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

CASTRATION, CIRCUMCISION, INFIBULATION

As a counterpart Aristophanes often describes scenes of female desire: “ But if delightful Eros and the Cyprus-born Aphrodite breathe desire upon our bosoms and our breasts, and then create in the men a pleasing passion and voluptuousness, I think that we shall some time be called amongst the Greeks ‘ Lysimache’”’ (as having put an end to the war) (Lysistrata, 551 ff.).

Indirectly, since the play upon words is untranslateable, there are a number of lines in the Thesmophoriazuse (esp. 246, 1119, 1185), in which the muscles of the buttocks are continually spoken of. In the Lysistrata (1148) the Laconian cries out in admiration: ‘‘Her buttocks are indescribably beautiful,” and in the Peace (868) the servant says : “The girl has bathed, beautiful and smooth are her buttocks!’’ The coquettish movement of the same, with which according to a fragment of comedy women used to entice men, was called zepimpwrriay,

That this part of the body must also suffer when children had to be punished with a switch or a stick, is known from vase painting and a passage of Herondas (vii, 13); and there is a vase in the Museo Nazionale in Naples on which are painted two half-naked youths lying on a couch and turning their heads towards a woman who is pulling her clothes up to show her naked buttocks.

2. CASTRATION, CIRCUMCISION, INFIBULATION

Of the self-emasculation of the priests in the cult of the Syrian goddess Gallos, Lucian (De Syr. dea, 50) tells us: ‘‘ On certain fixed days, the multitude assembles in the temple ; many priestesses and the men consecrated to the gods whom I have mentioned, celebrate the mysteries, cut their arms and beat one another on the back. Many standing by accompany with the flute, many beat drums, others sing inspired verses and sacred songs. This takes place outside the temple, nor do any who perform

DOF