The Truth About WomanHartley, C. Gasquoine (Catherine Gasquoine)
History
The Truth About Woman
Hartley, C. Gasquoine (Catherine Gasquoine)
Women; Women -- History; Women -- Social and moral questions
[253] To give a few examples, Plutarch mentions that the relations
between husband and wife in Sparta were at first secret (Plutarch,
_Lycurgas_). The story told by Pausanias about Ulysses' marriage
points to the custom of the husband going to live with his wife's
family (_Pausanias_, III. 20 (10), Frazer's translation). The legend
of the establishment of monogamy by Cecrops, because, before his time,
"men had their wives in common and did not know their fathers," points
clearly to a confused tradition of a period of mother-descent.
(_Athenaeus_, XIII. 2). Herodotus reports that mother-descent was
practised by the Lycians, and states that "if a free woman marry a man
who is a slave their children are free citizens; but if a free man
marry a foreign woman or cohabit with a concubine, even though he be
the first person in the state, the children forfeit all rights of
citizenship" (_Herodotus_, Bk. I. 173). The wife of Intaphernes, when
granted by Darius permission to claim the life of a single man of her
kindred, chose her brother, saying that both husband and brother and
children could be replaced (_Herodotus_, Bk. III. 119). Similarly the
declaration of Antigone in Sophocles (line 905 ff) that neither for
husband nor children would she have performed the toil she undertook
for Polynices clearly shows that the tie of the common womb was held
as closer than the tie of marriage.
[254] For a full account of the Homeric woman the reader is referred
to Lenz, _Geschichte des Weiber im Heroischen Zeitalter_, an admirable
work. The fullest English account will be found in Mr. Gladstone's
_Homeric Studies_, Vol. II. See also Donaldson, _Woman_, pp. 11-23,
where an excellent summary of the subject is given.
[255] _Odyssey_, I. 2.
[256] _Iliad_, VI. 429-430.
[257] _Odyssey_, VI. 182.
[258] Gladstone, _Homeric Studies_, Vol. II. p. 507.
[259] _Odyssey_, VII. 142 ff.
[260] Donaldson, _Woman_, p. 18-19.
[261] _Odyssey_, III. 450; _Iliad_, VI. 301.
[262] Simcox, _Primitive Civilisation_, Vol. I. p. 199. Reference may
also be made to the love-charm translated by M. Revillout in his
version of the _Tales of Selna_, p. 37.
[263] 2 _Nic. Ethics_, VIII. 14; _Econom._ I. p. 94.
[264] Letourneau, _Evolution of Marriage_, p. 195.
[265] _Lycurgus_, XXXVII.
[266] _Ibid._, XXVI.
[267] Donaldson, _Woman_, pp. 28-29.
[268] Plutarch, _Apophthegms of the Lacedemonians_.--_Demandes
Romaines_, LXV.
[269] Lycurgus, Polybius, XII. 6. Xenophon, _Rep. Laced._ I.
Aristotle, _Pol._ II. 9. Aristotle notes especially the sexual liberty
allowed to women.
[270] Donaldson, _op. cit._, p. 28.
[271] _Polit._ II. 9.
[272] Plutarch, _Life of Agis_; Donaldson, _Woman_, pp. 34, 35.
[273] Hobhouse, _Morals in Evolution_, Vol. I. p. 208.
[274] Thus Demosthenes bequeathed his two daughters, aged seven and
five years, and also their mother, to his nephews, classing them with
his property in the significant phrase "all these things" (Letourneau,
_op. cit._, p. 196).
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