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Paris, in "Phrygian dress", a second-century CE Roman marble (The King's Library, British Museum)
I call this photo:
"Paris of Troy -2 "
That's Paris and the forbidden apple - or fig - Phrygian code for Amazon on male anal sex ... The Phrygian penis was in the Fibula or bronze penis cage.
The Greeks adopted this system: in Aristophanes "Lysistrata" ravenous and sex-starved Greek women decide as a collective to stop having sex with their men. Eventually male/female sex roles are reversed ...
***
" ... Paris ..., also known as Alexander (?λ?ξανδρος, Aléxandros), the son of King Priam and Queen Hecuba of Troy, appears in a number of Greek legends.
Of these appearances, probably the best known was the elopement with Helen, queen of Sparta, this being one of the immediate causes of the Trojan War. Later in the war, he fatally wounds Achilles in the heel with an arrow as foretold by Achilles' mother, Thetis.
... Paris was a child of Priam and Hecuba . Just before his birth, his mother dreamed that she gave birth to a flaming torch. This dream was interpreted by the seer Aesacus as a foretelling of the downfall of Troy, and he declared that the child would be the ruin of his homeland. On the day of Paris's birth, it was further announced by Aesacus that the child born of a royal Trojan that day would have to be killed to spare the kingdom, being the child that would bring about the prophecy. Though Paris was indeed born before nightfall, he was spared by Priam. Hecuba was also unable to kill the child, despite the urging of the priestess of Apollo, one Herophile. Instead, Paris's father prevailed upon his chief herdsman, Agelaus, to remove the child and kill him. The herdsman, unable to use a weapon against the infant, left him exposed on Mount Ida, hoping he would perish there.... He was, however, suckled by a she-bear. Returning after nine days, Agelaus was astonished to find the child still alive and brought him home in a backpack (Greek p?ra, hence by folk etymology Paris’s name) to rear as his own. He returned to Priam bearing a dog's tongue as evidence of the deed's completion.
Paris's noble birth was betrayed by his outstanding beauty and intelligence. While still a child, he routed a gang of cattle-thieves and restored the animals they had stolen to the herd, thereby earning the surname Alexander ("protector of men"). It was at this time that Oenone became Paris's first lover. She was a nymph from Mount Ida in Phrygia. Her father was Cebren, a river-god or, according to other sources, she was the daughter of Oeneus. She was skilled in the arts of prophecy and medicine, which she had been taught by Rhea and Apollo, respectively. When Paris later left her for Helen, she told him that if he ever was wounded, he should come to her, for she could heal any injury, even the most serious wounds.
Paris's chief distraction at this time was to pit Agelaus's bulls against one another. One bull began to win these bouts consistently. Paris began to set it against rival herdsmen's own prize bulls and it defeated them all. Finally, Paris offered a golden crown to any bull that could defeat his champion. Ares responded to this challenge by transforming himself into a bull and easily winning the contest. Paris gave the crown to Ares without hesitation. It was this apparent honesty in judgment that prompted the gods of Olympus to have Paris arbitrate the divine contest between Hera, Aphrodite, and Athena.
... In celebration of the marriage of Peleus and Thetis, Lord Zeus, father of the Greek pantheon, hosted a banquet on Mount Olympus. Every deity and demi-god had been invited, except Eris, the goddess of strife (no one wanted a troublemaker at a wedding). For revenge, Eris threw the golden Apple of Discord inscribed with "t?i kallist?i" – "For the most beautiful" – into the party, provoking a squabble among the attendant goddesses over for whom it had been meant.
The goddesses thought to be the most beautiful were Hera, Athena, and Aphrodite, and each one claimed the apple. They started a quarrel so they asked Zeus to choose one of them. Knowing that choosing any of them would bring him the hatred of the other two, Zeus did not want to take part in the decision. He thus appointed Paris to select the most beautiful.
... Escorted by Hermes, the three goddesses bathed in the spring of Mount Ida and approached Paris as he herded his cattle. Having been given permission by Zeus to set any conditions he saw fit, Paris required that the goddesses undress before him (alternatively, the goddesses themselves chose to disrobe to show all their beauty). Still, Paris could not decide, as all three were ideally beautiful, so the goddesses attempted to bribe him to choose among them. Hera offered ownership of all of Europe and Asia. Athena offered skill in battle, wisdom and the abilities of the greatest warriors. Aphrodite offered the love of the most beautiful woman on Earth: Helen of Sparta. Paris chose Aphrodite and therefore Helen.
Helen was already married to King Menelaus of Sparta (a fact Aphrodite neglected to mention), so Paris had to raid Menelaus's house to steal Helen from him - according to some accounts, she fell in love with Paris and left willingly.
The Spartans' expedition to retrieve Helen from Paris in Troy is the mythological basis of the Trojan War. This triggered the war because Helen was famous for her beauty throughout Achaea (ancient Greece), and had many suitors of extraordinary ability. Therefore, following Odysseus's advice, her father Tyndareus made all suitors promise to defend Helen's marriage to the man he chose for her. When Paris took her to Troy, Menelaus invoked this oath. Helen's other suitors– who between them represented the lion's share of Achaea's strength, wealth and military prowess– were obliged to help bring her back. Thus, the whole of Greece moved against Troy in force and the Trojan War began. ... " Wikipedia
Garden of Priapus - 343
More Boss lady and two Asians over a rare black male ass - second Asian roughly mounting ... cowgirl style ...
***
The solution to endless war in Aristophanes "Lysistrata" was suggested by an Oracle:
Come on ladies, stop all these excuses!
All right, you miss your men. But don’t you see
they miss you, too? I’m sure the nights they spend
don’t bring them any pleasure. But please, dear friends,
hold on—persevere a little longer.
An oracle has said we will prevail,
if we stand together. That’s what it said.
Tell us what it prophesied.
“When the sparrows, as they fly away,
escaping from the hoopoe birds, shall stay
together in one place and shall say nay
to sexual encounters, then a bad day
will be rare. High thundering Zeus will say
‘What once was underneath on top I’ll lay.’”
Women are going to lie on top of men?
LYSISTRATA [continuing the oracle]
“ . . . but if the sparrows fight and fly away
out of the holy shrine, people will say
no bird is more promiscuous than they.”
That oracle is clear enough, by god. ..."
Aristophanes "Lysistrata"
Garden of Priapus - 344
More Boss lady and two Asians over a rare black male ass - Boss lady has a go - missionary style ...
Shot blocked. Used workaround.
