to say the gods take pleasure in (active) veneration on the part of men and see that they win a due return for it398. For naturally the rich offer much to the245 gods, bring correspondingly great contributions from their goods as marks of their veneration; but the poor less, because they possess nothing. Then are these discontented, because they have given them no wealth; so that those who possess little suffer more of the punishments for such faults than the rich. But as a matter of fact, as I have said before, these things come from the deity to just the same degree as the others; for everything happens in accordance with nature, and so does this affection arise among the Scythians from the original cause I have pointed out. Now it is precisely the same among the rest of mankind; where riding is practised most and most continuously, there very many suffer from κέδματα (varicose dilatations), hip and foot246 affections, and accomplish coition very badly (are only slightly disposed to coition). And this is the case with the Scythians, and they are of all men most like eunuchs, for the following reasons: Because they always wear trousers, and besides that pass the greatest part of their time on horseback, so that they cannot touch the genitals with the hand, through cold and lassitude forget the desire for coition and coition itself, and (in their senseless infatuation) think of nothing else but how to resign their manly privilege399. This is an account of how it is with the stock of the Scythians.”

247

Now if we separate the facts which are brought forward in this passage of Hippocrates from his attempted explanations, there can be no doubt that the same thing is in question here as that which248 Herodotus describes. There are men amongst the Scythians who behave as women, speak as women, perform women’s work and keep with the women, and their condition the Scythians consider as something sent by the deity, and for this reason honour and fear these men. All the rest is part of the attempted explanations of the author, who brings together every possible consideration in order to discover a natural cause of the phenomenon, leaving utterly and entirely unrecognized all the time the most natural cause of all. This of course was due to no other reason except that it was unknown to him, and that he was acquainted with the circumstances not from his own observation, but only from hearsay. This is a conjecture which Heyne (loco citato) had already made in his time, but which has met with many opponents, yet without the argument having ever been properly brought to the test of the evidence. In favour of Heyne’s view a passage from the book περὶ ἄρθρων (On Joints)400 might be cited, in which249 the limping of the men of the Amazons in consequence of the dislocation of the limbs is clearly declared to be an unauthenticated myth; for which reason Gruner401 denied Hippocrates’ authorship of this work in opposition to the general witness of Antiquity.

But really and truly we are as well without the passage; for if what he relates were the result of his own observation, how could the author write in connexion with his remark that the Scythians bled themselves behind the ears, ταύτας τοίνυν μοι δοκέουσι τὰς φλέβας ἐπιτάμνειν (now these are the veins, as it seems to me, that they cut)? Is the actual fact possibly, that all these attempted explanations flowed from the pen of some later, or of several later, writers? At any rate for ourselves, we have never yet been able to get rid of a suspicion to that effect. But be this as it may, so much at least is certain, as was stated above; viz. that the Author was unacquainted with the actual cause of attempts to explain it, probably from misunderstanding250 the effemination of the Scythians, and that all of the words ἀνανδρίες and εὐνουχίαι (unmanly, eunuch-like), aim at referring the loss of the generative power, i.e. ἀνανδρία in its strict sense, to some natural reason, while the effemination is looked upon merely as a secondary circumstance.

That Hippocrates was not, any more than the later Physicians of antiquity, fully and exactly acquainted with the consequences of the vice of the Pathic as affecting the body, we see from the following passage, appearing in an exceedingly corrupt form in the text of Foesius402: εὐνοῦχος ἐκ κυνηγεσίης καὶ διαδρομῆς ὑδραγωγὸς γίνεται· ὁ παρὰ τὴν Ἐλεαλκέος κρήνην· ὁ περὶ τὰ ἓξ ἄτεα ἱππουρίν τε καὶ βουβῶνα καὶ ἴξιν καὶ κέδματα· ὁ τὸν κενεῶνα φθινήσας ἑβδομαῖος ἀπέθανεν, προπιούντων ἄπεπτον, ἁλμυρὰ μετὰ μέλιτος· πορνείη ἄχρωμος δυσεντερίης ἄκος. (a eunuch by hunting or running becomes dropsical; he that is beside the fountain of Elealces; he that about six years [suffered from] “horse-tail” [a disease of the groin due to too much riding], swelling of the groin, varicocele and dilatations; he that was sick in the flank died the seventh day, when they were about to administer a raw drink, salt liquid with honey; inordinate fornication is a cure for dysentery.??) All editors of Hippocrates have been especially scandalized by the connection in which πορνείη ἄχρωμος (inordinate fornication) stands in this passage; only Foesius defended it, referring to other passages in Aëtius403 and Paul of Aegina404, in which coition is recommended in chronic251 diarrhœa as drying up the humours. This he might equally well have established from Hippocrates himself, for the latter says (Epidem. bk. VI. sect. 5. note 29.), λαγνεία τῶν ἀπὸ φλέγματος νούσων ὠφέλιμον (lasciviousness is advantageous in diseases that arise from phlegm) and (note 26.), μίξις τὰ κατὰ τὴν γαστέρα σκληρύνει (sexual intercourse hardens the contents of the belly)]405. However this holds good only of the man who performs coition, inasmuch as the effusion of semen compels the body to supply what is lost, and this can only be done at the cost of other secretions, and so must stop the flow of any morbid secretions as well to a greater or less degree. But the question here is not of the coition the man performs, but of that which he suffers another to perform on him, in fact the vice of the Pathic, as the word (fornication) clearly shows; and that Pathics have habitually a pallid complexion has been already mentioned (p. 144).

To bring some sort of sense into the passage quoted above, Mercurialis would read πόρνη ὡς ἄχρωμος (like a shameless harlot), Dacier πορνείη ἄχρωμον ἄκος, (fornication is a shameless remedy ...) and Richard Mead προῤῥοὴ ἄχρωμος (an inordinate effusion). But Triller406 was the first to come to the conclusion that the words were in the wrong order, and emends the sentence thus: 252ὁ τὸν αἰῶνα φθινήσας, πορνείῃ ἄχρωμος, ἑβδομαῖος ἀπέθανεν, προϊόντων ἀπέπτων. Ἁλμυρὰ μετὰ μέλιτος δυσεντερίης ἄκος, (he that destroyed his life and vigour, being inordinate in fornication, died on the seventh day, undigested matters coming from him. Salt drinks with honey are a remedy for dysentery). This certainly makes it more readable, particularly if πορνείη ἄχρωμος is put before ὁ τὸν αἰῶνα, inasmuch as the pallid complexion was undoubtedly a forerunner of phthisis. His reasons, which we beg the reader to peruse for himself in the author’s work, are at any rate to us so convincing that we do not hesitate a moment to adopt his emendations. These have unfortunately hitherto gone entirely unnoticed; for Grimm, who appears to have taken no exception to the passage generally, has translated entirely in accordance with the old text, and not added any note at all. The same is the case with Lilienhain, who has more recently gone over the same ground again; though both have restored instead of κενεῶνα (belly) αἰῶνα (life) previously conjectured by Foesius.

Granted that by these means the last sentence is made intelligible, and justice done Hippocrates by no longer making him recommend coition as a remedy against dysentery, still the preceding sentence likewise stands in need of correction. For ἴξιν obviously ἰξίαν or ἰξίας (varicosities) must be read, which indeed was done by former translators, and long ago suggested by Foesius; but as to ἱππουρίν, no sufficient account has ever yet been given by any editor. The word appears to us to be corrupt, and to have got into the text owing to the fact that in the Manuscript, instead of προπιούντων,—which indeed no single Codex has, the majority reading ὑποπνοιούντων, there stood in the next line ὑποπορούντων, ὑποῤῥυόντων or ὑπποῤῥεόντων. Cornarius read, περὶ ἓξ ἔτεα ἐξ ἱππασίης βουβῶνα, ἰξίας, κ. τ. λ. (for about six years, in consequence of riding, inguinal swellings, varicosities, etc.), but without assigning his reasons; in all probability however he made this conjecture, which253 does not commend itself at any rate to us, with the passage about the Scythians in his mind’s eye.

But we can only arrive at a probable emendation on the condition that we correctly estimate the sequence of the sentences as a whole. If we are not greatly mistaken, it is as follows: First of all the question is of a Eunuch who became dropsical; then in connection with this, the rest is added applying to another Eunuch. In the Book περὶ γονῆς (Of the Seed), (Vol. I. p. 273. K.) we read: οἱ δὲ εὐνοῦχοι διὰ ταῦτα οὐ λαγνεύουσιν, ὅτι σφέων ἡ δίοδος ἀμαλδύνεται τῆς γονῆς—αὕτη δὲ ἡ δίοδος ὑπὸ τῆς τομῆς οὐλῆς γενομένης στερεὴ γέγονεν. (Now Eunuchs are not lascivious, because in them the passage of the seed is wasted away,... and this passage has become hardened by the wound where they were cut getting skinned over but festering within). Now we might well be tempted to read in the text: ὁ περὶ τὰ ἓξ ἔτεα ὑπὸ τῆς τομῆς οὐλῆς καὶ βουβῶνα, that is to say, the man suffered for six years in consequence of the skinning over of the cut from swelling in the groin, etc. However this could hardly be justified, and we think it much better to join ὑπὸ and οὐλῆς and either to read ὕπουλος, ὑπουλῶς or ὑπουλὴν περὶ τὰ βουβῶνα, that is, he had had for six years festering places in the inguinal region,—which idea possibly Calvus may have had in his mind, or else ὑπουλήν τε καὶ βουβῶνας, he had had for six years festering places (fistulas), inguinal swellings, etc., or finally, what might seem the best of all, ὕπουλον βουβῶνα, a festering inguinal region407. In the De morbis mulierum,254 (On the Diseases of Women), bk. I., edit Kühn, Vol. II. 680. we read, ὀδύνη ἔχει καὶ τὰς ἰξύας καὶ τοὺς κενεῶνας καὶ τοῦς βουβῶνας (pain holds both the loins and belly and the inguinal regions),—so we might perhaps similarly read here, ὕπουλον (ἔχει) καὶ βουβῶνα καὶ ἰξύα καὶ κενεῶνα καὶ κέδματα, πορνείη ἄχρωμος, φθινήσας κ. τ. λ. (he has in a festering condition both inguinal region and loin and belly and also varicosities, being inordinate in fornication, in pain etc.), which would give κέδματα the meaning of Varices (varicosities), and the sense of the whole passage would then be as follows: “A Eunuch in consequence of hunting and running became dropsical; another at the fountain of Elealces, who for six years had had festering (fistulous) ulcers in the inguinal region, the loins and in the region of the os sacrum, as well as varicosities, had grown pallid and suffered wasting through indulgence in the vice of the pathic, died, after making involuntary evacuations, to counteract which he had taken salt with honey, a usual remedy against dysentery, on the seventh day.”

