Sexual life in ancient Greece : with thirty-two full-page plates

MARRIAGE AND THE LIFE OF WOMEN

‘Then the contest of song begins. It is at first a matter of discussing the question whether the class of maidens or that of the married housewife deserves the preference. The maidens begin ; they see in the lot of the wife and mistress of the house only anxiety, only burdens’:

Look how a flower in some close garden grows, Hid from rude cattle, bruiséd by no plows, Wind-stroked, sun-strengthened, nurtured by the rain: To pluck it many a youth and maid is fain ! But once ’tis culled, its beauty fades away : No youth, no maid, desires it from that day. So is a virgin loved, while she is chaste :

But if within a lover’s arms embraced

She lets her body’s flower be gathered, then No longer is she dear to maids or men. Hymen alone is our defence and shield ;

To Hymen Hymenzus all must yield.

“The young men on the other hand describe the happy lot of the married man, which finds support in the husband who 1s beloved :

Look how a vine unwedded never bears

Ripe grapes, but with a headlong heaviness wears Her tender body, and her highest sprout

Is quickly levelled with her fading root !

For her no hinds, no lusty younglings care ; But if by chance she shall be married there

To the elm her husband, then all love her well And by her side full many a hind will dwell. Yea, as the vine untended, even such

The maid who ne’er has felt a lover’s touch. But when she gains a husband for her own No more upon her will her parents frown |

‘Thus, and perhaps in several similar comparisons the state of the unmarried girl and that of the married housewife are weighed one against the other ; who shall sink the scale is self-evident, while now the bridegroom comes in the carriage to fetch away and greet the bride. He accompanies her into the festally adorned hall, glittering with torches ; in full tones the welcome to them resounds from

1 This, and the next extract in verse, is from Mr. F. A. Wright’s translation of Catullus, 62, in his Catullus, the Complete Poems (Broadway Translations, Geo. Routledge & Sons, Ltd.).