More of Lysistrata: Lust in ancient Greece was female - Why? My guess is the general application of the penis cage in the classical world: later in the play the women are accused by men of being promiscuous and addicted to various phallic cults ...
" ... Lysistrata ( Attic Greek: Λυσιστρ?τη, Lysistrát?, "Army Disbander") is an ancient Greek comedy by Aristophanes, originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BC. It is a comic account of a woman's extraordinary mission to end the Peloponnesian War between Greek city states by denying all the men of the land any sex, which was the only thing they truly and deeply desired. Lysistrata persuades the women of the warring cities to withhold sexual privileges from their husbands and lovers as a means of forcing the men to negotiate peace—a strategy, however, that inflames the battle between the sexes.
The play is notable for being an early exposé of sexual relations in a male-dominated society. Additionally, its dramatic structure represents a shift from the conventions of Old Comedy, a trend typical of the author's career. It was produced in the same year as the Thesmophoriazusae, another play with a focus on gender-based issues, just two years after Athens' catastrophic defeat in the Sicilian Expedition.
There are a lot of things about us women
That sadden me, considering how men
These lines, spoken by the Athenian Lysistrata and her friend Calonice at the beginning of the play, set the scene for the action that follows. Women, as represented by Calonice, are sly hedonists in need of firm guidance and direction. Lysistrata, however, is an extraordinary woman with a large sense of individual and social responsibility. She has convened a meeting of women from various Greek city-states that are at war with each other. (There is no explanation of how she manages this, but the satirical nature of the play makes this unimportant.) Soon after she confides in her friend her concerns for the female sex, the women begin arriving.
With support from the Spartan Lampito, Lysistrata persuades the other women to withhold sexual privileges from their menfolk as a means of forcing them to conclude the Peloponnesian War. The women are very reluctant, but the deal is sealed with a solemn oath around a wine bowl, Lysistrata choosing the words and Calonice repeating them on behalf of the other women. It is a long and detailed oath, in which the women abjure all their sexual pleasures, including the Lioness on the Cheese Grater (a sexual position).
Soon after the oath is finished, a cry of triumph is heard from the nearby Acropolis—the old women of Athens have seized control of it at Lysistrata's instigation, since it holds the state treasury, without which the men cannot long continue to fund their war. Lampito goes off to spread the word of revolt, and the other women retreat behind the barred gates of the Acropolis to await the men's response.
A Chorus of Old Men arrives, intent on burning down the gate of the Acropolis if the women do not open up. Encumbered with heavy timbers, inconvenienced with smoke and burdened with old age, they are still making preparations to assault the gate when a Chorus of Old Women arrives, bearing pitchers of water. The Old Women complain about the difficulty they had getting the water, but they are ready for a fight in defence of their younger comrades. Threats are exchanged, water beats fire, and the Old Men are discomfited with a soaking.
The magistrate then arrives with some Scythian Archers (the Athenian version of police constables). He reflects on the hysterical nature of women, their devotion to wine, promiscuous sex, and exotic cults (such as to Sabazius and Adonis), but above all he blames men for poor supervision of their womenfolk. He has come for silver from the state treasury to buy oars for the fleet and he instructs his Scythians to begin levering open the gate. However, they are quickly overwhelmed by groups of unruly women with such unruly names as σπερμαγοραιολεκιθολαχανοπ?λιδες (seed-market-porridge-vegetable-sellers) and σκοροδοπανδοκευτριαρτοπ?λιδες (garlic-innkeeping-bread-sellers).
Lysistrata restores order and she allows the magistrate to question her. She explains the frustrations that women feel at a time of war when the men make stupid decisions that affect everyone, and further complains that their wives' opinions are not listened to. She drapes her headdress over him, gives him a basket of wool and tells him that war will be a woman's business from now on. She then explains the pity she feels for young, childless women, ageing at home while the men are away on endless campaigns. When the magistrate points out that men also age, she reminds him that men can marry at any age whereas a woman has only a short time before she is considered too old. She then dresses the magistrate like a corpse for laying out, with a wreath and a fillet, and advises him that he's dead. Outraged at these indignities, he storms off to report the incident to his colleagues, while Lysistrata returns to the Acropolis.
The debate or agon is continued between the Chorus of Old Men and the Chorus of Old Women until Lysistrata returns to the stage with some news—her comrades are desperate for sex and they are beginning to desert on the silliest pretexts (for example, one woman says she has to go home to air her fabrics by spreading them on the bed). After rallying her comrades and restoring their discipline, Lysistrata again returns to the Acropolis to continue waiting for the men's surrender.
A man suddenly appears, desperate for sex. It is Kinesias, the husband of Myrrhine. Lysistrata instructs her to torture him. Myrrhine informs Kinesias that she will have sex with him but only if he promises to end the war. He promptly agrees to these terms and the young couple prepares for sex on the spot. Myrrhine fetches a bed, then a mattress, then a pillow, then a blanket, then a flask of oil, exasperating her husband with delays until finally disappointing him completely by locking herself in the Acropolis again. The Chorus of Old Men commiserates with the young man in a plaintive song.
A Spartan herald then appears with a large burden (an erection) scarcely hidden inside his tunic and he requests to see the ruling council to arrange peace talks. The magistrate, now also sporting a prodigious burden, laughs at the herald's embarrassing situation but agrees that peace talks should begin.
They go off to fetch the delegates. While they are gone, the Old Women make overtures to the Old Men. The Old Men are content to be comforted and fussed over by the Old Women; thereupon the two Choruses merge, singing and dancing in unison. Peace talks commence and Lysistrata introduces the Spartan and Athenian delegates to a gorgeous young woman called Reconciliation. The delegates cannot take their eyes off the young woman; meanwhile, Lysistrata scolds both sides for past errors of judgment. The delegates briefly squabble over the peace terms, but with Reconciliation before them and the burden of sexual deprivation still heavy upon them, they quickly overcome their differences and retire to the Acropolis for celebrations. The war is ended.
Another choral song follows. After a bit of humorous dialogue between tipsy dinner guests, the celebrants all return to the stage for a final round of songs, the men and women dancing together. All sing a merry song in praise of Athene, goddess of wisdom and chastity, whose citadel provided a refuge for the women during the events of the comedy, and whose implied blessing has brought about a happy ending to the play. ... " Wikipedia
[Athene was the goddess of male chastity - or the Fibula/bronze penis cage- Greek women were not bound by that - and as was mentioned by the magistrate were promiscuous and freely had lovers outside marriage - Below is mention of leather eight-inch dildos and fake penises - those were for the anus of penis caged or chaste husbands and lovers - men and boys and old men too..]
