thus the practice of the dowry became general. This dowry was constituted before marriage by a public act.[1] Securities and bonds were given to assure the dowry and the conditions of marriage. The dowry was mortgaged on the husband's property, and returned to the wife on the dissolution of the marriage. When the woman could shelter herself behind the shield of the dowry she was much more respected, and she even sometimes tyrannised in her turn. Aristophanes, Menander, Lucian, etc., pour out endless bitter criticisms on the haughty and extravagant rich woman.
In the comedy of The Clouds the good Strepsiades cries: "I led so happily in the country a good simple life, without vexation or care, rich in bees, in sheep, and in olives! Then I married the niece of Megacles, son of Megacles. I was of the country, she of the town; she was a haughty, extravagant woman, a true Cesyra. The wedding day, when I lay down by her, I smelt the wine, the cheese, and the wool; she cares for perfumes, saffron, tender kisses, expense, good cheer, and wanton transports. I will not say that she was idle—no—she worked hard at ruining me." According to Menander, religion served as an excuse to women for enormous expenses. Under the pretext of piety they ruined their husbands by religious sacrifices accompanied with perfumes, with golden clasps for the sandals, and female slaves ceremoniously ranged in a circle.[2]
One poor hen-pecked husband groans in these terms: "Cursed be the first man who invented marriage, and then the second, and the third, and the fourth, and all those who imitated them." One old husband laments: "I have married a witch with a dowry. I took her, to have her fields and house, and that, O Apollo, is the worst of evils."[3] Listen again to this one: "If being poor, you marry a rich woman, you give yourself a mistress and not a wife; you reduce yourself to be at the same time a slave and poor"—(Anaxandrides).[4]
To sum up, in ancient Greece marriage implied at first
