COURTESANS. he first erected a temple to the Public Venus with the money which was earned by the women who were prostituted at these brothels.
But Philemon speaks on this subject as follows:—
But you did well for every man, O Solon;
For they do say you were the first to see
The justice of a public-spirited measure,
The saviour of the state—(and it is fit
For me to utter this avowal, Solon);—
You, seeing that the state was full of men,
Young, and possess'd of all the natural appetites,
And wandering in their lusts where they'd no business,
Bought women, and in certain spots did place them,
Common to be, and ready for all comers.
They naked stand: look well at them, my youth,—
Do not deceive yourself; a'nt you well off?
You're ready, so are they: the door is open—
The price an obol: enter straight—there is
No nonsense here, no cheat or trickery;
But do just what you like, and how you like.
You're off: wish her good-bye; she's no more claim on you.
And Aspasia, the friend of Socrates, imported great numbers of beautiful women, and Greece was entirely filled with her courtesans; as that witty writer Aristophanes (in his Acharnenses[1]) relates,—saying, that the Peloponnesian war was excited by Pericles, on account of his love for Aspasia, and on account of the girls who had been carried away from her by the Megarians.
For some young men, drunk with the cottabus
Going to Megara, carry off by stealth
A harlot named Simætha. Then the citizens
Of Megara, full of grief and indignation,
Stole in return two of Aspasia's girls;
And this was the beginning of the war
Which devastated Greece, for three lewd women.
26. I therefore, my most learned grammarian, warn you to beware of the courtesans who want a high price, because
You may see other damsels play the flute,
All playing th' air of Phœbus, or of Jove;
But these play no air save the air of the hawk,
as Epicrates says in his Anti-Lais; in which play he also uses the following expressions concerning the celebrated Lais:—
But this fair Lais is both drunk and lazy,
And cares for nothing, save what she may eat
- ↑ Ach. 524.