***
“ … [The action of the play takes place in a street in Athens, with the citadel on the Acropolis in the back, its doors facing the audience.]
LYSISTRATA
If they’d called a Bacchic celebration
or some festival for Pan or Colias
or for Genetyllis, you’d not be able
to move around through all the kettle drums.
But as it is, there are no women here.
[Calonice enters, coming to meet Lysistrata.]
Ah, here’s my neighbour—at least she’s come.
Hello, Calonice.
CALONICE
Hello, Lysistrata.
What’s bothering you, child? Don’t look so annoyed.
It doesn’t suit you. Your eyes get wrinkled.
LYSISTRATA
My heart’s on fire, Calonice—I’m so angry
at married women, at us, because,
although men say we’re devious characters . . .
CALONICE [interrupting]
Because, by god, we are!
LYSISTRATA [continuing]
. . . when I call them all
to meet here to discuss some serious business,
they just stay in bed and don’t show up.
CALONICE
Ah, my dear, they’ll come. It’s not so easy
for wives to get away. We’ve got to fuss
about our husbands, wake up the servants,
calm and wash the babies, then give them food.
LYSISTRATA
But there are other things they need to do—
more important issues.
CALONICE
My dear Lysistrata,
why have you asked the women to meet here?
What’s going on? Is it something big?
LYSISTRATA
It’s huge.
CALONICE
And hard as well?
LYSISTRATA
Yes, by god, really hard.
CALONICE
Then why aren’t we all here?
LYSISTRATA
I don’t mean that!
If that were it, they’d all be charging here so fast.
No. It’s something I’ve been playing with—
wrestling with for many sleepless nights.
CALONICE
If you’ve been working it like that, by now
it must have shrivelled up.
LYSISTRATA
Yes, so shrivelled up
that the salvation of the whole of Greece
is now in women’s hands.
CALONICE
In women’s hands?
Then it won’t be long before we done for.
LYSISTRATA
It’s up to us to run the state’s affairs—
the Spartans would no longer be around.
CALONICE
If they weren’t there, by god, not any more,
that would be good news.
LYSISTRATA
And then if all Boeotians
were totally destroyed!
CALONICE
Not all of them—
you’d have to save the eels.
LYSISTRATA
As for Athens,
I won’t say anything as bad as that. 40
You can imagine what I’d say. But now,
if only all the women would come here
from Sparta and Boeotia, join up with us,
if we worked together, we’d save Greece.
CALONICE
But what sensible or splendid act
could women do? We sit around playing
with our cosmetics, wearing golden clothes,
posing in Cimmerian silks and slippers.
LYSISTRATA
Those are the very things which I assume
will save us—short dresses, perfumes, slippers,
make up, and clothing men can see through.
CALONICE
How’s that going to work?
LYSISTRATA
No man living
will lift his spear against another man . . .
CALONICE [interrupting]
By the two goddesses, I must take my dress
and dye it yellow.
LYSISTRATA [continuing]
. . . or pick up a shield . . .
CALONICE [interrupting again]
I’ll have to wear my very best silk dress.
LYSISTRATA [continuing]
. . . or pull out his sword.
CALONICE
I need to get some shoes.
LYSISTRATA
O these women, they should be here by now!
CALONICE
Yes, by god! They should have sprouted wings
and come here hours ago.
LYSISTRATA
They’re true Athenians,
you’ll see—everything they should be doing
they postpone till later. But no one’s come
from Salamis or those towns on the coast.
CALONICE [with an obscene gesture]
I know those women—they were up early
on their boats riding the mizzen mast.
LYSISTRATA
I’d have bet
those women from Acharnia would come
and get here first. But they’ve not shown up.
CALONICE
Well, Theogenes’s wife will be here.
I saw her hoisting sail to come. Hey, look!
Here’s a group of women coming for you.
And there’s another one, as well. Hello!
Hello there! Where they from?
[Various women start arriving from all directions.]
LYSISTRATA
Those?
From Anagyrus.
CALONICE
My god, it seems we’re kicking up a stink.
[Enter Myrrhine.]
MYRRHINE
Hey, Lysistrata, did we get here late?
What’s the matter? Why are you so quiet?
LYSISTRATA
I’m not pleased with you, Myrrhine.
You’re late.
And this is serious business.
MYRRHINE
It was dark.
I had trouble tracking down my waist band.
If it’s such a big deal, tell these women.
LYSISTRATA
No, let’s wait a while until the women
from Sparta and Boeotia get here.
MYRRHINE
All right. That sounds like the best idea.
Hey, here comes Lampito.
[Lampito enters with some other Spartan women and with Ismenia, a woman from Thebes.]
LYSISTRATA
Hello Lampito,
my dear friend from Sparta. How beautiful
you look, so sweet, such a fine complexion.
And your body looks so fit, strong enough
to choke a bull.
LAMPITO
Yes, by the two gods,
I could pull that off. I do exercise
and work out to keep my butt well toned.
CALONICE [fondling Lampito’s bosom]
What an amazing pair of breasts you’ve got!
LAMPITO
O, you stroke me like I’m a sacrifice.
LYSISTRATA [looking at Ismenia]
And this young woman—where’s she from?
LAMPITO
By the twin gods, she’s an ambassador—
she’s from Boeotia.
MYRRHINE [looking down Ismenia’s elegant clothes]
Of course, from Boeotia.
She’s got a beautiful lowland region.
CALONICE [peering down Ismenia’s dress to see her pubic hair]
Yes. By god, she keeps that territory
elegantly groomed.
LYSISTRATA
Who’s the other girl?
LAMPITO
A noble girl, by the two gods, from Corinth.
CALONICE [inspecting the girl’s bosom and buttocks]
A really noble girl, by Zeus—it’s clear
she’s got good lines right here, back here as well.
LAMPITO
All right, who’s the one who called the meeting
and brought this bunch of women here?
LYSISTRATA
I did.
LAMPITO
Then lay out what it is you want from us.
MYRRHINE
Come on, dear lady, tell us what’s going on,
what’s so important to you.
LYSISTRATA
In a minute.
Before I say it, I’m going to ask you
one small question.
CALONICE
Ask whatever you want.
LYSISTRATA
Don’t you miss the fathers of your children
when they go off to war? I understand
you all have husbands far away from home.
CALONICE
My dear, it’s five full months my man’s been gone—
off in Thrace taking care of Eucrates.
MYRRHINE
And mine’s been stuck in Pylos seven whole months.
