SACRED PROSTITUTION.
Mr. Darwin, in his work entitled “The Descent of Man” (vol. ii., p.
361), seems to endorse the opinion that the high honour bestowed in
ancient times on women who were utterly licentious is intelligible
only “if we admit that promiscuous intercourse was the aboriginal and
therefore the long revered custom of the tribe,”[230] and I propose, in
the present chapter, to show that the fact referred to has nothing at
all to do with the custom sought to be supported by it.
The examples on which Sir John Lubbock relies have been taken from
Dulaure’s work on ancient religions, but they are more fully detailed
in the “Histoire de la Prostitution” by M. Pierre Dufour, and they
certainly form one of the most remarkable chapters in the history of
morals.
According to Herodotus,[231] every woman born in Babylonia was obliged
by law, once in her life, to submit to the embrace of a stranger. Those
who were gifted with beauty of face or figure soon completed this
offering to Venus, but of the others some had to remain in the sacred
enclosure for several years before they were able to obey the law. This
statement of Herodotus is confirmed by the evidence of Strabo, who
says the custom dated from the foundation of the city of Babylon.
The compulsory prostitution of Babylonia was connected with the worship
of Mylitta, and wherever this worship spread it was accompanied by the
sexual sacrifice. Strabo relates[232] that in Armenia the sons and
daughters of the leading families were consecrated to the service of
Anaïtis for a longer or shorter period. Their duty was to entertain
strangers, and those females who had received the greatest number were
on their return home the most sought after in marriage. The Phœnician
worship of Astarté was no less distinguished by sacred prostitution,
to which was added a promiscuous intercourse between the sexes during
certain religious fêtes, at which the men and women exchanged their
garments. The Phœnicians carried the custom to the Isle of Cyprus,
where the worship of their great goddess, under the name of Venus,
became supreme.
According to a popular legend the women of Amathonte, afterwards
noted for its temple, were originally known for their chastity. When,
therefore, Venus was cast by the waves naked on their shores, they
treated her with disdain, and as a punishment they were commanded
to prostitute themselves to all comers, a command which they obeyed
with so much reluctance that the goddess changed them into stone.
With their worship of Astarté or Venus, the Phœnicians introduced
sacred prostitution into all their Colonies. St. Augustine says that,
at Carthage, there were three Venuses rather than one: one of the
virgins, another of the married women, and a third of the courtesans,
to the last of whom it was that the Phœnicians sacrificed the chastity
of their daughters before they were married. It was the same in
Syria. At Byblos during the fêtes of Adonis, after the ceremony which
announced the resurrection of the God, every female worshipper had to
sacrifice to Venus either her hair or her person. Those who preferred
to preserve the former adjourned to the sacred enclosures, where they
remained for a whole day for the purpose of prostituting themselves.
The same curious custom appears to have been practised in Media and
Persia, and among the Parthians. The Lydians were particularly noted
for the zeal with which they practised the rites of Venus. They did
not limit their observance to occasional attendance at the sacred
fêtes, but, says Herodotus, they devoted themselves to the goddess,
and practised, for their own benefit, the most shameless prostitution.
It is related that a magnificent monument to Alyattes, the father of
Crœsus, was built by the contributions of the merchants, the artisans,
and the courtesans, and that the portion of the monument erected with
the sum furnished by the courtesans much exceeded both the other parts
built at the expense of the artisans and merchants.
Some writers deny that sacred prostitution was practised in Egypt,
but the great similarity between the worship of Osiris and Isis and
that of Venus and Adonis renders the contrary opinion highly probable.