Be this as it may, at any rate it is shown very distinctly by the passage that its author was but very slightly acquainted with the consequences resulting from the vice of the Pathic, for he ascribes to it255 nothing but the pallidness of complexion, whereas the whole series of morbid symptoms might very well have been due to it (Comp. p. 180.). Certainly the Author is to be excused, for as a rule the bodily consequences resulting from the vice of the Pathic were in Greece very slight and of rare occurrence, neither did the vice in that country reach anything like such a height. Again among the pastoral Scythians, whose racial character in other respects was but little marked, the local bodily consequences fell rather into the background, while the assimilation of the whole person to the female type occurred the more readily; but at the same time stood out all the more glaringly conspicuous to the eyes of a foreign observer, as he had noted nothing to correspond at home. Thus it was easy for him to be misled in considering the marvellous phœnomenon into forgetting its real origin, which no doubt was, in seeming, somewhat remote; and was apt to think of any other cause rather than the vice of the pathic, the consequences of which even distinguished Physicians of more modern times failed adequately to appreciate. Is it for us to throw a stone on these grounds at Hippocrates and his contemporaries?

In confirmation of our view as to the νοῦσος θήλεια (feminine disease) we might further cite from more modern times the examples given by Reineggs and J. von Potocki in the case of the Mongolian race of the Nogay, and by the older Historians of America, particularly in connection with Florida and Mexico. Notoriously down to the present day Paederastia is in Asia one of the common vices, while as to America some reporters when speaking of the Men-women and Hermaphrodites of that Continent, expressly state that they indulged in the vice. But as the original Authorities are not accessible to us, we can only refer to Heyne, loco citato, p. 41. and Stark, loco citato, pp. 29 and 31., especially as without this the subject has already occupied overmuch space. Still we trust the less blame may256 attach to us on this account from the fact that so distinguished a scholar as Stark, whose conclusions even professed Philologists have endorsed, may naturally claim of a younger enquirer in the same field who challenges his views, not mere general phrases, but the most complete and satisfactory reasons possible. This much merit we trust he cannot deny us!

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259

1) Nicolai Leoniceni, Vicentini, et Joannis Almenar, Hispani, 1. de morbo Gallico, Angeli Bolognini, Bononiensis, de cura ulcerum exteriorum et unguentis communibus in solutione continui lib. II. Alexandri Benedicti Veronensis, 1. de pestilenti febre, Dominici Massariae, Vicentini, de ponderibus et mensuris medicinalibus lib. III. Papiae ex offic. Bernhardini de Garaldis. MDXVI. fol.

(Nicholas Leonicenus, of Vicenza, and Joannes Almenar, Spaniard, “On Syphilis”; Angelas Bologninus, of Bologna, “On the Treatment of External Ulcers and on Common Ointments applied in Breach of Continuity”,—2 books; Alexander Benedictus, of Verona, “On Malignant Fever”; Dominic Massaria, of Vicenza, “On Medical Weights and Measures”,—3 books. Pavia (printed by Bernhardinus de Garaldis) 1516. fol.).

The Work is rare; and appears only to have been seen by Astruc, II. p. 623. Comp. Girtanner, II. p. 41. Gruner, Aphrodisiac. pt. IV.

2) Nicolai Massae, Veneti, Artium et Medicinae Doctoris, Liber de morbo Gallico, mira ingenii dexteritate conscriptus. Joannis Almenar, Valentini Hispani, Philosophi ac Medici, Liber perutilis de morbo Gallico, VII capitulis quidquid desideratur complectens. Nicolai Leoniceni, Vicentini, fidis260simi Galeni interpretis, compendiosa ejusdem morbi cura. Angeli Bolognini, Medici eximii, libellus de cura ulcerum exteriorum: et de unguentis in soluta continuitate a Modernis maxime usitatis, in quibus multa ad curam Morbi Gallici pertinentia inserta sunt s. l. MDXXXII 8.

(Nicholas Massa, of Venice, Doctor of Arts and Medicine, “Treatise on Syphilis,—a Work of extraordinary Hability and Competence”. Joannes Almenar, of Valencia (in Spain), Philosopher and Physician, “A Treatise of the greatest Utility on Syphilis, embracing in Seven Chapters all Information required”; Nicholas Leonicenus, of Vicenza, the most faithful Translator of Galen, “Compendious Treatment of Syphilis”; Angelus Bologninus, a highly renowned Physician, “Pamphlet on the Treatment of External Ulcers: and on Ointments applied in Broken Continuity as mostly Employed by the Moderns, wherein are included many Particulars concerning the Treatment of Syphilis.” (no place of publication) 1532. 8vo.).

This Work was in the Sloane (Sir Hans Sloane), and in the Trew (Christopher James Trew) Libraries. Astruc, II. p. 652. conjectures that the book was printed at Venice; which Haller, Bibliotheca Med. Pract. (Library of Medical Practice), I. p. 535. wrongly gives as proved.—Comp. Girtanner, II. p. 70., Gruner, Aphrod. p. V.

3) Liber de morbo Gallico, in quo diversi celeberrimi in tali materia scribentes medicinae continentur auctores, videlicet Nicolaus Leonicenus, Vicentinus. Ulrichus de Hutten Germanus. Petrus Andreas Matheolo, Senensis. Laurentius Phrisius. Joannes Almenar, Hispanus. Angelus Bologninus. Venetiis per Joannem Patavinum et Venturinum de Ruffinellis. Anno Domini MDXXXV. 8.

(“Treatise on Syphilis,” in which the various most Celebrated Authors writing on that Department of261 Medicine are contained viz. Nicholas Leonicenus, of Vicenza; Ulrich von Hütten, German; Petrus Andreas Matheolo, of Sienna; Laurentius Phrisius; Joannes Almenar, Spaniard; Angelus Bologninus. Venice, printed by Joannes Patavinus and Venturinus de Ruffinellis. Anno Domini 1535. 8vo.).

In the copy from the Sloane Library which Astruc, II. p. 659., had before him, was, printed on the same paper and with the same type, although the Title-page made no mention of it: Nicholas Poll, Medicinae Professoris et Sacrae Caesareae Majestatis Physici, Libellus de Cura Morbi Gallici per lignum Guajacanum (Nicholas Poll, Professor of Medicine and Physician to the Holy Roman Emperor, Pamphlet “On the Treatment of Syphilis by the Guajac wood”. Gruner, Aphrod. p. V., who possessed the same edition, does not mention this, but says the book is printed without pagination, and that each book has a separate Title (nova cuique libro inscriptione praefixa,—a fresh Title being prefixed to each book), so that a Part might easily be missing. Trew and Hensler also possessed the Work. Comp. Girtanner, II. p. 73.

4) Morbi Gallici curandi ratio exquisitissima a variis iisdemque peritissimis medicis conscripta: nempe Petro Andrea Matheolo, Senensi. Joanne Almenar, Hispano. Nicolao Massa, Veneto. Nicolao Poll, Caesareae Majestatis Physico. Benedicto de Victoriis, Faventino. Hic accessit Angeli Bolognini de ulcerum exteriorum medela opusculum perquam utile. Ejusdem de unguentis ad cujusvis generis maligna ulcera conficiendis lucubratio. Cum indice rerum omnium quae in curationem cadere possunt copiosissimo. Basileae apud Joann. Bebelium. MDXXXVI. 299 S. 4.

(“The Most Approved Method of treating Syphilis;” by Several and these the Most skilful Doctors, viz. Peter Andreas Matheolo, of Sienna; Joannes Almenar, Spaniard; Nicholas Massa, of Venice; Nicholas Poll,262 Physician to His Imperial Majesty; Benedictus de Victoriis of Faenza. To this is added: Angelus Bologninus, On the Medical Treatment of External Ulcers,—a Pamphlet of the Highest Utility. By the Same Author, Treatise on the Compounding of Ointments against Malignant Ulcers of every Kind. With a most Copious Index of all Matters incidental to the Treatment. Bâle, published by Joann. Bebelius, 1536. pp. 299. 4to.).

This Edition, according to the Dedication to Adam Bresinius (Basil. Idibus Martii 1536.—Bâle, 15th March 1536.), was seen through the press by Joseph Tectander from Cracow. The Tract of Benedictus de Victoriis included in it is a College Exercise which Tectander had had copied down and printed without the author’s knowledge. Comp. Astruc, II. p. 266.—Girtanner, II. p. 74.—Gruner, Aphrod. p. V.

A pirated impression of this Edition appeared at Lyons: Lugduni 1536, expensis Scipionis de Gabiano et fratrum, mense Augusto,—(Lyons 1536, at the cost of Scipio de Gabiano and his Brothers, August) pp. 280, and 16. (printed in cursives). Comp. Astruc II. p. 660. and H. Choulant, Fracastori Siphilis. Leipzig 1830. p. 8.

5) De morbo Gallico omnia quae extant apud omnes medicos cujuscunque nationis, qui vel integris libris, vel quoque alio modo hujus affectus curationem methodice aut empirice tradiderunt, diligenter hinc inde conquisita, sparsim inventa, erroribus expurgata et in unum tandem hoc corpus redacta [ab Aloysio Luisino, Utinensi]. In quo de ligno Indico, Salsa Perillia, Radice Chyne, Argento vivo, ceterisque rebus omnibus ad hujus luis profligationem inventis, diffusissima tractatio habetur. Cum indice locupletissimo rerum omnium scitu dignarum, quae in hoc volumine continentur. Opus hac nostra aetate, quo Morbi Gallici vis passim vagatur, apprime necessarium. Catalogum scriptorum sexta pagina comperies. [Sebast. Aquilanus, Nicol.263 Leonicenus, Nic. Massa, Natal. Montesaurus, Anton. Scanarolus, Jac. Cataneus, Joan. Benedictus, Hier. Fracastorius, Georg. Vella, Joan. Paschalis, Nic. Poll, Petr. Andr. Mathaeolus, Ulr. ab Hutten, Wendelinus Hock de Brackenau, Coradinus Gilinus, Laurent. Phrisius, Gonsalvus Fernandez de Oviedo, Joan. Almenar, Aloysius Lobera, Leonh. Schmaus, Petr. Maynardus, Anton Benivenius, Alphons. Ferrus, Joan de Vigo, Anton. Gallus, Casp. Torella, Joan. Bapt. Montanus, Andr. Vesalius, Leonhard. Fuchsius, Joan. Manardus, Joan. Fernelius, Benedictus Victorius, Amatus Lusitanus, Anton. Musa Brassavolus, Alex. Fontana, Nic. Macchellus, Hier. Cardanus, Gabr. Fallopius, Ant. Fracantianus, Joan. Langius, Petr. Bayr]. Tomus prior. Venetiis apud Jordanum Zilettum. 1566. 8. 736 u. 28 S. fol.