LAMPITO
And mine—as soon as he gets home from war
he grabs his shield and buggers off again.
LYSISTRATA
As for old flames and lovers—there are none left.
And since Milesians went against us,
I’ve not seen a decent eight-inch dildo.
Yes, it’s just leather, but it helps us out.
So would you be willing, if I found a way,
to work with me to make this fighting end?
MYRRHINE
By the twin goddesses, yes. Even if
in just one day I had to pawn this dress
and drain my purse.
CALONICE
Me too—they could slice me up
like a flat fish, then use one half of me
to get a peace.
LAMPITO
I’d climb up to the top
of Taygetus to get a glimpse of peace.
LYSISTRATA
All right I’ll tell you. No need to keep quiet
about my plan. Now, ladies, if we want
to force the men to have a peace, well then,
we must give up . . .
MYRRHINE [interrupting]
Give up what? Tell us!
LYSISTRATA
Then, will you do it?
MYRRHINE
Of course, we’ll do it,
even if we have to die.
LYSISTRATA
All right then—
we have to give up all male penises.
[The women react with general consternation.]
Why do you turn away? Where are you going?
How come you bite your lips and shake your heads?
And why so pale? How come you’re crying like that?
Will you do it or not? What will it be?
MYRRHINE
I won’t do it. So let the war drag on.
CALONICE
I won’t either. The war can keep on going.
LYSISTRATA
How can you say that, you flatfish? Just now
you said they could slice you into halves.
CALONICE
Ask what you like, but not that! If I had to,
I’d be willing to walk through fire—sooner that
than give up screwing. There’s nothing like it,
dear Lysistrata.
LYSISTRATA
And what about you?
MYRRHINE
I’d choose the fire, too.
LYSISTRATA
What a debased race
we women are! It’s no wonder men write
tragedies about us. We’re good for nothing
but screwing Poseidon in the bath tub.
But my Spartan friend, if you were willing,
just you and me, we still could pull it off.
So help me out.
LAMPITO
By the twin gods, it’s hard
for women to sleep all by themselves
without a throbbing cock. But we must try.
We’ve got to have a peace.
LYSISTRATA
O you’re a true friend!
The only real woman in this bunch.
CALONICE
If we really do give up what you say—
I hope it never happens!—would doing that
make peace more likely?
LYSISTRATA
By the two goddesses, yes,
much more likely. If we sit around at home
with all our make up on and in those gowns
made of Amorgos silk, naked underneath,
with our crotches neatly plucked, our husbands
will get hard and want to screw. But then,
if we stay away and won’t come near them,
they’ll make peace soon enough. I’m sure of it.
LAMPITO
Yes, just like they say—when Menelaus
saw Helen’s naked tits, he dropped his sword.
CALONICE
But my friend, what if our men ignore us?
LYSISTRATA
Well then, in the words of Pherecrates,
you’ll find another way to skin the dog.
CALONICE
But fake penises aren’t any use at all.
What if they grab us and haul us by force
into the bedroom.
LYSISTRATA
Just grab the door post.
CALONICE
And if they beat us?
LYSISTRATA
Then you must submit—
but do it grudgingly, don’t cooperate.
There’s no enjoyment for them when they just
force it in. Besides, there are other ways
to make them suffer. They’ll soon surrender.
No husband ever had a happy life
if he did not get on well with his wife.
CALONICE
Well, if you two think it’s good, we do, too.
LAMPITO
I’m sure we can persuade our men to work
for a just peace in everything, no tricks.
But how’ll you convince the Athenian mob?
They’re mad for war.
LYSISTRATA
That’s not your worry.
We’ll win them over.
LAMPITO
I don’t think so—
not while they have triremes under sail
and that huge treasure stashed away
where your goddess makes her home.
LYSISTRATA
But that’s all been well taken care of.
Today we’ll capture the Acropolis.
The old women have been assigned the task.
While we sit here planning all the details,
they’ll pretend they’re going there to sacrifice
and seize the place.
LAMPITO
You’ve got it all worked out.
What you say sounds good.
LYSISTRATA
All right Lampito,
let’s swear an oath as quickly as we can.
That way we’ll be united.
LAMPITO
Recite the oath.
Then we’ll all swear to it.
LYSISTRATA
That’s good advice.
Where’s that girl from Scythia?
[The Scythian slave steps forward. She’s holding a small shield.]
Why stare like that?
Put down your shield, the hollow part on top.
Now, someone get me a victim’s innards.
CALONICE
Lysistrata, what sort of oath is this
we’re going to swear?
LYSISTRATA
What sort of oath?
One on a shield, just like they did back then
in Aeschylus’s play—with slaughtered sheep.
CALONICE
You can’t, Lysistrata, not on a shield,
you can’t swear an oath for peace on that!
LYSISTRATA
What should the oath be, then?
CALONICE
Let’s get a stallion,
a white one, and then offer up its guts!
LYSISTRATA
Why a white horse?
CALONICE
Then how will we make our oath?
LYSISTRATA
I’ll tell you, by god, if you want to hear.
Put a large dark bowl down on the ground,
then sacrifice a jug of Thasian wine,
and swear we’ll never pour in water.
LAMPITO
Now, if you ask me, that’s a super oath!
LYSISTRATA
Someone get the bowl and a jug of wine.
[The Scythian girl goes back in the house and returns with a bowl and a jug of wine. Calonice takes the bowl.]
CALONICE
Look, dear ladies, at this splendid bowl.
Just touching this gives instant pleasure.
LYSISTRATA
Put it down. Now join me and place your hands
on our sacrificial victim.
[The women gather around the bowl and lay their hands on the wine jug. Lysistrata starts the ritual prayer.]
O you,
Goddess of Persuasion and the bowl
which we so love, accept this sacrifice,
a women’s offering, and be kind to us.
[Lysistrata opens the wine jug and lets the wine pour out into the bowl.]
CALONICE
Such healthy blood spurts out so beautifully!
LAMPITO
By Castor, that’s a mighty pleasant smell.
MYRRHINE
Ladies, let me be the first to swear the oath.
CALONICE
No, by Aphrodite, no—not unless
your lot is drawn.
LYSISTRATA [holds up a bowl full of wine]
Grab the brim, Lampito,
you and all the others. Someone repeat
for all the rest of you the words I say—
that way you’ll pledge your firm allegiance:
No man, no husband and no lover . . .
CALONICE [taking the oath]
No man, no husband and no lover . . .
LYSISTRATA
. . . will get near me with a stiff prick. . . Come on . . .
