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

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his favourite (Ath., xiii, 602; Aéslian, Hist. an., vi, 15; Var. hist., xi, 5; Apollodorus, iii, 44).

As in Thebes (Xen., Symp., vil, 32f; Plato, Symp., 1826), so also in Elis the love of boys had a sensual element, although the religious feeling was not wanting. Plutarch also attests the combination of sensuality and a sacrificing heroic spirit in Chalcis (Plut., Amat., 17; there also the song) on the island of Eubcea and its colonies. A song that became popular there has been preserved and also a similar one of Seleucus (Ath., xv, 697d) by whom the love of boys is called more valuable than marriage on account of the knightly fellowship of which it is the cause. ‘The song of the people of Chalcis, the author of which is unknown, is as follows: ‘“O ye boys of brave fathers, shining in the grace of your charms, never grudge the companionship of your beauty to honourable men, for in the cities of Chalcis, in union with manly virtue still ever blooms your gracious, heart-infatuating sweet youth.”

According to Aristotle (Plutarch, Amat., 761), this song went back to the bond of love between the heroic Cleomachus and his young friend, already spoken of p. 442); or it may, perhaps, have arisen out of the belief that Cleomachus’s victory was due to his enthusiasm having been encouraged and sustained by the presence of his friend as a witness of his bravery. What taste the Chalcidians had for beautiful boys is also proved by the notice of Hesychius, that xaA«dilew is synonymous with madepaoretv, ‘This is confirmed by Athenzus, who adds that the Chalcidians, like others, made claim to the honour that Ganymede was carried off from a myrtle grove near their city, and they proudly showed this place, which they called Harpagion (the place of the rape) to strangers.

According to Xenophon (Rep. Lac., 2, 13) the love between a man and a youth was considered entirely as a conjugal union.

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