De morbo gallico Tomus posterior, in quo medicorum omnium celebrium universa monumenta ad hujus morbi cognitionem et curationem attinentia, quae hucusque haberi potuerunt nunquam alias impressa, nunc primum conjecta sunt. Cum indice locupletissimo rerum omnium scitu dignarum, quae in hoc volumine continentur. Catalogum scriptorum quarta pagina comperies. [Bartholomaeus Montagnana, Martin. Brocardus, Benedict. Rinius, Francisc. Frizimelica, Petr. Trapolinus, Bernard Tomitanus, J. Sylvius, Mich. J. Paschalius, Prosp. Borgarutius, Bartholom. Maggius, Alex. Trajan. Petronius]. Venetiis MDLXVII. ex officina Jordani Ziletti. 24 u. 216 S. fol.

Appendix tomi prioris de morbo gallico, in quo, qui eidem jam antea destinati fuerant, reliqui congesti sunt autores. Cum indice rerum memorabilium in eo contentarum abunde amplo et copioso. Catalogum scriptorum quarta pagina comperies.264 [Anton. Chalmeteus, Leonh. Botallus, Dominic. Leonus, Augerius Ferrerius, Petr. Haschardus, Guilielmus Rondeletius, Dionys. Fontanonus, Jos. Struthius]. Venetiis MDLXVII. Ex officina Jord. Ziletti. 4, 96 und 6 S. fol.

(“On Syphilis—All Works Extant on this Subject by All Doctors of Every Nation, who whether in separate Books or in any other Manner have dealt methodically or empirically with its Treatment, carefully compiled from various Sources, with original remarks interspersed, and errors removed, the Whole arranged for the first time in One Work, (by Aloysius Luisinus, of Udine,—Friuli). In which India wood (Ironwood, Guajac), Sarsaparilla, China Root, Quicksilver, and all other means discovered for the destruction of this contagion, are most copiously considered. With a very full Index of all Matters worthy of note contained in this Volume. A Work pre-eminently necessary in our Day when the infection of this Complaint is so widely diffused. List of Authors will be found on page 6. First Volume. Venice, published by Jordanus Ziletti, 1566. 8vo. 736, and 28. fol.

“On Syphilis,” Second Volume,—in which are included all the Works of all the Celebrated Doctors concerning the Diagnosis and Treatment of this Disease that have been thus far obtainable, now for the first time printed. With a very full Index of all Matters worthy of note contained in this Volume. List of Authors will be found on page 4. Venice 1567, (printed by Jordanus Ziletti). pp. 24, and 216. fol.

Appendix to First Volume “On Syphilis”, in which are collected the remaining Authors intended from the first to be included, but not hitherto printed. With a most ample and copious Index of noteworthy Matters contained therein. List of Authors will be found on page 4. Venice 1567 (printed by Jord. Ziletti. pp. 4, 96, and 6. fol.)

265

Astruc, II. p. 780., rightly censures the unsystematic arrangement of the different Writings, the omission of Prefaces, Dedications and indeed all matter except the actual texts. This edition received subsequently a new Title-page, as is shown, according to Astruc, II. p. 846., by the fact that not only does the number of pages, lines and words closely agree with the above mentioned edition, but also at the end of the First Part the name of the printer Ziletti occurs with the date 1556. The new Title reads as follows:—

“Aphrodisiacus sive de lue venerea in duo volumina bipartitus, continens omnia quaecunque hactenus de hac re sunt ab omnibus Medicis conscripta, ubi de ligno Indico, Salsa parillia, Radice Chinae, Mercurio ceterisque omnibus ad hujus luis profligationem inventis, diffusissima tractatio habetur ab excellente Aloysio Luisino, Utinensi Medico celeberrimo novissime collecta. Venet. apud Baretium et socios. 1599. fol.

(“Aphrodisiacus: or A Treatise on the Venereal Disease,—in Two Volumes, containing all that has been written on this subject to the present day by all Doctors, and in which Indian wood (Ironwood, Guajac), Sarsaparilla, China Root, Mercury and all other remedies discovered for the Destruction of this Disease are most fully treated, compiled and newly edited by the excellent Aloysius Luysinus, a Celebrated Physician of Udine,—Friuli. Venice, published by Baretius and Associates, 1599. fol.

6) Aphrodisiacus sive de lue venerea; in duos tomos bipartitus, continens omnia quaecunque hactenus de hac re sunt ab omnibus Medicis conscripta. Ubi de Ligno Indico, Salsa Perilla, Radice Chynae, Argento vivo, ceterisque rebus omnibus ad hujus luis profligationem inventis, diffusissima tractatio habetur. Opus hac nostra aetate, qua Morbi Gallici vis passim vagatur apprime necessarium: ab excellentissimo Aloysio Luisino Utinensi, Medico266 celeberrimo novissime collectum, indice rerum omnium scitu dignarum adomatum. Editio longe emendatior, et ab innumeris mendis repurgata. Tomus primus et secundus. Lugd. Batav. apud. Joann. Arnold. Langerak et Joh. et Herm. Verbeck. MDCCXXVIII. 1366 gespaltene Seiten, ohne 11 Blatt Vorrede und 10-1/2 Blatt Index. fol.

(“Aphrodisiacus: or A Treatise on the Venereal Disease,—in Two Volumes, containing all that has been written on this subject to the present day by all Doctors. In which Indian wood (Ironwood, Guajac), Sarsaparilla, China Root, Quicksilver and all other remedies discovered for the Destruction of this Disease are most fully treated. A Work pre-eminently necessary in our Day when the infection of this Complaint is so widely diffused; the whole collected for the first time by the most excellent Aloysius Luisinus, of Udine,—(Friuli), a most famous Physician, and provided with an Index of all Matters worthy of note. Much improved Edition, freed from very numerous errors. Vols. I and II. Leyden, published by Joann. Arnold. Langerak and Joh. and Herm. Verbeck, 1728. pp. 1366, besides 11 leaves Preface and 10-1/2 leaves Index. fol.

Is, as Astruc, II. p. 1071., justly observes, a mere reprint of the Venice edition, the only alteration being that the Appendix to the First Part is added immediately after the First Part. Comp. Choulant, p. 9. The Preface at the beginning by Boerhave contains his views on the Venereal Disease, and has been several times since printed separately and translated.

7) Daniel Turner: Aphrodisiacus, containing a Summary of the Ancient Writers on the Venereal Disease, under the following heads: I. of its Original; II. of the Symptoms; III. of the various Methods of cure. London, printed for John Clarke. MDCCXXXVI. 8vo.

An Abridgement from the “Aphrodisiacus” of267 Luisinus, arranged under the three heads named on the Title-page. (Astruc, II. p. 1110.)

8) John Armstrong: A Synopsis of the history and cure of the Venereal Disease. London 1737. 8vo.

Another Abridgement from Luisinus. (Girtanner, iii. p. 430.)

9) Aphrodisiacus sive de lue venerea in duas partes divisus, quarum altera continet ejus vestigia in veterum auctorum monimentis obvia, altera quos Aloysius Luisinus temere omisit scriptores et medicos et historicos ordine chronologico digestos, collegia notulis instruxit, glossarium indicemque rerum memorabilium subjecit D. Christianus Gothofredus Gruner etc. Jenae apud Christ. Henr. Cunonis heredes. MDCCLXXXVIIII. XIV. 166 und 16 S. fol.

(“Aphrodisiacus: or A Treatise on the Venereal Disease, divided into two parts, whereof the one contains Traces of this Disease to be met with in the Writings of Ancient Authors, the other Those Writers, whether Doctors or Historians, whom Aloysius Luisinus has without sufficient reason omitted, arranged in chronological order. Collected and edited, with Notes, Glossary, and Index of noteworthy Matters, by D. Christianus Gothofredus Gruner, etc. Jena, published by heirs of Christ. Henr. Cuno. 1789. pp. XIV, 166 and 16. fol.).

A second additional Title-page bears: Volume Third. In the Preface Gruner accepts the Moorish origin of the Disease, which he further maintains in the Book itself, and gives a survey of the Bibliography. In the first Part he gives the passages from the Bible, the Greek, Roman, Arabic and Arabist Works, so far as they had been discovered at that time. The second Part contains the Works wanting or imperfectly given in Luisinus’ Collection, and passages from the following Authors: “Joan Nauclerus, Steph. Infessura, Petr. Delphinius,268 Joan. Burchardus, Philipp. Beroaldus, Alex. Benedictus, Conrad. Schelling, Jac. Wimphelingius, Chronicon Monasterii Mellicensis, Joan. Salicetus, Marcellus Cumanus, Chronica von Cöln, Joan. Trithemius, Universitas Manuasca. Sebast. Brant, Joh. Grünbeck, Decretum Senatus Parisiensis, Proclamatio Anglica, Joan. Sciphover de Meppis, Bartholom. Steber, Simon Pistoris, Anton. Benivenius, Petr. Pinctor, Joan. Bapt. Fulgosus, Christoph. Columbus, Petr. Martyr, Franciscus Roman. Pane, Elias Capreolus, M. Anton. Coccius Sabellicus, Albericus Vesputius, Wendelinus Hock de Brackenau, Petr. Crinitus Linturius, Clementius Clementinus, Joan. Vochs, Angel. Bologninus, Francisc. Guiccardinus, Berlerus, Leo Africanus, Petr. Bembus, Paul. Jovius, Joan. de Vigo, Symphor. Champegius, Francisc. Lopez de Gomara, Ulric. ab Hutten, Desider. Erasmus, Missa de ben. Job., Joannes le Maire, Gonsalvus Ferdinandus de Oviedo, Joan. de Bourdigne, Joan. Ludov. Vives, Aureolus Theophr. Paracelsus, Magnus Hundt, Leonh. Fuchs, Sebast. Frank, Sebast. Montuus, Joan. Bapt. Theodosius, Hieron. Benzonus, Petr. de Cieça de Leon, Joan. Fernelius, Michael Angel. Blondus, Augustin. de Zaratte, Joan. Stumpf, Rodericus Diacius Insulanus, Hieron. Montuus.”269

10) De morbo gallico scriptores medici et historici partim inediti partim rari et notationibus aucti. Accedunt morbi gallici origines maranicae. Collegit, edidit. glossario et indice auxit D. Christ. Gothofr. Gruner. Jenae sumptibus bibliopolii academici 1793. XVIII. XXXVI. 624. S. 8.

(“Medical and Historical Writers on Syphilis” some not before published, others rare, with Notes. To which are added Moorish Sources of Syphilis. Collected and edited, with the addition of a Glossary and Index, by D. Christ Gothofr. Gruner. Jena, at the cost of the University Press, 1793. pp. XVIII, XXXVI, 624. 8vo.).