Say it!
CALONICE
. . . will get near me with a stiff prick.
O Lysistrata, my knees are getting weak!
LYSISTRATA
At home I’ll live completely without sex . . .
CALONICE
At home I’ll live completely without sex . . .
LYSISTRATA
. . . wearing saffron silks, with lots of make up . . .
CALONICE
. . . wearing saffron silks, with lots of make up . . .
LYSISTRATA
. . . to make my man as horny as I can.
CALONICE
. . . to make my man as horny as I can.
LYSISTRATA
If against my will he takes me by force . . .
CALONICE
If against my will he takes me by force . . .
LYSISTRATA
. . . I’ll be a lousy lay, not move a limb.
CALONICE
. . . I’ll be a lousy lay, not move a limb.
LYSISTRATA
I’ll not raise my slippers up towards the roof . . .
CALONICE
I’ll not raise my slippers up towards the roof . . .
LYSISTRATA
. . . nor crouch down like a lioness on all fours.
CALONICE
. . . nor crouch down like a lioness on all fours.
LYSISTRATA
If I do all this, then I may drink this wine.
CALONICE
If I do all this, then I may drink this wine.
LYSISTRATA
If I fail, may this glass fill with water.
CALONICE
If I fail, may this glass fill with water.
LYSISTRATA
Do all you women swear this oath?
ALL
We do.
LYSISTRATA
All right. I’ll make the offering.
[Lysistrata drinks some of the wine in the bowl … “
Aristophanes "Lysistrata"
Garden of Priapus - 345
More Boss lady and two Asians over a rare black male ass - second Asian roughly mounting ... cowgirl style ...
Erections in the Fibula were a painful experience. In this scene from Aristophanes "Lysistrata" a Greek wife tortures her husband by denying him sex.
Without the penis cage, he could have just masturbated - but this seems to not be possible ... The couple refer to Aphrodite as the deity of the sex act and from many sources, Aphrodite had a penis ... Most Greek sex was probably Amazon female on male anal sex ...
In the end, to end the torture the Greek husband had to rely on the services of a young boy - probably an uncaged adolescent to service him ...
- My guess is most Galla were in a permanent Fibula or bronze penis cage and only had anal sex with wives, prostitutes and young boys - Plato is on record as saying that sex was women over men ... That's also the oracle of Lysistrata -
“When the sparrows, as they fly away,
escaping from the hoopoe birds, shall stay
together in one place and shall say nay
to sexual encounters, then a bad day
will be rare. High thundering Zeus will say
‘What once was underneath on top I’ll lay.’”
***
[Lysistrata appears on a balcony of the citadel, looking off in the distance. Other women come out after her.]
LYSISTRATA
Hey, you women! Over here to me. Come quick!
CALONICE
What’s going on? Why are you shouting?
LYSISTRATA
A man!
I see a man approaching mad with love,
seized with desire for Aphrodite’s rites.
O holy queen of Cyprus, Cythera,
and Paphos, keep moving down the road,
the straight path you’ve been travelling on.
CALONICE
Where is he, whoever he is?
LYSISTRATA
Over there,
right beside the shrine of Chloe.
CALONICE
Oh yes,
there he is, by god. Who is he?
LYSISTRATA
Have a look.
Do any of you know him?
MYRRHINE
O god, I do.
It’s my husband Cinesias.
LYSISTRATA
All right,
your job is to torment him, be a tease,
make him hot, offer to have sex with him
and then refuse, try everything you can,
except the things you swore to on the cup.
MYRRHINE
Don’t you worry. I’ll do that.
LYSISTRATA
All right, then.
I’ll stay here to help you play with him.
We’ll warm him up together. You others,
go inside.
[The women go inside, including Myrrhine. Cinesias enters with a very large erection. An attendant comes with him carrying a young baby.]
CINESIAS
I’m in a dreadful way.
It’s all this throbbing. And the strain. I feel
as if I’m stretched out on the rack.
LYSISTRATA
Who’s there,
standing inside our line of sentinels?
CINESIAS
It’s me.
LYSISTRATA
A man?
CINESIAS
Yes, take a look at this!
LYSISTRATA
In that case leave. Go on your way.
CINESIAS
Who are you
to tell me to get out?
LYSISTRATA
The daytime watch.
CINESIAS
Then, by the gods, call Myrrhine for me.
LYSISTRATA
You tell me to summon Myrrhine for you?
Who are you?
CINESIAS
Cinesias, her husband,
from Paeonidae.
LYSISTRATA
Welcome, dear friend, your name
is not unknown to us. Your wife always
has you on her lips. Any time she licks
an apple or an egg she says, “Ah me,
if only this could be Cinesias.”
[Lysistrata licks her fist obscenely.]
CINESIAS
O my god!
LYSISTRATA
Yes, by Aphrodite, yes. And when our talk
happens to deal with men, your wife speaks up
immediately, “O they’re all useless sorts
compared to my Cinesias.”
CINESIAS
Please call her out.
LYSISTRATA
Why should I do that? What will you give me?
CINESIAS
Whatever you want, by god. I have this . . .
[Cinesias waves his erection in front of Lysistrata.]
I’ll give you what I’ve got.
LYSISTRATA
No thanks.
I think I’ll tell her to come out to you.
[Lysistrata leaves to fetch Myrrhine.]
CINESIAS
Hurry up. I’ve had no pleasure in life
since she’s been gone from home. I go out,
but I’m in pain. To me now everything
seems empty. There’s no joy in eating food.
I’m just so horny.
[Lysistrata appears dragging Myrrhine with her. Myrrhine is pretending to be reluctant.]
MYRRHINE [loudly so that Cinesias can hear]
I love him. I do.
But he’s unwilling to make love to me,
to love me back. Don’t make me go to him.
CINESIAS
O my dear sweetest little Myrrhine,
what are you doing? Come down here. 1
MYRRHINE
I’m not going there, by god.
CINESIAS
If I ask you,
won’t you come down, Myrrhine?
MYRRHINE
You’ve got no reason to be calling me.
You don’t want me.
CINESIAS
You don’t think I want you?
I’m absolutely dying for you!
MYRRHINE
I’m leaving.
CINESIAS
Hold on! You might want to hear our child.
Can you call out something to your mama?
CHILD
Mummy, mummy, mummy!
CINESIAS
What’s wrong with you? [
Don’t you feel sorry for the boy. It’s now
six days since he’s been washed or had some food.
MYRRHINE
Ah yes, I pity him. But it’s quite clear
his father doesn’t.
