[116]. They were also called hetairistriae:—Hesychius: “Hetairistriae tribads”—and likewise dietairistriae, according to the same author: “Dietairistriae, women who go after prostitutes (hetairae) for carnal intercourse, just as men do; same as tribads.”
[117]. Aloysia Sigaea, Dialogue III.: “But I forgot (Tullia speaking) to tell you of the clitoris. This is a membranous body, situated at the bottom of the pubis, and representing in a reduced form the virile verge. As is the case with the verge, the amorous desire excites it to erection, and in certain women of an ardent temperament it inflames them with pruriency to such a degree that by the mere caressing of it with the hand they very often discharge their fluid without the help of a rider at all.”
[118]. If that woman whom Plater saw, according to Venette in his Tableau de l’amour conjugal, vol. I., ch. 1, 3, was not a tribad, she might well have been one; her clitoris, which with other women attains in its utmost erection the length of the half of the little finger or thereabouts, was as long as the neck of a goose. Is it surprising that women furnished with such an implement should wish to get rid of it? Amputation is however dangerous. Plater did not venture to finish an amputation which he had commenced, and Rodohamides, an Egyptian physician of the XIth century, had not courage to even undertake one, although commanded by a queen to perform the operation (Venette, IV., 2). Those whom Adramytes, the king of the Lydians, order to castrate women, were they more courageous? Athenæus, XII., 2: “Xanthus states in the second book of his Lydiacs, that Adramytes, king of the Lydians, was the first to have women castrated and employ them as eunuchs.” However that may be, these female eunuchs have very much exercised the commentators. Some suppose that straps and buckles did in their case the same service as the chastity-belts, which, it is said, Spaniards and Italians to this day compel their wives to wear if they think they have reason to be jealous: others believe that it was a question of suture, as is the case with the natives of Angola and the Congo, who stitch the vulvas of young girls for the protection of their maidenheads; but I believe that nobody knows anything certain in this respect. Nor does it appear that these women had to submit to an operation, which is certainly practised upon the young girls by the Arabs, Copts, Ethiopians, in some parts of Persia and Nigritia, and which consists in cutting off the prepuce of the clitoris; this is proved by abundant evidence, and reported in the Encyclopedia of Ersch and Gruber under the word: “Beschneidung” (Circumcision); how indeed could Athenæus describe as Eunuchize that which is calculated to increase the fecundity of women. I thought first that these women were tribads changed into eunuchs by the removal of their immoderately large clitoris; I am now inclined to believe that the king caused that to be done to these women, which according to Aristotle, Nat. Hist. IX., 50, was done to sows: “Sows are castrated, so that they shall no longer desire the coitus and get quickly fattened. They are castrated, suspended by their hind legs, after fasting two days, by an incision in that place where with a man the testicles are situated, in fact in the female matrix.” Pliny, Nat. Hist., VIII., 51: “Sows are castrated in the same way as female camels, after a fast of two days, suspended by their hind legs, by an incision in the vulva; they thus fatten much quicker.” Columella, VII., IX. 5: “Sows are also castrated by incision in the vulva; the wounds cicatrics, and they cannot conceive any more.” This practice has by no means disappeared; Schneider notes it in the passage of Columella; sows, cows, mares, sheep, are still castrated by excising their ovarium. Why should we not believe that Adramytes wanted the same process to be applied to the fair sex, in order to make women sterile? However the ancient Egyptians, who (see Strabo, book XVII., p. 824) undoubtedly circumcized themselves, and also their women, appear to me to have had in view not so much ovariotomy as the circumcision of the prepuce of the clitoris, a practice still in use with them, as stated above; cutting the female parts being thus something like circumcision, it is to be assumed that a similar operation was intended rather than any other one.
[119]. Let us consult again Aloysia Sigæa, Dialogue III.: “It has happened sometimes to myself (Tullia), when Callias tries on me his lubricities, when he tickles me and excites me. Then I sometimes water his too libertine hands with an abundant dew from my pleasure grounds. And that gives him an opportunity for letting off a whole sheaf of sarcasms and jokes. But what can I do? I begin to laugh, and so does he; I tell him he is too impudent, he tells me I am too lewd; we call each other names right and left, and in the midst of our mutual recrimination he will throw himself upon me, turn me on my back, and force me to submit to his assault, saying he will give me his dewdrops for those he has drawn from me, so that I may not be a loser.” Further on, Dial., IV.: “Callias, pressing me more closely to him, buried his weapon deeper into my belly, almost as though he were trying to get himself in altogether. Soon a delicious stream spirted into me, and at the same time I felt my liquid boiling over, causing me such delight that I forgot all reticence, and myself excited Callias more and more, pressing him against me and begging him to quicken his pace. Thus we expired both together with our muscles relaxing at one and the same instant.” You will understand by this the meaning of the epigram to Sosipator in the Analecta of Brunck, I., p. 504:
“Until the white liquor ran over with both of them, and Doras unwound her wearied limbs.”
Reiske thought the “white liquor” in this passage meant drops of perspiration. Nonsense! it means the virus secreted by both sexes, and liberated in the last spasms of lust. Aloysia Sigæa, Dialogue IV.: “As I finished speaking” (it is still Tullia that speaks), “he got upon me, and collecting all his strength he pushed the arrow into me, he filled my womb with his fecundating dew, and I also shed the rivulet of white liquid. Incapable of enduring any longer so intense a voluptuous feeling, we sank back exhausted in each other’s arms.” We have quoted besides on different occasions extracts from the rich treasures of Aloysia Sigæa, on this subject.
[120]. Women, whose clitoris is too prominent, are thus prevented from having intercourse with men, so that when they are seized with amorous designs they cannot well find any other way of satisfying their desires than by playing tribadism. (Venette IV., ii, 4.)
[121]. Pyrrha and Methymna are towns in Lesbos. Pomponius Mela, II., 7: “In the Troad is Lesbos, and in Lesbos there were formerly five cities, viz.: Antissa, Pyrrha, Eresos, Methymna, Mytilene.”
[122]. Not innocently, or rather, “not without crime”; some read “which I loved not without crime” others, “which I loved here without crime,” but the difference is not great. If you prefer “which I loved here,” the excuse itself is a confession. All we want is the admission that the tribad-tastes of Sappho are no modern invention, but originated, how we know not, and prevailed in very early times. The love of woman for woman was never known under any other name than the notorious one of tribadism.