Forms the second Supplement to the Collection of Luisinus, and contains Works and passages from the following Authors, etc.: “Ancient Laws of Nüremberg,” “Matthaeus Landauer, Julianus Tanus (de saphati), Antonius Codrus, Anonymi prognosticatio, Jacob. Unrestus, Bilibaldus Birkheimer, Augustinus Niphus, Hieron. Emser, Philipp. Beroaldus, Leonard. Giachinus, Janus Cornarius, Thomas Rangonus, Joan. Anton. Rovellus (de patursa), Remaclus Fuchs, Aloysius Mundella, Anton. Fumanellus, Hier. Cardanus, Hier. Bonacossus, Bernard. Corius, Joan. Langius, Joach. Curaeus, Joan. Hessus, Thom. Erastus, Achill. Pirmin. Gasserus, Joan. Crato, Thom. Jordanus (luis novae Moravia exortae descriptio,—Description of new Disease and its Moorish Origin). “Comp. N. allg. deutsch. Bibl. Vol. IX. p. 183.”

11) D. Christ. Goth. Gruner Spicilegium scriptorum de morbo gallico. Spic. I-XV. Jenae 1799-1802. 4.

(D. Christ. Goth. Gruner, “Selection of Writers on Syphilis”, Selections, I-XV. Jena 1799-1802. 4to.).

This third Supplement to Luisinus was never regularly published; the separate Selections were issued as “Programs” in connection with the Public Announcements of Doctorial Graduations in the Faculty of Medicine at Jena. Selections I-VI. contain Investigations as to the History and Nature of the Disease; VII-XI. Passages from the Poems and Letters of Conrad Celte, from a Letter of Albert270 Durr, from Symphorian. (Champerius, Vocabulorum Medicorum Epitoma); XII, Passages from the Poems of Henric. Bebelius, Hel. Eoban. Hessus and a quotation from a Work of Petr. Parvus; XIII, XIV. Passage from Erasmus, Jac. von Bethencourt, Jo. Lud. Vives, Enric. Cordus, Georg, Bersmannus, Engelbert, Werlichius, and the Latin translation of a Fragment from a Book written in the Coptic language which the Society of Missions had sent to Cardinal Borgia; Domeier communicated it to Baldinger and the latter handed it on to Gruner to make use of in his Collection.

In Selection XV. Gruner makes some objections against the view expressed by Hensler in his “Program,” “De herpete seu formica Veterum”. This Collection belongs in part to the Works mentioned in the next section (“Historians”), but appears to be little known generally, for it has escaped even Choulant in his usually complete Survey of the “Scripta Historica de Morbo Gallico”,—Historical Works on Syphilis, in the Edition of the Poem of Fracastor, pp. 5-9. Hacker, p. 20. mentions it indeed, but appears not even to have seen it, as he gives nothing more precise as to its contents.

1) Patin, Carol. Eques. D. Marci Paris. primar. Prof. Luem veneream non esse morbum novum; Oratio habita in Archilyceo Patavino die V. Nvbr. 1687. Patavii 1687. 4.

(Patin, Carolus. of Paris, Chevalier of St. Mark, First Prof. of Surgery at Padua,271 “The Venereal Disease not a new Complaint: Speech delivered in the High Schools of Padua on Nov. 5th 1687.” Padua 1687. 4to.)

Astruc, II. p. 991., knew this Speech only from a citation of Zach. Platner, who equally had not seen it, and supposed it had probably never appeared, since Nic. Comnenus Papadopoli in his “historia gymnasii Patavini” (History of the High School of Padua) Vol. I. sect. 2. ch. 25. No. 159., does not mention it at all, though he cites freely from Patin’s Speeches and his separate Works. Girtanner, II. p. 279., however cites the complete Title as above; and must consequently have seen the book, though he remarks nothing further about its contents than, “He recapitulates the old well-known Reasons for the Antiquity of the Venereal Disease”. For the rest, Patin seems to have taken the main part from the Lettres Choisies, Vol. III, Letter 370, p. 95, of his father Guy Patin, where the latter defends the antiquity of Venereal Disease.

2) Quaestio medica quodlibetarius disputationibus mane discutienda die Jovis 9 Dcbris 1717. M. Johanne Baptista Fausto Alliot de Mussay, Doctore medico praeside. An Morbus antiquus Syphilis? Proponebat Johannes Franciscus Leaulté, Parisinus, Anno R. S. H. 1717. Typis Johann. Quillau, facultatis medicinae Typographi. 8 Blatt. 4.

(“Medical Question to be discussed in open disputation for and against in the morning, Thursday, 9th of December 1717. M. Joannes Baptista Faustus Alliot de Mussay, Doctor of Medicine, presiding:—Is Syphilis an Ancient Disease? Raised by Johannes Franciscus Leaulté of Paris. 1717. Printed by Johann. Quillau, Printer to the Faculty of Medicine. 8 leaves. 4to.)

According to Astruc, II. p. 1054., this Dissertation consists of 8 Corollaries, of which only the fifth seeks to establish the antiquity of Venereal Disease, arguing from: Horace, Odes bk. I. 37. Sat. bk. I.272 5. 62 (morbus campanus,—the Campanian disease); Juvenal, Sat II.; Martial, Epigr. bk. I. 66.; Tacitus, Annals bk. IV.; Suetonius, Vita Octav. Augusti ch. 80.; Lucian, Pseudologista; Valerius Maximus, Memorab. bk. III. ch. 5.; Lucius Apuleius, Metamorphos. bk. X. The refutation given by Astruc repeats almost word for word Girtanner vol. II. p. 357-363., though he gives it, as usual, as his own Production.

3) Becket, William. An attempt to prove the Antiquity of the Venereal Disease long before the discovery of the West-Indies. In Philosophical Transactions. Vol. XXX. 1718. No. 357. p. 839.—A letter to Dr. W. Wagstaffe concerning the antiquity of the Venereal Disease. Ibid. Vol. XXXI. 1720. No. 365. p. 47.—A letter to Dr. Halley, in answer to some objections made to the history of the Venereal disease. No. 366. p. 108.

In England Nic. Robinson, “A New Treatise of the Venereal Disease”, in three parts, London 1736. 8 vols., Pt. I. ch. 1., seeks to further confirm the Reasons laid down by Becket for the antiquity of the Disease. According to Astruc, vol. II. p. 1058, Sir Hans Sloane, “Voyage to the Islands of Madeira, Barbadoes, Nevis, St. Christopher and Jamaica, with the Natural History,” London 1707. fol., Vol. I. in the Introduction, pp. 2, 3., would seem to have already indicated the most important passages cited by Becket.

4) Sanchez, (Antonio Nunhez Ribeiro) Dissertation sur l’origine de la maladie vénérienne, pour prouver: que le mal n’est pas venu d’Amérique, mais qu’il a commencé en Europe, par une Epidémie. à Paris chez Durand et Pissot. MDCCLII. 110 S. 8. Reprinted 1765. 12.

(Sanchez, Antonio Nunhez Ribeiro. “Dissertation on the Origin of the Venereal Disease, to prove: that the Malady did not come from America, but that it began in Europe by an Epidemic.” Paris, published273 by Durand and Pissot. 1752. pp. 110. 8vo. Reprinted 1765. 12mo.)

The first issue of this Work published without the name of the Author, must have been ready, as early as the year 1750, for not only is the “Privilegium” (licence to print) subscribed in that year (August and October), but also Sanchez says himself in the Preface to the second Part that this First Part had appeared in Paris in 1750, published by Durand. It runs thus: “M. Castro, Médecin de Londres, ayant traduit en Anglais une dissertation avec ce titre: Sur l’origine de la Maladie Vénérienne; imprimée à Paris, chez Durand 1750, envoya un Exemplaire de la traduction à M. le Baron de Van-Swieten”,—M. Castro, Physician in London, having translated into English a Dissertation entitled: On the Origin of the Venereal Disease; printed at Paris 1750, and published by Durand, sent a Copy of the Translation to the Baron Van-Swieten). The Title of this English Translation is: “A Dissertation on the Origin of Venereal Disease; proving that it was not brought from America, but began in Europe by an Epidemical Distemper. Translated from the original MS. by an Eminent Physician”. London 1751. 8vo. According to this the Translation must have appeared very nearly at the same time as the original.—A German Translation came out under the Title: “Treatise on the Origin of the Venereal Disease, in which is proved: that this Evil did not come from America, but took its beginning in Europe by an Epidemic,” translated from the French; edited by Georg Heinrich Weber. Bremen 1775. pp. 94. 8vo.—An Abstract from the Original may be found in: “Commentaria de rebus in scientia naturali et medicina gestis”—(Records of Achievements in Natural Science and Medicine): Supplement. Leipzig 1772. pp. 156-159.—Allgem. deutsche Bibliothek, Vol. 28. p. 461.—Tode, Med. Chir. Bibliothek. Vol. IV. Pt. I. p. 49.—Haller’s Tagebuch. Vol. III. p. 331.—The Work itself is divided into 7 Sections.—The First Section contains:274 Arguments proving that in most parts of Europe the Venereal Disease became known and disseminated since 1493, and last of all in the month of June 1495. pp. 1-10.—Second Section: When did Christopher Columbus discover the Island of Hispaniola and when did he return to Spain from his first and second voyages? pp. 11-20.—Third Section: Did the Venereal Disease come from America at the time of Columbus’ return from his second voyage? pp. 21-39.—Fourth Section: Did the Troops of Fernandez Cordova communicate the Disease to the French? pp. 40-47.—Fifth Section: Answer to some objections that may be raised to prove that Venereal Disease took its origin from America, pp. 47-79.—Sixth Section: Reasons which caused Writers on Venereal Disease since the year 1517 to believe this Malady came from America, pp. 79-87.—Seventh Section: Venereal Disease is an Epidemic Complaint, which began in Italy and almost at the same time spread over France and the rest of Europe, pp. 88-108.—Recapitulation: The Disease existed in Italy and France before Columbus returned from his second Voyage; the Troops of Cordova could not have communicated it to the French, for the two never came into contact; the Disease displayed all the appearance of an Epidemic; the discovery of the drug “Guajac” gave occasion to the assumption of the American origin of the Disease.—Van Swieten, who had received the English Translation sent to him by Castro, only ought to weaken the proofs brought forward in this book in his “Commentar. in Boerhavi Aphorismos” (Commentary on Boerhaave’s Aphorisms), Leyden 1772., Vol. V. pp. 373 sqq., which occasioned Sanchez to issue the following Work, also published anonymously.

5) Examen historique sur l’apparition de la maladie vénérienne en Europe, et sur la nature de cette epidémie. A Lisbonne MDCCLXXIV. pp. VIII. and 83. 8vo.