CINESIAS
My lovely wife,
come down here to the child.
MYRRHINE
Being a mother
is so demanding. I better go down.
What I put up with!
[Myrrhine starts coming down from the Acropolis accentuating the movement of her hips as she goes.]
CINESIAS
She seems to me
to be much younger, easier on the eyes.
She was acting like a shrew and haughty,
but that just roused my passion even more.
MYRRHINE [to the child]
My dear sweet little boy. But your father—
such rotten one. Come here. I’ll hold you.
Mummy’s little favourite.
CINESIAS
You dim-witted girl,
what are you doing, letting yourself
be led on by these other women,
causing me grief and injuring yourself?
MYRRHINE
Don’t lay a hand on me!
CINESIAS
Inside our home
things are a mess. You stopped doing anything.
MYRRHINE
I don’t care.
CINESIAS
You don’t care your weaving
is being picked apart by hens?
MYRRHINE
So what?
CINESIAS
You haven’t honoured holy Aphrodite
by having sex, not for a long time now.
So won’t you come back?
MYRRHINE
No, by god, I won’t—
unless you give me something in return.
End this war.
CINESIAS
Well now, that’s something I’ll do,
when it seems all right.
MYRRHINE
Well then, I’ll leave here,
when it seems all right. But now I’m under oath.
CINESIAS
At least lie down with me a little while.
MYRRHINE
I can’t. I’m not saying I wouldn’t like to.
CINESIAS
You’d like to? Then, my little Myrrhine,
lie down right here.
MYRRHINE
You must be joking—
in front of our dear baby child?
CINESIAS
No, by god.
[Cinesias turns toward the attendant.]
Manes, take the boy back home.
[The attendant, Manes, leaves with the child, returning home.]
All right then,
the lad’s no longer in the way. Lie down.
MYRRHINE
But, you silly man, where do we do it?
CINESIAS
Where? The Cave of Pan’s an excellent place.
MYRRHINE
How will I purify myself when I return
into the citadel?
CINESIAS
You can wash yourself
in the water clock. That would do the job.
MYRRHINE
What about the oath I swore? Should I become
a wretched perjurer?
CINESIAS
I’ll deal with that.
Don’t worry about the oath.
MYRRHINE
Well then, I’ll go and get a bed for us.
CINESIAS
No, no.
The ground will do.
MYRRHINE
No, by Apollo, no!
You may be a rascal, but on the ground?
No, I won’t make you lie down there.
[Myrrhine goes back into the Acropolis to fetch a bed.]
CINESIAS
Ah, my wife—
she really loves me. That’s so obvious.
[Myrrhine reappears carrying a small bed.]
MYRRHINE
Here we are. Get on there while I undress. O dear! I forgot to bring the mattress.
CINESIAS
Why a mattress? I don’t need that.
MYRRHINE
You can’t lie
on the bed cord. No, no, by Artemis,
that would be a great disgrace.
CINESIAS
Give me a kiss—
right now!
MYRRHINE [kissing him]
There you go.
[Myrrhine goes back to the Acropolis to fetch the mattress.]
CINESIAS
Oh my god—
get back here quickly!
[Myrrhine reappears with the mattress.]
MYRRHINE
Here’s the mattress.
You lie down on it. I’ll get my clothes off.
O dear me! You don’t have a pillow.
CINESIAS
But I don’t need a pillow!
MYRRHINE
By god, I do.
[Myrrhine goes back to the Acropolis for a pillow.]
CINESIAS
This cock of mine is just like Hercules—
he’s being denied his supper.
[Myrrhine returns with a pillow.]
MYRRHINE
Lift up a bit.
Come on, up! There, I think that’s everything.
CINESIAS
That’s all we need. Come here, my treasure.
MYRRHINE
I’m taking off the cloth around my breasts.
Now, don’t forget. Don’t you go lying to me
about that vote for peace.
CINESIAS
O my god,
may I die before that happens!
MYRRHINE
There’s no blanket.
CINESIAS
I don’t need one, by god! I want to get laid!
MYRRHINE
Don’t worry. You will be. I’ll be right back.
[Myrrhine goes back to the Acropolis to fetch a blanket.]
CINESIAS
That woman’s killing me with all the bedding!
[Myrrhine returns with a blanket.]
MYRRHINE
All right, get up.
CINESIAS
But it’s already up!
MYRRHINE
You want me to rub some scent on you?
CINESIAS
No, by Apollo. Not for me.
MYRRHINE
I’ll do it,
whether you want it rubbed on there or not—
for Aphrodite’s sake.
[Myrrhine goes back to the Acropolis to get the perfume.]
CINESIAS
O great lord Zeus,
pour the perfume out!
[Myrrhine returns with the perfume.]
MYRRHINE
Hold out your hand, now.
Take that and spread it round.
CINESIAS [rubbing the perfume on himself]
By Apollo,
this stuff doesn’t smell so sweet, not unless
it’s rubbed on thoroughly—no sexy smell.
MYRRHINE [inspecting the jar of perfume]
I’m such a fool. I brought the Rhodian scent!
CINESIAS
It’s fine. Just let it go, my darling.
MYRRHINE [getting up to leave]
You’re just saying that.
[Myrrhine goes back to the Acropolis to get the right perfume.]
CINESIAS
Damn the wretch who first came up with perfume!
[Myrrhine comes back from the Acropolis with another box of perfume.]
MYRRHINE
Grab this alabaster thing.
CINESIAS [waving his cock]
You grab this alabaster cock.
Come lie down here, you tease. Don’t go and fetch
another thing for me.
MYRRHINE
By Artemis, I’ll grab it.
I’m taking off my shoes. Now, my darling, you will be voting to bring on a peace.
CINESIAS
I’m planning to.
[Myrrhine goes back to the Acropolis. Cinesias turns and sees she’s gone.]
That woman’s killing me!
She teased me, got me all inflamed, then left.
[Cinesias gets up and declaims in a parody of tragic style.]
Alas, why suffer from such agony?
Who can I screw? Why’d she betray me,
the most beautiful woman of them all?
Poor little cock, how can I care for you?
Where’s that Cynalopex? I’ll pay him well
to nurse this little fellow back to health.
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
You poor man, in such a fix—your spirit
so tricked and in distress. I pity you.
How can your kidneys stand the strain,
your balls, your loins, your bum, your brain
endure an erection that’s hard for you,
without a chance of a morning screw.
CINESIAS
O mighty Zeus, it’s started throbbing once again.
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
A dirty stinking bitch did this to you.