On their way to the fêtes of Isis at Bubastis the female pilgrims
executed indecent dances when the vessels passed the villages on
the banks of the river. “These obscenities,” says Dufour, “were only
such as were about to happen at the temple, which was visited each
year by seven hundred thousand pilgrims, who gave themselves up to
incredible excesses.” Strabo asserts that a class of persons called
_pellices_ (harlots) were dedicated to the service of the patron deity
of Thebes, and that they “were permitted to cohabit with anyone they
chose.” It is true that Sir Gardner Wilkinson[233] treats this account
as absurd, on the ground that the women, many of whom were the wives
and daughters of the noblest families, assisted in the most important
ceremonies of the temple. This fact is, however, quite consistent with
Strabo’s statement, which may have referred to an inferior class of
female servitors, and considering the customs of allied peoples, it is
more likely to be true than the reverse. The testimony of Herodotus is
certainly opposed to that of Strabo. But the former acknowledges that
he did not reveal all that he knew of the secrets of Egyptian worship,
and we must, therefore, receive with some hesitation his assertion
that “the Egyptians are the first who, from a religious motive, have
forbidden commerce with women in the sacred places, or even entrance
there after having known them, without being first cleansed.” The Greek
historian adds—“Almost all other peoples, except the Egyptians and the
Greeks, have commerce with women in the sacred places; or, when they
rise from them, they enter there without being washed.” Whatever may be
the truth as to the inhabitants of ancient Egypt, at the present day
the dancing girls of that country, who are also prostitutes, attend the
religious festivals just as the ancient devotees of Astarté are said to
have done.
If we test the value of Herodotus’ evidence on the matter in question
by what is known of Grecian customs, it will have little weight. Sacred
prostitution at Athens was under the patronage of Venus Pandemos, who
is said to have been the first divinity that Theseus caused the people
to adore, or, at least, to whom a statue was erected on the public
place. The fêtes of that goddess were celebrated on the fourth day of
each month, a chief part in them being assigned to the prostitutes,
who then exercised their calling only for the profit of the goddess,
and they expended in offerings the money which they had gained under
her auspices. At the height of its prosperity the temple of Venus at
Corinth had, according to Strabo, one thousand courtesans. It was a
common custom in Greece to consecrate to Venus a certain number of
young girls, when it was desired to render the goddess favourable, or
when she had granted the prayers addressed to her.
The ordinary Athenian prostitutes appear to have been dedicated to the
public service, and they were forbidden to leave the country without
the consent of the Archons, who often accorded it only on having a
guarantee that they would return. There would seem even to have been
a College of Prostitutes, which was declared useful and necessary to
the state. The story of the social influence of the _heteræ_ during
the palmiest days of Greece is too well known to need repetition, and
it will be found fully detailed in the pages of Dufour. The majority
of the _heteræ_, however, were far from being in the position of
Aspasia, Laïs, and others, who were the friends, and even instructors,
of statesmen and philosophers. Although they were allowed some of
the rights of citizenship, they were often treated with implacable
rigour by the Areopagus, and their children were condemned to the
same ignominy as themselves. Curiously enough, the chief accusation
against the prostitutes was their irreligion, and although they were
priestesses in some temples, from others they were rigidly excluded.
Among the Romans the prostitute class held a much lower position in
public opinion than with the Greeks, and for a long time its members
were treated as below the attention of legislators, and were left to
the arbitrary regulation of the police. They were classed with the
slave population as civilly dead, and, having once become “infamous,”
the moral stain was indelible. Dufour says, as to the religious
character of Latin prostitution—“The courtesans at Rome were not,
as in Greece, kept at a distance from the altars. On the contrary,
they frequented all the temples, in order, no doubt, to find their
favourable chances of gain; they showed their gratitude to the divinity
who had been propitious to them, and they brought to his sanctuary a
portion of the gain which they believed they owed to him. Religion
closed its eyes to this impure source of revenue and offerings; civil
legislation did not intermeddle with these details of false devotion,
which concerned only religion; and, thanks to that tolerance, or rather
the systematic abstention from judicial and religious control, sacred
prostitution preserved at Rome nearly its primitive features, with this
difference, nevertheless, that it was always confined to the class of
courtesans, and that, instead of being an integral part of worship,
it was a foreign accessory to it.” According to some Roman writers,
however, Acca Laurentia (the foster-mother of Romulus and Remus), in
whose honour the Lupercales were instituted, was a prostitute, and
the fêtes of Flora had a similar origin. The goddess of flowers was
originally a courtesan, who made an enormous fortune, which she left
to the state. Her legacy was accepted, and the Senate, in gratitude,
decreed that the name of Flora should be inscribed in the fastes of
the state, and that solemn fêtes should perpetuate the memory of her
generosity. These fêtes always preserved a remembrance of their origin,
and were accompanied by the most scandalous scenes, which were publicly
enacted in the circus.