275

(“Historical Inquiry concerning the First Appearance of the Venereal Disease in Europe, and the Nature of that Epidemic.” Lisbon 1774. pp. VIII, and 83. 8vo.).

H. Dav. Gaubius had this Work again re-printed together with the preceding (Leyden 1777. 8vo.) and a Preface. An English Translation was edited by Jos. Skinner. London 1792. 8vo.—The Work falls into 8 Divisions. Div. 1. Extracts from Pet. Pintor, Sebast. Aquitanus, Pet. Delphinus, Petr. Martyr, pp. 1-24.—Div. 2. Symptoms of the so called Venereal Disease, as they were observed in Italy in the month of March 1793 and 1794. pp. 24-31.—Div. 3. In the history of Medicine there is no Description of an epidemic Disease resembling in all its consequences that which invaded Italy, Spain and France in the years 1493 and 1494. pp. 31-42.—Div. 4. The Venereal attacks, which have been observed since the time of Hippocrates, were not the consequence of the inflammatory or chronic Venereal Disease, such as it has been observed since the years 1493 and 1494. pp. 42-45.—Div. 5. On certain passages in Astruc’s book “On the Venereal Disease”. pp. 45-54.—Div. 6. Conclusions from the passages of Pet. Pintor and Pet. Delphinus concerning the Venereal Epidemic in Italy, France and Spain in the years 1493, 1494. pp. 54-61.—Div. 7. Did the early Voyages who discovered the Harbours and Peoples of North and South America observe the Venereal Disease, and was their Manhood infected with it? pp. 62-72.—Div. 8. On the Spread of infectious Diseases by sea, and the Quarantine observed during the Plague on the different coasts of the Mediterranean Sea. pp. 73-81.—Recapitulation: The Venereal Disease prevailed as a “Febris Pestilentialis” (pestilential fever) in March 1493, and after the arrival of Charles VIII in Italy (1494) took the name of “Morbus Gallicus” (French Complaint); the Venereal affections observed in Antiquity are distinct from the276 Venereal Disease as known since 1494; the Spaniards imported it into the Antilles, and the French were already infected when they came into Italy, where the Disease had been prevalent before their arrival. The early Voyages mention not a word of having found the Disease among the Savages. America, Africa and the East Indies have never communicated their epidemic and endemic Diseases to Europe; therefore the Venereal Disease cannot have been brought by the Spaniards from America to Europe.—Both Works of Sanchez are now rare. Comp. Girtanner, vol. III. pp. 460-471.—Richter, Chirurg. Bibliothek. vol. III. p. 381.

6) Berdoe, Mermaduke: An essay on the Pudendagra. Bath 1771. 8vo.

Girtanner, vol. III. p. 577., says: the Author has collected everything that is found in the older Writers on the subject of the “Pudendagra”, and shows wherein it is distinct from the Venereal Disease.

7) Ph. Gabr. Hensler, Geschichte der Lustseuche, die zu Ende des XV. Jahrhunderts ausbrach. Erster Band. Altona 1783. 335. 134 S. 8. Neuer Abdruck oder Titel? 1794.

(Ph. Gabr. Hensler, “History of the Venereal Disease, which broke out at the End of the XVth. Century.” First Volume. Altona 1783. pp. 335 and 134. 8vo. New Impression or new Title? 1794.)

The Work is divided into two Books. First Book: Notices of contemporary Works on Venereal Disease, pp. 1-140. Section I., Works before Leonicenus, pp. 5-26. Sect. II., Works from Leonicenus to Almenar, pp. 27-68. Sec. III., Works of contemporary Writers directed towards diminishing the Disease, pp. 69-140.—Second Book: Description of the Disease. Sec. I., Local Affections. 1. Infection of the private parts, pp. 144-150. 2. Scalding and Urine-Scalding before and at the time of the Attack, pp. 151-168. 3. Discharge from the Penis in Men,277 pp. 169-203. 4. Discharge in Women, pp. 204-217. 5. Foul Ulcer, pp. 228-244. 6. Abscesses of the groin, pp. 245-264. 7. Local Sequelae of foul Discharge and Ulcer, pp. 265-275. (Swellings of the Testicles, Ulcers of the Urethra, Scalding Urine, Sharp Urine, Ulcers and Fistulae of the Perinaeum, Phimosis and Paraphimosis, Wasting of the Genitals). 8. Other Local Affections of the secret parts, pp. 277-302. (Eruptions, Morbid Growths, Ulcers of the Anus, Piles). 9. Traces of the earlier Taint in non-medical Writers, pp. 307-328.—Forming an Appendix, pp. 1-134, are excerpts from Schellig, Wimpheling, Cumanus, Brant, Grunpeck, Widmann, Steber, Pinctor, Grünbeck, Benedictus, different Historians of the XVth. and XVIth. Centuries, St. Job, and Christ. Columbus’ “Epistola de insulis nuper in mari Indico repertis,” (Letter on the Islands lately discovered in the Indian Sea).

8) Ph. Gabr. Hensler, über den westindischen Ursprung der Lustseuche. Hamburg 1789. 92. 15 S. 8.

(Ph. Gabr. Hensler, “On the West-Indian Origin of the Venereal Disease.” Hamburg 1789. pp. 92 and 15. 8vo.)

Also under the Title: “History of the Venereal Disease etc.” Second Volume, Second Part. The First Part of this Vol., which was to contain the Description of the Disease, never appeared. The Work is particularly directed against Girtanner; and investigates. (2) The exact Time of the appearance of the Disease in Italy. (3) The eye-witnesses of the importation of Venereal Disease from Hispaniola to Spain. (4) Eye-witnesses of the existence of Venereal Disease in Hispaniola as its home. (5) Testimonies to the fact that Venereal Disease was once endemic on the main-land of America. (6) Later witnesses of the importation into Spain of the Venereal Disease previously endemic in Hispaniola. The proofs are from (pp. 1-15): Oviedo, Welsch, Lopez de Gomara, Roman. Pane,278 Pedro de Cieça de Leon, Augustin. de Zaratte, Hieron. Benzoni.

9) Phil. Gabr. Hensler, Programma de Herpete seu Formica veterum labis venereae non prorsus experte. Kilon. 1801. 64 S. 8.

(Phil. Gabr. Hensler, ““Program” (College Exercise) on the Herpes (Creeping eruption) or Formica of the Ancients,—a Malady not unconnected with the Venereal Disease.” Kiel 1801. pp. 64. 8vo.)

This “Program”, which Hensler wrote on his resignation as Dean and for the Public Announcement of certain Graduations, is divided into 10 Divisions, of which Div. 1 gives a survey of the Contents, Div. 2 considers certain passages from the genuine Writings of Hippocrates (Prorrhetic. 11, 18, 21, “de aere, aquis et locis”—“of the effects of air, water and locality”, II. Aphorism. V. 22.) dealing with Herpes, from which we gather that under the name Herpes were understood eating (phagedenic) Ulcers, that the Herpes esthiomenes attacked especially the abdomen and the Genitals, that Epinyctis was pre-eminently a disease of adults, whence a suspicion arises of its being communicated by coition. Div. 3 gives medical opinion on the different kinds of Herpes down to Celsus. Div. 4 gives the same on Epinyctis, special importance being given to the pains at night. Div. 5 discusses the Therioma of Celsus (V. 28. 3.), which according to Pollux, Onomast. IV. 15., specially affects the Genitals, and is closely akin to the Epinyctis. Div. 6 gives the views of Galen on Herpes. Div. 7. The Author proceeds to the Formica of the Arabians, and shows that they have designated several distinct Skin-diseases by this name. Div. 8 treats the views held by Arabic writers down to the XVth. Century; whilst Div. 9 gives the shape these views took during the XVth. Century. In Div. 10 Hensler draws the following conclusions from the evidence he has adduced: Formica was the same thing as the Herpes of the279 Greeks; under both names, yet by no means exclusively, were indicated syphilitic affections. Immorality at all periods generated Venereal Disease, which arose at first rather sporadically, but towards the end of the XVth. Century in consequence of its universal diffusion became virtually epidemic. The early neglect of Etiology, as well as the Galenian hypotheses of deteriorations of the humours, stood in the way of the right understanding of the Disease. Venereal Disease is not a single Malady, but a Diathesis (General Condition of Body), which in accordance with time and circumstances may manifest itself in different forms. “Hujusmodi vero lues mihi illa omnis esse videtur, quae ipso coitu, quo quidem loco luis praecipuus focus est, facillime cum aliis communicari et ad ipsam prolem propagari possit. Summa ejus genera esse equidem arbitror Lepram, malum, quod Pians vocant, ipsamque Syphilidem.” “This contagion seems to me to be a general one, and of this sort that it is capable of being very readily communicated to others by the act of coition, where indeed is the chief nidus of the Disease, and of being propagated even to posterity. Its main forms are, in my opinion, Leprosy, a Malady called Pians, and Syphilis itself.” (p. 54). The Pians would seem to be Pox, the seeds of which the Moors disseminated, Syphilis a “Morbus Europae inquilinus” (a Disease native to Europe). The three Diseases are akin, and merge into one another.

10) La America vindicada de la calumnia de haber sido madre del mal venereo. Madrid 1785. 4.

(“America Vindicated from the Calumny of having been the Mother of the Venereal Disease.” Madrid 1785. 4to.)

Sprengel in the Annotations to P. Ant. Perenotti di Cigliano, “Of the Venereal Disease”, p. 348., calls this Work, which would seem to be in the University Library of Göttingen:280 “a well-written Tract, wherein, from p. 34 onwards, it is demonstrated that Venereal Disease did not come from Hayti.” Comp. Götting. gelehrte Anzeig. 1788. Sect 169 p. 1614.

11) P. Ant. Perenotti di Cigliano, Storia generale dell’ origine dell’ essenza e specifica qualita della infezione venerea. Turin 1788. 8.

(P. Ant. Perenotti di Cigliano, “General History of the Origin, Essence and Specific Quality of the Venereal Contagion”. Turin 1788. 8vo.)

This Work with another of the same Author dealing with the treatment of Venereal Disease was translated into German and furnished with appendices by C. Sprengel, under the Title: P. A. Perenotti di Cigliano, “Of the Venereal Disease, translated from the Italian, with Appendices.” Leipzig 1791. pp. XVI, 384. large 8vo. The Author maintains the antiquity of the Disease.

12) Will. Turnbull, An inquiry into the origin and antiquity of the lues venerea, with observations on its introduction and progress in the Islands of the South-Sea. London 1786. 8vo.

Of this there appeared a German translation by Dr. Christ. Friedr. Michaelis. Zittau and Leipzig 1789. pp. 110. large 8vo. The Author maintains the American origin, and especially seeks to confute Becket and Raynold Forster.