CINESIAS
No, by god, a loving girl, a sweet one, too.
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
Sweet? Not her. She’s a tease, a slut.
CINESIAS
All right, she is a tease, but—
O Zeus, Zeus, I wish
you’d sweep her up there
in a great driving storm,
like dust in the air,
whirl her around,
then fall to the ground.
And as she’s carried down,
to earth one more time,
let her fall right away
on this pecker of mine. … “
Aristophanes "Lysistrata" Translated by Ian Johnston (2008)
Garden of Priapus - 346
More Boss lady and two Asians over a rare black male ass - Boss lady balls in hand ...
More evidence that the classical Greek penis was locked up in the Fibula - both the Athenian and Spartan delegates to the peace conference are suffering from painful erections because their wives have stopped having sex with them:
"SPARTAN HERALD
Not good. The Spartans are all standing tall and the allies, too— everyone is firm and hard. We need a thrust
in someone’s rear."
One of the proposed cures is having homosexual sex - "cornholing Cleisthenes". They also talk of "forking manure" which is a reference to anal sex - manure is the reason Greco Romans had to purify themselves after having sex. There also the constant threat of having their erections cut off by anti erection vigilantes.
The cure is brought by a sexually arousing naked young woman "Reconciliation"who takes them by the erections and forces them to come to a negotiated peace settlement.
“ …. [Enter the Spartan herald. He, too, has a giant erection, which he is trying to hide under his cloak.]
SPARTAN HERALD
Where’s the Athenian Senate and the Prytanes?
I come with fresh dispatches.
CINESIAS [looking at the Herald’s erection]
Are you a man,
or some phallic monster?
SPARTAN HERALD
I’m a herald,
by the twin gods. And my good man,
I come from Sparta with a proposal,
arrangements for a truce.
CINESIAS
If that’s the case,
why do you have a spear concealed in there?
SPARTAN HERALD
I’m not concealing anything, by god.
CINESIAS
Then why are you turning to one side?
What’s that thing there, sticking from your cloak?
Has your journey made your groin inflamed?
SPARTAN HERALD
By old Castor, this man’s insane!
CINESIAS
You rogue,
you’ve got a hard on!
SPARTAN HERALD
No I don’t, I tell you.
Let’s have no more nonsense.
CINESIAS [pointing to the herald’s erection]
Then what’s that?
SPARTAN HERALD
It’s a Spartan herald’s stick.
CINESIAS
O that’s what it is,
a Spartan herald stick. Let’s have a chat.
Tell me the truth. How are things going for you
out there in Sparta?
SPARTAN HERALD
Not good. The Spartans are all standing tall and the allies, too— everyone is firm and hard. We need a thrust
in someone’s rear.
CINESIAS
This trouble of yours—
where did it come from? Was it from Pan?
SPARTAN HERALD
No. I think it started with Lampito.
Then, at her suggestion, other women
in Sparta, as if from one starting gate,
ran off to keep men from their honey pots.
CINESIAS
How are you doing?
SPARTAN HERALD
We’re all in pain.
We go around the city doubled up,
like men who light the lamps.
The women
won’t let us touch their pussies, not until
we’ve made a peace with all of Greece.
CINESIAS
This matter
is a female plot, a grand conspiracy
affecting all of Greece. Now I understand.
Return to Sparta as fast as you can go.
Tell them they must send out ambassadors
with full authority to deal for peace.
I’ll tell our leaders here to make a choice
of our ambassadors. I’ll show them my prick.
SPARTAN HERALD
All you’ve said is good advice. I must fly.
[Cinesias and the Spartan Herald exit in opposite directions.]
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
There’s no wild animal harder to control
than women, not even blazing fire.
The panther itself displays more shame.
LEADER OF WOMEN’S CHORUS
If you know that, then why wage war with me?
You old scoundrel, we could be lasting friends.
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
But my hatred for women will not stop!
LEADER OF WOMEN’S CHORUS
Whatever you want. But I don’t much like
to look at you like this, without your clothes.
It makes me realize how silly you are.
Look, I’ll come over and put your shirt on.
[The Leader of the Women’s Chorus picks up a tunic, goes over to the Leader of the Men’s Chorus, and helps him put it on.]
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
By god, what you’ve just done is not so bad.
I took it off in a fit of stupid rage.
LEADER OF WOMEN’S CHORUS
Now at least you look like a man again.
And people won’t find you ridiculous.
If you hadn’t been so nasty to me,
I’d grab that insect stuck in your eye
and pull it out. It’s still in there.
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
So that’s what’s been troubling me. Here’s a ring.
Scrape it off. Get it out and show it to me.
God, that’s been bothering my eye for ages.
[The Leader of the Women’s Chorus takes the ring and inspects the Leader of the Men’s Chorus in the eye.]
LEADER OF WOMEN’S CHORUS
I’ll do it. You men are born hard to please.
My god, you picked up a monstrous insect.
Have a look. That’s a Tricorynthus bug!
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
By Zeus, you’ve been a mighty help to me.
That thing’s been digging wells in me a while.
Now it’s been removed, my eyes are streaming.
LEADER OF WOMEN’S CHORUS
I’ll wipe it for you, though you’re a scoundrel.
I’ll give you a kiss.
LEADER OF THE MEN’S CHORUS
I don’t want a kiss.
LEADER OF WOMEN’S CHORUS
I’ll will, whether it’s what you want or not.
[She kisses him]
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
O you’ve got me. You’re born to flatter us.
That saying got it right—it states the case
quite well, “These women—one has no life
with them and cannot live without them.”
But now I’ll make a truce with you. I won’t insult you any more in days to come,
and you won’t make me suffer. So now,
let’s make a common group and sing a song.
[The Men’s and Women’s Choruses combine.]
COMBINED CHORUS [addressing the audience]
You citizens, we’re not inclined
with any of you to be unkind. Just the reverse—our words to you
will be quite nice. We’ll act well, too.
For now we’ve had enough bad news.
So if a man or woman here needs ready cash, give out a cheer,
and take some minae, two or three.
Coins fill our purses now, you see.
And if we get a peace treaty,
you take some money from the sack,
and keep it. You don’t pay it back. I’m going to have a great shindig—
I’ve got some soup, I’ll kill a pig—
with friends of mine from Carystia. You’ll eat fine tender meat again.
Come to my house this very day.
But first wash all the dirt away,
you and your kids, then walk on by.
No need to ask a person why.
Just come straight in, as if my home
was like your own—for at my place we’ll shut the door right in your face.
[A group of Spartans enters.]