The religious prostitutes of antiquity find their counterparts in the
dancing girls attached to the Hindoo temples. These “female slaves of
the idol” are girls who have been dedicated to the temple service,
often by their own parents, and they act both as dancing girls and
courtesans. Notwithstanding their calling, they are treated with great
respect, and such would seem always to have been the case, if we may
judge by the ancient legend which relates that Gautama was entertained
at Vesali by a lady of high rank who had the title of “Chief of the
Courtesans.”[234] No doubt the attention paid to the appearance and
education of the temple prostitutes has much to do with the respect
with which they are treated, the position accorded by the ancient
Greeks to the superior class of _heteræ_ being due to an analogous
cause.
Bishop Heber says, in relation to the Bayadêres of Southern India,
that they differ considerably from the Nautch girls of the Northern
Provinces, “being all in the service of different temples, for which
they are purchased young, and brought up with a degree of care which is
seldom bestowed on the females of India of any other class. This care
not only extends to dancing and singing, and the other allurements of
their miserable profession, but to reading and writing. Their dress is
lighter than the bundle of red cloth which swaddles the _figuranté_
of Hindostan, and their dancing is more indecent; but their general
appearance and manner seemed to me far from immodest, and their
air even more respectable than the generality of the lower classes
of India.... The money which they acquire in the practice of their
profession is hallowed to their wicked gods, whose ministers are said
to turn them out without remorse, or with a very scanty provision, when
age or sickness renders them unfit for their occupation. Most of them,
however, die young.” The Bishop adds, “I had heard that the Bayadêres
were regarded with respect among the other classes of Hindoos, as
servants of the gods, and that, after a few years’ service, they often
marry respectably. But, though I made several inquiries, I cannot find
that this is the case; their name is a common term of reproach among
the women of the country, nor could any man of decent caste marry one
of their number.”[235] The courtesans of Hindostan do not appear to be
attached to the temples, but Tavernier relates that they made offerings
to certain idols, to whom they surrendered themselves when young to
bring good fortune.
The chief facts connected with religious prostitution have now been
given, and it remains only to show that this system has nothing to
do with any custom of communal marriage, or promiscuous intercourse
between the sexes, such as it is thought to give evidence of. Sir
John Lubbock says that the life led by the courtesans attached to the
Hindoo temples is not considered shameful, because they continue the
old custom of the country under religious sanction. This statement,
however, is wholly inaccurate, as the former existence of the custom
referred to cannot be established. The social phenomena which are
thought to establish that mankind has passed through a stage of
promiscuity in the intercourse between the sexes are capable of totally
different interpretation. The ease with which any doctrine or practice,
however absurd or monstrous, will be accepted, if it possesses a
religious sanction, would alone account for the respect entertained for
religious prostitutes. But among a people who, like the Hindoos, view
sexual immorality for personal gain with abhorrence, such a calling,
if it were based on so barbarous a custom as communal marriage, would
inevitably lessen rather than increase that sentiment. On the other
hand, if the religious position accorded to the temple prostitutes
is connected with ideas which have a sacredness of their own, the
respect will be greatly increased. And thus, in fact, it is. Probably
no custom is more widely spread than the providing for a guest a
female companion, who is usually a wife or daughter of the host. Such
a connection with a stranger is permitted even among peoples who are
otherwise jealous preservers of female chastity. This custom of sexual
hospitality is said to have been practised by the Babylonians in the
time of Alexander, although, according to the Roman historian, parents
and husbands did not decline to accept money in return for the favours
thus accorded. Eusebius asserts that the Phœnicians prostituted their
daughters to strangers, and that this was done for the greater glory
of hospitality. So, also, we find that at Cyprus the women who devoted
themselves to the good goddess walked about the shores of the island to
attract the strangers who disembarked.
In the earliest phase of what is called sacred prostitution it was not
every man who was entitled to enjoy its privileges. The Babylonian
women, who were compelled to make a sacrifice of their persons once in
their lives, submitted to the embraces only of strangers. In Armenia,
also, strangers alone were entitled to seek sexual hospitality in the
sacred enclosures at the temple of Anaïtis, and it was the same in
Syria during the fêtes of Venus and Adonis. Dufour was struck by this
fact, and, speaking of it, he says, “It may be thought surprising
that the inhabitants of the country were so impressed with a worship
in which their women had all the benefit of the mysteries of Venus.”