13) Just. Arnemann, De morbo venereo analecta quaedam ex manuscriptis musei Britannici Londinensis. Götting. 1789. 4.

(Just. Arnemann, “Certain Extracts from Manuscripts in the British Museum in London dealing with the Venereal Disease.” Göttingen 1789. 4to.)

This Work contains according to Girtanner, III. p. 733., fresh proofs for the American origin.

14) M. Sarmiento, Antiquitad de los bubas. Madrid 1788. 32 S. 8.

(M. Sarmiento, “Antiquity of Buboes.” Madrid 1788. pp. 32. 8vo.)

281

Comp. the English Review. 1778. p. 221.—Allgem. Literaturzeitung 1789. vol. II. p. 647.

15) M. S. G. Schmidt, praeside (et auctore) C. Sprengel, de ulceribus virgae tentamen historico-chirurgicum. Halae 1790. 8.

(M. S. G. Schmidt, (Editor and part-Author, C. Sprengel), “On Ulcers of the Penis,—a Historico-Surgical Essay.” Halle 1790. 8vo.)

16) Christ. Gothofr. Gruner, Morbi Gallici origines Maranicae. Progr. Jen. 1793. 4.

(Christ. Gothofr. Gruner, “Moorish Sources of Syphilis”. (University “Program”) Jena 1793. 4to.)

Is re-printed in the above cited, p. 12. No. 10., Collection of “Scriptores de Morbo Gallico” (Writers on Syphilis).

17) Sind die Maranen die wahren Stammväter der Lustseuche von 1493? Im Journal der Erfind., Theorien und Widersprüche in der Natur- und Arzneiwissenschaft. Stück III. Gotha 1793. S. 1-34. Stück IV. Gotha 1794. S. 119-129.

(“Are the Moors the true Parents of the Venereal Disease of 1493?” In the Journal of Discoveries, Theories and Refutations in Natural Science and Medicine. Part III. Gotha 1793. pp. 1-34. Part IV. Gotha 1794. pp. 119-129.)

Both these Papers would seem to have had Prof. Fr. Aug. Hecker, of Erfurt, as Author; and are directed especially against the just mentioned Work of Gruner, and the Moorish origin generally. Gruner sought to maintain his views in the following Papers:

18) Die Maranen sind die wahren Stammväter der Lustseuche von 1493; in s. Almanach Jahrgang 1792. S. 51-92.—Geschichte der Maranen und der Eroberung von Granada. Ebendaselbst S. 158-196.—Die Maranen dürften doch wohl die Stammväter der Lustseuche von 1493 sein. Ebendas. 1793. S. 69-89. 1794. S. 229-268.

282

(“The Moors are the true Parents of the Venereal Disease of 1493;” in his Almanach, Year 1792. pp. 51-92.—“History of the Moors and the Conquest of Granada.” Ibid. pp. 158-199.—The Moors must be admitted the Parents of the Venereal Disease of 1493.” Ibid. 1793. pp. 69-89. 1794. pp. 229-268).

Comp. also some earlier Papers in Year 1784. pp. 224-237, Year 1790 pp. 139-157.

19) Sim. N. H. Linguet, Histoire politique et philosophique de Mal de Naples. Paris 1796. 8.

(Sim. N. H. Linguet, “History, Political and Philosophical, of the Neapolitan Disease.” Paris 1796. 8vo.).

This Work seems to be no longer on the market; at any rate we were unable by any means to procure it

20) C. Sprengel, Ueber den muthmasslichen Ursprung der Lustseuche aus dem südwestlichen Afrika. In dessen Beiträgen zur Geschichte der Medicin. Halle 1796. Bd. I. Hft. 3. S. 61-104.

(C. Sprengel, “On the probable Origin of the Venereal Disease in South-Western Africa.” In his Contributions to the History of Medicine. Halle 1796. Vol. I. Pt. 3. pp. 61-104).

The Author maintains, following up a previous suggestion of Hensler’s, that Yaws and Pians are the original forms of Venereal Disease.

21) J. F. B. Bouillon la Grange, Observations sur l’origine de la maladie vénérienne dans les Isles de la mer du Sud. In Recueil périodique de la societé de Santé. T. I. 1797. 38-47.

J. F. B. Bouillon la Grange, “Observations on the Origin of the Venereal Disease in the Islands of the South Sea.” In Periodical Review of the Health Society. Vol. I. 1797. 38-47).

283

22) Wilh. Ernest. Christ. Aug. Sickler, Diss. exhibens novum ad historiam luis venereae additamentum. Jenae 1797. (VIII. April.) 32 S. 8.

(Wilh. Ernest. Christ. Aug. Sickler, “Dissertation containing some fresh Material towards a History of the Venereal Disease.” Jena 1797. (Apr. 8.) pp. 32. 8vo.).

The Author here treats some of the passages from the Old Testament referring to the Plague of the Jews that spread amongst them on account of their worshipping Baal Peor, which had not before been used. The little Work seems not to have been made use of by later Writers; neither Hacker nor Choulant note it. The Author’s brother had first called attention to the passages in Augusti “Theologische Blätter”, Gotha, No. 13.

23) Dr. Schaufus, Neueste Entdeckungen über das Vaterland und die Verbreitung der Pocken und der Lustseuche. Leipzig 1805. 160 S. 8.

(Dr. Schaufus, “Latest Discoveries with regard to the Original Home and Dissemination of Pox and Venereal Disease.” Leipzig 1805. pp. 160. 8vo).

Comp. Ehrhardt, Med. Chirurg. Zeitung. Insbruck 1806. Vol. I. p. 375. Pierer, Allgem. Med. Annalen. 1866. p. 364.

The Author derives Venereal Disease from the East Indies and makes the Gypsies bring it to Europe. From p. 65 to the conclusion of the Work he treats fully of the Venereal Disease in the islands of the South Sea, and at the same time gives an exhaustive list of the authorities on this subject.

24) Carol. Sam. Törnberg, Spic. inaug. med. sistens sententiarum de vera morbi gallici origine synopsin historicam. Jenae XXIX. August. 1807. 26 S. 8.

(Carol. Sam. Törnberg, “Selection of Medical “Programs”,—giving a Historical Synopsis of Views284 as to the True Origin of Syphilis.” Jena 29 Aug. 1807. pp. 26. 8vo.).

The Author decides for the American origin, but without adducing anything fresh.

25) J. B. C. Rousseau, New observations on Syphilis, tending to settle the disputes about its importation, by proving that it is a disease of the human race, that has and will always exist among the several Nations of the Globe. In Coxe, Philadelph. med. Museum. 1808. Vol. IV. No. 1. pp. 1-11.

26) H. A. Robertson, Historical Inquiry into the Origin of the Venereal Disease. Pts. I. II. in the London Medical Repository 1814. Vol. II. pp. 112-119, 185-192.

The Author maintains the antiquity of Venereal Disease, but denies that the Malady which prevailed amongst the French at the siege of Naples was true Syphilis; he supposes it rather to have been a fever resembling the Plague accompanied by pustulous eruptions. A later Paper in the same Periodical, 1818. vol. IX. pp. 465-495., contains the result of his observations in Spain during the War, so far as they confirm his earlier views.

27) Rob. Hamilton, On the early History and Symptoms of Lues. In the Edinburgh medical and surgical Journal 1818. Vol. XIV. pp. 485-498.

The Author seeks to prove that the Disease at the end of the XVth. Century was not “Lues Venerea”, but “Sibbens”. Comp. Ehrhardt, Med. Chirurg. Zeitung. 1819. Vol. I. p. 198.

28) Gust. Adolph Werner, de origine ac progressu luis venereae animadversiones quaedam. Diss. inaug. med. Lips. 1819. 29. S. 4.

(Gust. Adolph Werner, “Some Thoughts on the Origin and Progress of the Venereal Disease,”—a Medical Graduation Exercise. Leipzig 1819. pp. 29. 4to.).

285

Maintains the antiquity of the Disease, citing again the passages already known. The Ancients, he says, confounded Syphilis with Leprosy; the Immorality prevailing at the end of the XVth. Century and the arrival of the Moors in Italy were the original cause and occasion of the general extension of the Disease. According to Choulant in Pierer, Allgem. Med. Annalen, Year 1825. p. 237., Prof. Heinrich Robbi was the Author of this Dissertation.

29) J. L. W. Wendt, Bydrag til historien af den veneriske sygdoms begyndelse og fremgang i Danemark. Kjöbnhavn 1820. 8. Deutsch in Hufelands Journ. 1822. Bd. 55. S. 1-51.

(J. L. W. Wendt, “Contribution to the History of the Origin and Progress of the Venereal Disease in Denmark.” Copenhagen 1820. 8vo. In German in Hufeland’s Journ. vol. 55. pp. 1-51).

Shows that Venereal Disease became known in Denmark after 1495; that its treatment was given over especially to the Surgeons and quacks; also an account of the medical Police-regulations against the Disease.

30) Nicol. Barbantini, Notizie istoriche concernanti il contagio venereo, le quali precedono la sua opera sopra questo contagio. Lucca 1820. 8.

(Nicol. Barbantini, “Historical Notices concerning the Venereal Contagion,—introductory to his Work on this Disease.” Lucca 1820. 8vo.).

Appears to be not yet at all well known in Germany. Neither through the booksellers nor in any other way could we obtain the Work. It would seem to be out of print.

31) Domenico Thiene, Lettere sulla storia de’ mali venerei. Venezia 1823. 303. S. gr. 8.

(Domenico Thiene, “Letters on the History of Venereal Maladies.” Venice 1823. pp. 303. large 8vo.).

