727. From Jerome against Jovin., lib. i. (near the end); Epist. i. 52.
'Socrates Xantippen et Myron neptem Aristidis duas habebat uxores ...
Quodam autem tempore cum infinita conuicia ex superiori loco ingerenti
Xantippae restitisset, aqua perfusus immunda, nihil amplius respondit,
quàm, capite deterso: Sciebam (inquit) futurum, ut ista tonitrua hymber
sequeretur.' The story is thus told by Erasmus, as translated by Udall.
'Socrates, after that he had within dores forborne his wife Xantippe, a
greate while scoldyng, and at the last beyng wearie, had set him doune
without the strete doore, she beyng moche the more incensed, by reason of
her housbandes quietnesse and stilnesse, powred down a pisse-bolle upon him
out of a windore, and al beraied him. But upon soche persones as passed by,
laughing and hauing a good sport at it, Socrates also, for his part,
laughed again as fast as the best, saiyng: Naie, I thought verie well in my
minde, and did easily prophecie, that after so great a thonder would come a
raine.'--Udall, tr. of Erasmus' Apophthegmes, _Socrates_, § 59.
733. These instances are also from Jerome, some twenty lines further on
(same page). 'Quid referam Pasiphaën, Clytemnestram, et Eriphylam; quarum
prima deliciis diffluens, quippe regis uxor, tauri dicitur expetisse
concubitus: altera occidisse uirum ob amorem adulteri: tertia prodidisse
Amphiarãum, et saluti uiri monile aureum praetulisse.' This passage is
quoted, almost in the same words, in the margin of E. As to Eriphyle,
Chaucer shews that he possessed further information, as he mentions Thebes.
He consulted, in fact, the Thebaid of Statius, bk. iv, where we learn that
Eriphyle betrayed her husband Amphiaraus, for a golden necklace; he was
thus forced to accompany Polynices to the siege of Thebes, where he
perished by being swallowed up by an earthquake. Chaucer again calls him
_Amphiorax_ in Anelida, 57, and in Troilus, ii. 105, v. 1500. Cf. Lydgate's
Siege of Thebes, part 3.
747. Tyrwhitt says:--'In the Epistola Valerii, in MS. Reg. 12. D. iii. [in
the British Museum], the story is told thus: "_Luna_ virum suum interfecit
quem nimis odivit: _Lucilia_ suum quem nimis amavit. Illa sponte miscuit
aconita: haec decepta furorem propinavit pro amoris poculo." _Lima_ and
_Luna_ in many MSS. are only distinguishable by a small stroke over the
_i_, which may easily be overlooked where it is, and supposed where it is
not.' However, the right name is neither _Lima_ nor _Luna_, but _Liuia_
(Livia), which is easily confused with either of the other forms. Livia
poisoned her husband Drusus (son of Tiberius), at the instigation of
Sejanus, A. D. 23. See Ben Jonson's [312] Sejanus, Act ii. sc. 1. Lucia (or
rather Lucilia) was the wife of Lucretius the poet; see Tennyson's poem of
Lucretius (Lounsbury, Studies in Chaucer, ii. 369).
757. This is a stock story, told of various people. Tyrwhitt says that it
occurs in the Epistola Valerii, of one _Pavorinus_, and that the story
begins:--'Pavorinus flens ait Arrio.' Lounsbury (Studies in Chaucer, ii.
369) referring to the same story, gives the name as Pacuvius. It is, in
fact, one of the stories in the Gesta Romanorum (tale 33), where it is
ascribed to Valerius. (By Valerius is, of course, meant the Epistola
Valerii of Walter Mapes, where it duly appears, as Tyrwhitt notes, and may
be found in MS. Reg. 12. D. iii; as is observed by Sir F. Madden, in a note
to Warton's Hist. E. Poet., ed. Hazlitt, 1871, i. 250. It does _not_ refer
to Valerius Maximus, as I have ascertained.)
In the Gesta, it is told of Paletinus, who lamented to his friend Arrius
that a certain tree in his garden was fatal, for three of his wives had,
successively, hung themselves upon it. Arrius at once begged to have some
slips of it; and Paletinus 'found this remarkable tree the most productive
part of his estate.'
The story is really from Cicero, De Oratore, lib. ii. 69; 278. 'Salsa sunt
etiam, quae habent suspicionem ridiculi absconditam; quo in genere est
illud Siculi, cum familiaris quidam quereretur, quod diceret, uxorem suam
suspendisse se de ficu. _Amabo te_, inquit, _da mihi ex ista arbore, quos
seram, surculos_.'
Thus the original story only mentions _one_ wife. This is just how stories
grow.
A similar story is ascribed to Diogenes. 'When he [Diogenes] had on a time
espied women hanging upon an olive-tree, and there strangled to death with
the halters: Would God (said he) that the other trees had like fruite
hanging on them!'--Udall, tr. of Erasmus' Apophthegmes, Diogenes, § 124.
766. The horrible story of 'the Widow of Ephesus' is of this character, but
not _quite_ so bad, as her husband died naturally. See Wright's
introduction to his edition of The Seven Sages, p. lxvi; and the text of
the same, pp. 84-9. It occurs in John of Salisbury, Policraticus, viii. 11.
And see Exempla of Jacques de Vitry, ed. Crane, 1890, p. 228; Clouston's
Pop. Tales, i. 29.