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and squares for the purpose of display and gossip.[1] At home she is often a tyrant to her maidservants, and not infrequently whips them severely with her own hand.[2] Precisely the reverse of this picture is the condition of the Byzantine maiden in her father's house; before her coverture she is persistently immured in the women's apartments, and seldom passes the outer door of the dwelling; never unless under strict surveillance.[3] In most instances, however, her state of seclusion is not of long duration; for, at the age of fourteen or fifteen she is considered to be marriageable.[4] She
- ↑ Chrysostom, De non Iterat. Conj., 4 (in Migne, i, 618). At all times there were ladies of such lubricity as to court the opportunity of bathing before men in the public baths; prohibited by Marcus (Hist. Aug.. 23), this commerce of the sexes was encouraged by Elagabalus, and again forbidden by Alexander (Hist. Aug., 24, 34). Hadrian, however, seems to have been the first to declare against this promiscuous bathing (Hist. Aug., 18): "Olim viri foeminaeque mixtim lavabant, nullo pudore nuditatis," says Casaubon, commenting on the passage; cf. Aulus Gell., x, 3; Cod. Theod., IX, iii, 3; Cod., V, xvii, 11; Novel, xxii, 16, etc. Clement Alex. (c. 200) complains that ladies were to be seen in the baths at Alexandria like slaves exposed for sale; Paedag., iii, 5. Far different was the conduct of the Byzantine matrons a thousand years later; they then fell into the ways of Oriental exclusiveness as seen amongst the dominant Turks; see Filelfo, Epistolae, ix, Sphortiae Sec., 1451. A native of Ancona, who lived at CP. for several years in the half century preceding the capture of the city.
- ↑ Chrysostom, In Epist. ad Ephes., iv, Hom. xv, 3 (in Migne, xi, 109). The cries of the girl, often tied to a bedpost, might even be heard in the street, and if she stripped herself in a public bath the weals on her back were sometimes the subject of public remark. Whilst counselling mercy he considers that the whipping is generally deserved.
- ↑ Chrysostom, Quales duc. sint Uxores, 7 (in Migne, iii, 236); In Epist. I ad Corinth., Hom. xii, 5 (in Migne, x, 103).
- ↑ Fifteen for males and thirteen for females were the marriageable ages as legally recognized; Leo, Novel., lxxiv.