He adds, however, that the former were not less interested than the
latter in these mysteries. “The worship of Venus was in some sort
stationary for the women, nomadic for the men, seeing that these could
visit in turn the different fêtes and temples of the goddess, profiting
everywhere, in these sensual pilgrimages, by the advantages reserved to
guests and to strangers.”
Besides hospitality, the practice of which is, under ordinary
circumstances, an almost sacred duty with uncultured peoples, there
was another series of ideas associated with the system of sacred
prostitution. In the East, the great aim of woman’s life is marriage
and bearing children. We have a curious reference to this fact in the
lament of the Hebrew women for Jephthah’s daughter, which appears to
have been occasioned less by her death than by the recorded fact that
“she knew no man.” When she heard of the vow made by her father, she
said to him, “Let me alone two months, that I may go up and down upon
the mountains and bewail my virginity, I and my fellows.” The desire
of the wife, however, is not merely for children, but for a man-child,
the necessity for which has given rise to the practice of adoption;
another custom which Sir John Lubbock believes to support his favourite
doctrine of communal marriage. In India adoption is practised when a
man has no son of his own, and it has a directly religious motive.
Sir Thomas Strange shows that the Hindoo law of inheritance cannot
be understood without reference to the belief that a man’s future
happiness depends “upon the performance of his obsequies and the
payment of his [spiritual] debts.” He who pays these debts is his
heir; and, as “offerings from sons are more effectual than offerings
from other persons, sons are first in order of succession.” Hence to
have a son is to the Hindoo a sacred duty, and when his wife bears no
children, or only daughters, he is compelled by his religious belief to
adopt one. We can understand how anxious for a son women must be where
those ideas prevail, and this anxiety has given rise to various curious
ceremonies having for their object to prevent or cure sterility. Some
of these, which have been described by Dulaure and other writers,
existed in Europe down to a comparatively recent period. In India, and
probably in some other Eastern countries, they are still practised both
by wives who have continued childless and by newly-married women, the
latter offering to the _Linga_ the sacrifice of their virginity.
This desire for children led to offerings being made to ensure the
coveted blessing, and to vows to be performed on its being obtained.
The nature of the vow would undoubtedly have some reference to the
thing desired; and, as related by an old Arabian traveller in India,
“when a woman has made a vow for the purpose of having children, if
she brings into the world a pretty daughter, she carries it to _Bod_
(so they call the idol which they adore), and leaves it with him.” The
craving for children was anciently as strong among Eastern peoples
as it is at the present day, and it is much more probable that this,
rather than a habit of licentiousness, either of the women themselves
or of the priests, led to the sacrifice at the shrine of Mylitta. If we
are to believe Herodotus, the Babylonian women were in his time noted
for their virtue, although at a later period they would seem to have
lost that characteristic.
The desire for children is directly opposed to the feeling which would
operate in the case of communal marriage, where parents and children,
having no special relation, no one would have any particular interest
in preserving the issue of such intercourse. Among the uncultured
peoples of the present era who the most nearly approach in their sexual
relations to a state of communal marriage, the indifference to children
is often apparent. Infanticide is very general, and abortion is often
practised by the women to enable them to retain the favour of their
husbands. The sacred prostitution, which is intimately connected with
the craving for children, must, therefore, have originated at a time
when a considerable advance had been made in social culture.
It would not be surprising if the ancient Babylonish custom had,
of itself, resulted in a system of sacred prostitution. The act of
sexual intercourse was in the nature of an offering to the Goddess of
Fecundity, and a life of prostitution in the service of the goddess
might well come to be viewed as pleasing to her and as deserving of
respect at the hands of her worshippers. We have an analogous phase of
thought in the Japanese notion, that a girl who enters the Yoshiwara
for the purpose of thus supporting her parents performs a highly
meritorious act. In Armenia, as we have seen, children were devoted by
their parents to the service of the great goddess for a term of years,
and those who had received the most numerous favours from strangers
were the most eagerly sought after in marriage on the expiration of
that period. That dedication was in pursuance of a vow, which no doubt,
like the vows of Indian women at the present day, would at first have
relation to some sexual want, although thank-offerings of the same
character would afterwards come to be presented by the worshippers of
the goddess for blessings of any description. Thus Xenophon consecrated
fifty courtesans to the Corinthian Venus, in pursuance of the vow which
he had made when he besought the goddess to give him the victory in the
Olympian games. Pindar makes Xenophon thus address these slaves of the
goddess: “Oh, young damsels, who receive all strangers and give them
hospitality, priestesses of the goddess Pitho in the rich Corinth, it
is you who, in causing the incense to burn before the images of Venus
and in invoking the mother of love, often merit for us her celestial
aid, and procure for us the sweet moments which we taste on the
luxurious couches where is gathered the delicate fruit of beauty.”