286

Contains 9 letters as follows: I. On the common opinion of the American origin of the Venereal Disease,—to Signor C. Sprengel, pp. 7-27, in which the American Source and Girtanner’s Arguments for it are confuted. He cites here in the Notes, p. 238, an Italian poem of George Summaripa, a Patrician of Verona (1496), not previously known, in which the Disease is represented as having come from Gaul; which a letter of Nicolaus Scillatius re-printed on p. 236 confirms. This had already been given in Brera, Giornale di Medicina, August 1817, vol. XII. p. 123, and borrowed and made use of by Huber, p. 37., and Sprengel, Geschichte der Medicin, 3rd ed., vol. II. p. 701., in correction of Choulant’s statement, as cited below p. 238.—II. Of Discharge from the Penis (Scolagione) or Gonorrhœa of the Ancients,—to Signor Christ. Goff. Gruner408, shows that the Gonorrhœa of the Ancients was no mere Spermatorrhœa, but actual Gonorrhœa (Clap) pp. 31-48.—III. Of Discharge from the Penis (Scolagione) or Gonorrhœa of the Middle Ages,—to Signor F. Swediaur, pp. 51-73. Shows that actual Gonorrhœa existed in the Middle Ages.—IV. Of Ulcers, Buboes and other such Affections of the Secret Parts in Antiquity,—to Signor Nic. Barbantini, pp. 77-92.—V. Of the true Venereal Disease or Syphilis,—to Signor Anton Scarpa, pp. 95-119. Survey of the Venereal Disease to the end of the XVth Century and of its changes, with special reference to the sympathy of the Genital organs and those of the Throat.—VI. On certain modern Forms of Disease referable to the Venereal Taint,—to Signor Cullerier, pp. 123-144. Considers the Brünn Sickness in the year 1577, the “Sibbens, Amboina pox, Canadian Disease,” “Scherlievo” and “Falcadina”.—VII. Of287 certain ancient Forms of Disease referable to the Venereal Taint,—to Signor Dr. Cambieri, pp. 148-178. In this are more exactly described the “Yaws”, “Pians”, “Judham”, Mentagra, Malum mortuum and Morphea, and the near relationship of leprosy with Venereal Disease hinted at.—VIII. Of the Origin of the Venereal Disease,—to Signor Filip. Gabr. Hensler, pp. 182-208. The Author considers the Disease endemic in Africa, whence it came into Italy with the Moors, and to America with the Negro slaves.—IX. On the public Hygiene of Venereal Maladies,—to Franc. Aglietti, pp. 212-235. Chronological Survey of Legislation as to Brothels. The book ends, pp. 230-303, with Annotations in which he gives specially the documentary proofs on which his conclusions rest, and that too arranged according to the numbers given in the text.

An Abstract of this Work, rare apparently in Germany, is given by Choulant in Pierer’s Allgem. Med. Annalen, Year 1825. pp. 236-244.

32) V. A. Huber, Bemerkungen über die Geschichte und Behandlung der venerischen Krankheiten. Stuttgart und Tübingen. 1825. 124 S. 8.

(V. A. Huber, “Remarks on the History and Treatment of Venereal Diseases.” Stuttgart and Tübingen 1825. pp. 124. 8vo.).

The Author specially combats the American origin, and to this end examines particularly the Spanish Chroniclers. Without exactly wishing to arrive at a definite conclusion for or against, he contents himself with exposing the inconsistencies in the reasoning of the supporters of either view.—Commendatory notices of the Book are found in: Heidelberg Jahrb. 1825. Pt. XII. pp. 1194-1199.—Hecker’s Lit. Annalen 1826. Vol. IV. pp. 77-97.—Hufeland’s Bibliothek d. prakt. Heilde. 1826. Vol. LV. pp. 262-268.

33) Alex. Dubled, Coup d’œil historique sur la maladie vénérienne. Paris 1825.?

288

(Alex. Dubled, “Historical Survey of the Venereal Disease.” Paris 1825.?

Hacker, p. 164, says: “would seem to contain much of interest.” We have not been able to obtain a sight of this Work; however it appears to quite agree with what Dubled has repeated in a later work, “Statement of the new Doctrine as to Venereal Disease,” transl. from the French. Leipzig 1830. pp. VI-VIII and pp. 1-10. He says, p. V of the Preface,—“Finally, inasmuch as the systematic historical study of the Venereal Disease seems also to confirm the truth of my view, I have prefixed to this Work the Historical Survey, which at the time of its composition I read before the Surgical Section of the Royal Academy of Medicine. A Report that should have been rendered by it never appeared.” Then follows a Preface belonging to the Historical Survey, subscribed—Paris, October 1823, to which year accordingly must be assigned the above-mentioned Work. But the whole publication, as may be supposed from the scanty number of pages, is more than superficial.

34) S. J. Beer, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Syphilis. In Okens Isis. Jahrg. 1828. Bd. II. S. 728-731.

(S. J. Beer, “Contributions to the History of Syphilis.” In Oken’s Isis. Year 1828. Vol. II. pp. 728-731).

The Author, a Jewish Physician, seeks to prove that the Moors did not suffer from Venereal Disease, because they as Martyrs of their Faith, could not therefore be dissolute, immoral men, because (Deuteronomy, Ch. 33. v. 17.) excesses in love, especially with Gentiles (Nehemiah Ch. X. vv. 29, 30) are strictly forbidden, finally because Don Isac Abarbanel, born 1437, in his Exposition of the Prophets (printed 1650), on Zachariah Ch. XIV. v. 12. says expressly, that the Disease “Zarfosim” occurs only amongst the “Goiem” (Gentiles) and not amongst the Jews. The289 Author promises eventually to issue a Treatise on Syphilis which he has in hand on a larger scale; but to our knowledge it has not appeared.

35) H. Spitta, Beitrag zur Geschichte der Verbreitung der Lustseuche in Europa. In Heckers lit. Annalen 1826. Bd. IV. S. 371-374.

(H. Spitta, “Contribution to the History of the Spread of the Venereal Disease in Europe.” In Hecker’s Lit. Annalen 1826. Vol. IV. pp. 371-374).

The contribution is a passage from the following book: “Libro que trata de las cosas, que traen de las Indias Occidentales, que sirven al uso de medicina, y de la orden qui se ha de tener en tomar la Rayz de Mechoacan etc. Hecho y copilado por el Doctor Monardes, medico de Sevilla. 1565.” (Book treating of Substances imported from the East Indies and used in Medicine, and of the Course to be observed in taking the Mechoacan Root, etc. Written and compiled by Dr. Monardes, Physician of Seville. 1565). This work treats of the drug “Guajac”, and lays down the American origin of Venereal Disease as confidently as if the Author had been on the spot when it happened! The value of the whole argument may be judged from this passage, “Our Creator willed that from that same country whence Venereal Disease (el mal de las buvas,—the malady of buboes) came, should come also the Means of its cure.”

36) Pet. de Jurgenew, Luis venereae apud veteres vestigia. Diss. inaug. Dorpati Livon. 1826. 54 S. 8.

(Pet. de Jurgenew, “Traces of the Venereal Disease amongst the Ancients.” Medical Graduation Exercise, Dorpat (in Livonia) 1826. pp. 54. 8vo.).

An industrious, partly critical, Collection of the passages connected with this subject down to Peter Martyr in chronological order, of which however perhaps only those given on given p. 11, though these290 are incomplete, from the “Lusus in Priapum” or “Priapeia” had not previously been noted. Comp. Recension by Struver in Rust’s and Casper’s Krit. Repertor. Vol. XX. p. 141.

38) Friedr. Alex. Simon, Versuch einer kritischen Geschichte der verschiedenartigen, besonders unreinen Behaftungen der Geschlechtstheile und ihrer Umgegend, oder der örtlichen Lustübel, seit der ältesten bis auf die neueste Zeit, und ihres Verhältnisses zu der Ende des XV. Jahrhunderts erschienenen Lustseuche; nebst praktischen Bemerkungen über die positive Entbehrlichkeit des Quecksilbers bei der Mehrzahl jener Behaftungen, oder der sogenannten primairen syphilitischen Zufälle. Ein Beitrag zur Pathologie und Therapie der primairen Syphilis, für Aerzte und Wundärzte. I. Thl. Hamburg. 1830. XVIII. 253 S. II. Thl. 1831. XVI. 543 S. gr. 8.

(Friedr. Alex. Simon, “Essay towards a Critical History of the different sorts of Infections, particularly of foul Infections, of the Sexual parts and their Neighbourhood, in other words of Local Venereal Maladies, from the earliest times to the most recent, and of their Relation to the Venereal Disease that made its appearance at the end of the XVth Century; together with Practical Remarks as to the positive Needlessness of Mercury in the case of the majority of those Infections, or the so-called primary Syphilitic Symptoms. A Contribution to the Pathology and Therapeutics of Primary Syphilis, for Physicians and Surgeons.” I Part. Hamburg 1830. pp. XVIII, 253. II Part. 1831. pp. XVI, 543. large 8vo.).

The first Part of this Work, one displaying great care and diligence, contains the History of Gonorrhœa, Swellings of the Testicles, Ulcers and warty Growths in the Urethra, Scalding Urine, Strictures, Ulcers and Fistulae in the Perinœum, so far as these subordinate affections were observed before the appearance of the Venereal Disease; the second Part the History291 of the Ulcers or Shankers in the Sexual organs, particularly after coition where infection is suspected, down to the most recent time. The promised Critical History of the Venereal Disease with reference to its appropriate Treatment has unfortunately never yet appeared, though only then can we estimate the justice of many of the Author’s views and statements touching the local Symptoms. Would that an end might be put to the delay!

38) Math. Jaudt, de lue veterum et recentium. Diss. inaug. med. Monachii 1834. 23 S. 8.

(Math. Jaudt, “On Syphilis amongst Ancients and Moderns.” Medical Graduation Exercise. Munich 1834. pp. 23. 8vo.).

In this somewhat cursory Treatise the Author assumes with the English writers a “Lues antiqua” (ancient Contagion), which manifested itself only through affections of the Genitals of a similar nature, and a “Lues universalis” (general Contagion) since 1494-1496, both of which now occur; hence he would deduce the distinction in the treatment with Mercury,—Mercury not being necessary for the former, but required for the latter.

39) Max Ludov. Schrank, de luis venereae antiquitate et origine. Dissert inaug. Ratisbonae (Monachii) 1834. 24 S. 8.

(Max Ludov. Schrank, “On the Antiquity and Origin of the Venereal Disease.” Graduation Exercise. (Ratisbon Bavaria) 1834. pp. 24. 8vo.).

The Author seeks to prove by citation of the familiar passages of the ancient writers: (1) “luem veneream antiquissimis temporibus jamjam cognitam itidemque contagiosam, sub finem saeculi XV. majorem malignitatis gradum, conditionibus secundis concurrentibus, ostendisse, ideoque, (2) Americam ejusdem patriam non esse habendam” (that the Venereal Disease was already known in the most ancient times, that towards the end of the XVth.292 Century, under the concurrence of favouring conditions, it exhibited a greater degree of malignancy; consequently that America is not to be considered its place of origin. He seems especially to have made use of Huber’s Work.

40) Prof. Naumann, zur Pathogenie und Geschichte des Trippers, in Schmidt’s Jahrb. der in- und ausländ. gesammt. Medicin Jahrg. 1837. Bd. XIII. S. 94-105.

(Prof. Naumann, “Pathology and History of Gonorrhoea”, in Schmidt’s Jahrb. der in- und ausländ. gesammt. Medicin, Year 1837. Vol. XIII. pp. 94-105).

Contains valuable notices on the history of Venereal disease, specially dealing with Gonorrhoea in Antiquity; cites several very important passages from Galen previously overlooked, and by their help maintains the antiquity of the Disease. The matters dealt with in this Treatise had already been gone into by the same Author in the Seventh Volume of his Handbook to Medical Clinics.

