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 III. Hetaïrism.—Jus primæ noctis.

Not only is it impossible to admit that mankind has, in all times and places, passed through a necessary stage of promiscuity, but we must go further, and also renounce a theory which has had some degree of success lately—the theory of obligatory primitive hetaïrism. According to this theory, when the instinct of holding feminine property arose in man, some individuals arrogated the right to keep for themselves one or more of the women hitherto common. The community then protested, and while tolerating this derogation from ancient usage, exacted that the bride, or purchased woman, should make an act of hetaïrism, or prostitution, before belonging to one man only.

It is Herodotus who has transmitted to us the most striking example of this kind, the one invoked by all the theorists of hetaïrism. I shall, therefore, quote it at length: "The most disgraceful of the Babylonian customs is the following. Every native woman is obliged, once in her life, to sit in the temple of Venus and have intercourse with some stranger. And many, disdaining to sit with the rest, being proud on account of their wealth, come in covered carriages, and take up their station at the temple with a numerous train of servants attending them. But the far greater part do this: many sit down in the temple of Venus, wearing a crown of cord round their heads; some are continually coming and others are going out. Passages marked out in a straight line lead in every direction through the women, along which strangers pass and make their choice. When a woman has once seated herself, she must not return home till some stranger has thrown a piece of silver into her lap and lain with her outside the temple. He who throws the silver must say thus: 'I beseech the goddess Mylitta to favour thee;' for the Assyrians call Venus Mylitta. The silver may be ever so small, for she will not reject it, inasmuch as it is not lawful for her to do so, for such silver is accounted sacred. The woman follows the first man that throws, and refuses no one. But when she has had intercourse, and has absolved herself from her obligations to the goddess, she returns home; and after that