The legitimate inference to be made from what has gone before is that
sacred prostitution sprang from the primitive custom of providing
sexual hospitality for strangers, the agents by which it was carried
out being supplied by the votaries of the deity under whose sanction
the custom was placed. Assuming its existence, and the strong desire
on the part of married women for children, which led them to sacrifice
their own virginity as an offering to the Goddess of Fecundity, or to
dedicate their daughters to her service, we have a perfect explanation
of the custom of sacred prostitution. The duty of these “servants of
the idol” would include the furnishing of hospitality to the strangers
who visited the shrines and fêtes of the deity. These pilgrims became
the guests of the deity, and she was bound to furnish them with the
same hospitality as that which they would have met with if they had
been entertained by private individuals. The piety of her worshippers
enabled her to do this, either by devoting their daughters for a
limited period to this sacred service, in return for which the reward
of fecundity would be looked for, or by presenting them absolutely
to the goddess in return for favours received at her hands. It is
not surprising that among peoples having such notions, the temple
courtesans were regarded with great respect, nor that those who had
acted in that capacity with success were eagerly sought after as wives.
It is more difficult to understand how sexual hospitality should have
come to be placed under divine sanction. The difficulty vanishes,
however, when the light in which the process of generation is viewed
in the East is considered. That which by us is looked upon as due to
a passionate impulse, was anciently (except among certain religious
sects), and is still to the Eastern mind, an act of mysterious
significance. The male organ of generation was the symbol of creative
power, and the veneration in which it was held led to practices which
to a modern European are nothing but disgusting, although to the Semite
they partake of a purely religious character.
To pursue this subject further would be to enter upon the wide field of
Phallic worship. Sufficient has, however, already been said to prove
that sacred prostitution is only remotely connected, if at all, with
communal marriage. The only apparent connection between them is the
sexual hospitality to strangers which the former was established to
supply; but the association is only apparent, as the providing of that
hospitality is perfectly consistent with the recognition of the value
of female chastity, and is quite independent of any ideas entertained
as to marriage.
In conclusion, I may add that the opinion expressed by Sir John
Lubbock,[236] that the Grecian _hetæræ_ were more highly esteemed than
the married women, because the former were originally countrywomen and
relations, and the latter captives and slaves, is not consistent with
the facts of the case. Any one conversant with the social customs of
ancient Greece will be able to give a totally different explanation
of that phenomenon. Marriage with foreign women was forbidden, and
thus captives and slaves furnished the Greeks with concubines and
prostitutes, while their wives were taken from among their own
countrywomen. Even such was the case in the earliest heroic ages,
when, says Mr. Gladstone, the intercourse between husband and wife was
“thoroughly natural, full of warmth, dignity, reciprocal deference,
and substantial, if not conventional delicacy.” The same writer says:
“The relations of youth and maiden generally are indicated with extreme
beauty and tenderness in the Iliad; and those of the unmarried woman
to a suitor, or probable spouse, are so portrayed, in the case of the
incomparable Nausicaa, as to show a delicacy and freedom that no period
of history or state of manners can surpass.”[237]
FOOTNOTES:
[230] Sir John Lubbock’s “Origin of Civilisation,” 3rd ed., p. 96.
[231] Clio, sec. 199.
[232] Bk. ii., Melpom., 172.
[233] “Ancient Egyptians,” iv., 204.
[234] Mrs. Spier’s “Life in Ancient India,” p. 281.
[235] “Journey,” iii., 219.
[236] _Op. cit._, p. 120.
[237] “Juventus Mundi,” pp. 408, 411.