41) August Zennaro, Diss. inaug. de syphilidis antiquitate et an sit semper contagio tribuenda, Patav. 1837. 32 S. gr. 8.

(August Zennaro, “Graduation Exercise, on the Antiquity of Syphilis; should it be considered always Contagious?” Padua 1837. pp. 41. large 8vo.).

42) Jos. Ferd. Masarei, Diss. sist. argumentum, morbos venereos esse morbos antiquos. Viennae 1837. 8.

(Jos. Ferd. Masarei, “Exercise maintaining the thesis that: the Venereal diseases are ancient Diseases.” Vienna 1837. 8vo.).

Besides the above Works, specially devoted to the History of Venereal Disease and dealing exclusively with this, the subject is discussed also by most of the larger Hand-books and Manuals on this293 Malady, e.g, Swediaur, Bertrandi, Foot, Barbantini, Jourdan. However we must particularize:

Joan. Astruc, de morbis venereis libri sex. In quibus disseritur tum de origine, propagatione et contagione horumce affectuum in genere: tum de singulorum natura, aetiologia et therapeia, cum brevi analysi et epicrisi operum plerorumque quae de eodem argumento scripta sunt. Paris 1736. XVIII. 20. 628. 50 S. 4. Paris (Nachdruck zu Basel). 1738. 4.—Translated by Will. Borrowby. Lond. 1737. 8.—Editio secunda: de morbis venereis libri IX. Paris 1740. 4. Vol. I. XXXVI. 608 S. (Enthält zugleich Dissertatio I. de origine, appellatione natura et curatione morborum venereorum inter Sinas S. DXXXVII-DLXVI). Vol. II. 537-1196 S. (Unsere Citate beziehen sich auf diese Ausgabe).—Paris 1743. Vol. I-IV. 12. Die ersten 4 Bücher wurden von Boudon und Aug. Franc. Jault ins Französische übersetzt. Paris 1740. 12. Vol. I-III.—Editio tertia aucta per Jo. Astruc et Ant. Louis. Paris 1755. Vol. I-IV. 12. Nachdruck Venetiis 1760. 4. mit Hinzufügung von Gerardi van Swieten, Epistolae duae de mercurio sublimato und Jos. Mar. Xav. Bertini, diss. de usu mercurii.—Translated by Sam. Chapmann. Lond. 1755. 1. deutsch von Joh. Gottlob Heise. Frankf. und Leipz. 1784. gr. 8. Editio quarta: Paris. 1773. Vol. I-IV. 12.—Editio quinta, cura Ant. Louis. Paris 1777. Vol. I-IV. 12.

(Jean Astruc, “On Venereal Diseases,—Six books. In which is discussed the Origin, Propagation and Contagion of these Maladies generally; secondly the Nature, Etiology and Therapeutics of the same individually; together with a brief Analysis and Appreciation of most of the Works dealing with this Subject.” Paris 1736. XVIII, 20, 628, 50 pp. 4to. Paris (pirated edition, Bâle) 1738. 4to.—Translated by Will. Borrowby, Lond. 1737. 8vo.—Second Edition: “On Venereal Diseases,—IX books.” Paris 1740. 4to. Vol. I. pp. XXXVI, 608. (Contains also Dissertation294 I, “On the Origin, Nomenclature, Nature and Treatment of Venereal Diseases amongst the Chinese”, pp. DXXXVII-DLXVI). Vol. II. pp. 537-1196. (Our citations refer to this Edition).—Paris 1743, Vols. I-IV. 12mo. The first 4 books were translated into French by Boudon and Aug. Franc. Jault. Paris. 1740. 12mo, Vols. I-III.—Third Edition enlarged by Jo. Astruc and Ant. Louis. Paris 1755. Vols. I-IV. 12mo. Pirated edition, at Venice 1760. 4to., with addition by Gerardi van Swieten, “Epistolae Duae de Mercurio sublimato” (Two Letters concerning Mercury Sublimate), and Jos. Mar. Xav. Bertini, “Diss. de usu Mercurii”. (Dissertation on the Use of Mercury).—Translated by Sam. Chapmann. Lond. 1755. 8vo.; in German by Joh. Gottlob Heise. Frankfort and Leipzig 1784, large 8vo.—Fourth Edition: Paris 1773. Vols. I-IV. 12mo.—Fifth Edition, edit. Ant. Louis. Paris 1777. Vols. I-IV. 12mo).

To Astruc belongs the credit of having been the first who began to collect on a comprehensive plan and to sift the material for a history of the Venereal Diseases that had been accumulating for Centuries. His historical results are imperfect and one-sided, in so far as they are directed solely to maintaining the American origin; but at the same time his chronological Review of the Writers from 1475 to 1740 is even now almost indispensable, as he gives comprehensive Extracts from all the Works that were at his disposal, that fill the whole of the second Volume of his Book. Down to Hensler, almost all later Historians owe to him their Bibliography of Authorities, though they are not always honest enough to specify the mine from which they drew their knowledge. According to Bertrandi, “Treatise on the Venereal Diseases”, transl. from the Italian by C. H. Spohr, Vol. I. p. 44. Note k., Astruc has copied almost the whole of the first book of this Work, without naming the Author(!?), from: Charles Thuillier,295 “Observations sur les maladies vénériennes avec leur cure sûre et facile, lettres sur les accidents, l’origine et les progrès de la vérole,” (Observations on the Venereal diseases, with a sure and easy method of cure: Letters on the Symptoms, Origin and Progress of the Pox.) Paris 1707. pp. 211-261. 8vo.

Christoph Girtanner, Abhandlung über die venerische Krankheit. I. Bd. Götting. 1788. 459 S, II. und III. Bd. 1789. 933 S. gr. 8. Zweite Ausgabe 1793. III Bde. gr. 8.—Dritte Ausgabe vom I. Bde. 1796.—Vierte Ausgabe vom I. Bde., mit Zusätzen und Anmerkungen herausgegeben von Ludw. Christoph Wilh. Cappel 1803. XVI. 455 S. gr. 8. (Christoph Girtanner, “Treatise on the Venereal Disease.” I Vol; Göttingen 1788. pp. 459, II and III Vols. 1789. pp. 933. large 8vo.—Third edition of Vol. I. 1796.—Fourth edition of Vol. I., edited with Addition and Notes by Ludw. Christoph Wilh. Cappel, 1803. pp. XVI, 455. large 8vo.).

In the First Volume the Author gives, Bk. I. Pt. 1. pp. 1-57, a history of the Venereal disease, in which he employs every possible artifice and perversion of the facts in his endeavour to prove the American origin of the Disease. In the Second and Third Vols. (in which the pages run on continuously, pp. 808) he gives a general review of all the Works that have appeared on Venereal disease from 1595 to 1793, the total—including Supplements—amounting to 1912. As far as Astruc served, he has often translated him word for word,—without declaring the fact. But as only those Works which support his own views, in particular the American origin, are estimated with any accuracy, while the rest are summarily disposed of,—often without any precise account of the Contents, it is properly speaking solely for the sake of the Titles that the Review as a whole is of use to Historians. A Continuation of this Bibliographical review is found in: Heinr. August Hacker, Literatur der syphilitischen Krankheiten vom Jahr 1794 bis mit 1829, etc. Leipzig 1830. 264 S. gr. 8. (Heinr. August Hacker,296 “Literature of the Venereal Disease from the year 1794 down to and including 1829, etc.” Leipzig 1830. pp. 264. large 8vo.).

Unfortunately a major portion of the Books, particularly of the foreign ones, did not actually come into the hands of the Author, so that he was forced often to content himself with merely citing the Titles; and in such as are more precisely designated, he omits, as indeed is the case also with Girtanner, to give the length (pagination, or number of sheets) of the Works, from which at any rate a relative judgement might be made as to their completeness. Then since its publication almost another decade has passed, and the continuation of his Collection is still awaited on the part of the Author; consequently a second edition, carried on so as to cover the latest period, one that has been very prolific in Literary productions, is both necessary and desirable, and in it what is deficient might easily be supplied. Again from earlier Literature many additions might well be made and supplements giving what was overlooked or only cursorily noted by Girtanner. However would it not on the whole be more expedient to undertake an entirely new Work dealing with the whole Literature of Venereal Disease, but on other principles than those of Girtanner? Indeed for such a task the use of a Library such as Göttingen would be required. It would undoubtedly be of very great utility.

George Rees, On the primary Symptoms of the lues venerea, with a critical and chronological account of all the English writers on the subject, from 1735 to 1785. Lond. 1802. 8vo.

Finally we have to mention the Writers on the History of Medicine who have treated more or less fully the History of the Venereal Disease. To this class belong in especial:

J. Freind, histoire de la médicine, traduit de l’Anglais par Etienne Coulet. Leide 1727. 8. T. III. S. 192-277. (J. Freind, “History of Medicine,” translated from the English by Etienne297 Coulet. Leyden 1727. 8vo. Vol. III. pp. 192-277).

Seeks to prove the American origin.

Chr. Godfr. Gruner, Morborum antiquitates. Vratislav. 1774. gr. 8. S. 69-101. (Chr. Godfr. Gruner, “Antiquities of Diseases.” Breslau 1774. large 8vo. pp. 69-101).

Decides for the American origin.

Curt. Sprengel, Versuch einer pragmat. Geschichte der Arzneikunde. 3. Auflage. Halle 1828. Bd. II. S. 521-525. 697-714. Bd. III. S. 204-217. Bd. V. S. 579-594. (Curt. Sprengel, “Attempt at a Pragmatic History of Medicine.” 3rd. edition. Halle 1828. Vol. II. pp. 521-525, 697-714. Vol. III. pp. 204-217. Vol. V. pp. 579-594).

The Author accepts the Development of Venereal disease from Leprosy.

In connection with other Diseases the Venereal is also dealt with in the following Works:

Franc. Raymond, Histoire de l’éléphantiasis, contenant aussi l’origine du Scorbut, du Feu St. Antoine, de la Vérole etc. Lausanne 1767. 132 S. 8. (Franc. Raymond, “History of Elephantiasis, containing also the Origin of Scurvy, St. Anthony’s Fire, Pox, etc.” Lausanne 1767. pp. 132. 8vo.).

The Author maintains the Antiquity of the Disease. Comp. “Commentar. de rebus in Scientia naturali et Medicina gestis” (Record of Exploits in Natural Science and Medicine). Leipzig Vol. XVI. pp. 455-460.

Gerhard Gebler, Diss. Migrationes celebriorum morborum contagiosorum. Götting. 1780. 4. (Gerhard Gebler, “Dissertation: The Migrations of the more important Contagious Diseases.” Göttingen 1780. 4to.)

According to Girtanner the portion dealing with Venereal Disease is word for word from Astruc.

End of the First Volume.