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
Ah, here come the Spartan ambassadors
trailing their long beards. They’ve got
something like a pig pen between their thighs.
[The Spartan ambassadors enter, moving with difficulty because of their enormous erections.]
Men of Sparta, first of all, our greetings.
Tell us how you are. Why have you come?
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
Why waste a lot of words to tell you?
You see the state that brought us here.
[The Spartans all display their erections with military precision.]
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
Oh my! The crisis has grown more severe.
It seems the strain is worse than ever.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
It’s indescribable. What can I say?
But let someone come, give us a peace
in any way he can.
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
Well now, I see
our own ambassadors—they look just like
our wrestling men with their shirts sticking out
around their bellies or like athletic types
who need to exercise to cure their sickness.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
Where’s Lysistrata? Can someone tell me?
We’re men here and, well, look . . .
[The Athenians pull back their cloaks and reveal that, like the Spartans, they all have giant erections.]
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
They’re clearly suffering from the same disease.
Hey, does it throb early in the morning?
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
By god, yes. What this is doing to me—
it’s torture. If we don’t get a treaty soon
we’ll going to have to cornhole Cleisthenes.
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
If you’re smart, keep it covered with your cloak.
One of those men who chopped off Hermes’ dick
might see you.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR [pulling his cloak over his erection]
By god, that’s good advice.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR [doing the same]
Yes, by the twin gods, excellent advice.
I’ll pull my mantle over it.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
Greetings, Spartans.
We’re both suffering disgracefully.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
Yes, dear sir, we’d have been in real pain
if one of those dick-clippers had seen us
with our peckers sticking up like this.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
All right, Spartans, we each need to talk.
Why are you here?
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
Ambassadors for peace.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
Well said. We want the same. Why don’t we call
Lysistrata. She’s the only one who’ll bring
a resolution to our differences.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
By the two gods, bring in Lysistratus,
if he’s the ambassador you want.
[Lysistrata emerges from the gates of the citadel.]
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
It seems there is no need to summon her.
She’s heard us, and here she is in person.
LEADER OF THE CHORUS
Hail to the bravest woman of them all.
You must now show that you’re resilient—
stern but yielding, with a good heart but mean,
stately but down-to-earth. The foremost men
in all of Greece in deference to your charms
have come together here before you
so you can arbitrate all their complaints.
LYSISTRATA
That task should not be difficult, unless
they’re so aroused they screw each other.
I’ll quickly notice that. But where is she,
the young girl Reconciliation?
[The personification of the the goddess Reconciliation comes out. She’s completely naked. Lysistrata addresses her first.]
Come here,
and first, take hold of those from Sparta,
don’t grab too hard or be too rough, not like
our men who act so boorishly—instead
do it as women do when they’re at home.
If they won’t extend their hands to you,
then grab their cocks.
[Reconciliation takes two Spartans by their penises and leads them over to Lysistrata.]
Now go and do the same
for the Athenians. You can hold them
by whatever they stick out.
Now then,
you men of Sparta, stand here close to me,
and you Athenians over here. All of you,
listen to my words. I am a woman,
but I have a brain, and my common sense
is not so bad—I picked it up quite well
from listening to my father and to speeches
from our senior men. Now I’ve got you here,
I wish to reprimand you, both of you,
and rightly so. At Olympia, Delphi, and Thermopylae (I could mention
many other places if I had a mind
to make it a long list) both of you
use the same cup when you sprinkle altars,
as if you share the same ancestral group.
We’ve got barbarian enemies, and yet
with your armed expeditions you destroy
Greek men and cities. At this point, I’ll end
the first part of my speech.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
This erection—
it’s killing me!
LYSISTRATA
And now you Spartans,
I’ll turn to you. Don’t you remember how,
some time ago, Periclidias came,
a fellow Spartan, and sat down right here,
a suppliant at these Athenian altars—
he looked so pale there in his purple robes—
begging for an army? Messenians then
were pressing you so hard, just at the time
god sent the earthquake. So Cimon set out
with four thousand armed infantry and saved
the whole of Sparta. After going through that,
how can you ravage the Athenians’ land,
the ones who helped you out?
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
Lysistrata,
you’re right, by god. They’re in the wrong.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR [looking at Reconciliation]
Not true,
but look at that incredibly fine ass!
LYSISTRATA
Do you Athenians think I’ll forget you?
Don’t you remember how these Spartans men,
back in the days when you were dressed as slaves
came here with spears and totally destroyed
those hordes from Thessaly and many friends
of Hippias and those allied with him?
It took them just one day to drive them out
and set you free. At that point you exchanged
your slavish clothes for cloaks which free men wear.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
I’ve never seen a more gracious woman.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR [looking at Reconciliation]
I’ve never seen a finer looking pussy.
LYSISTRATA
If you’ve done many good things for each other,
why go to war? Why not stop this conflict? Why not conclude a peace? What’s in the way? … “
Aristophanes "Lysistrata" Translated by Ian Johnston (2008)
Garden of Priapus - 347
More Boss lady and two Asians over a rare black male ass - first Asian roughly mounting missionary style ....
***
The nude young goddess Reconciliation arouses the Greek delegates - "forking manure and plouging naked" to me means anal sex - phallic Aphrodite on male anal sex ...
I’d like to strip and start ploughing naked.
By god, yes! But me first. I’ll fork manure.
You can do those things once you’ve made peace.
If these terms seem good, you’ll want your allies
to come here to join negotiations. ... "
" ... [In the negotiations which follow, the ambassadors use the body of Reconciliation as a map of Greece, pointing to various parts to make their points.]
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
We’re willing, but the part that’s sticking out
we want that handed back.
LYSISTRATA
Which one is that?
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR [pointing to Reconciliation’s buttocks]
This one here—that’s Pylos. We must have that—
we’ve been aching for it a long time now.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
By Poseidon, you won’t be having that!
LYSISTRATA
My good man, you’ll surrender it to them.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
Then how do we make trouble, stir up shit?
LYSISTRATA
Ask for something else of equal value.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR [inspecting Reconciliation’s body and pointing to her pubic hair]
Then give us this whole area in here—
first, there’s Echinous, and the Melian Gulf,
the hollow part behind it, and these legs
which make up Megara.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
By the twin gods,
my good man, you can’t have all that!
LYSISTRATA
Let it go.
Don’t start fighting over a pair of legs.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
I’d like to strip and start ploughing naked.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
By god, yes! But me first. I’ll fork manure.
LYSISTRATA
You can do those things once you’ve made peace.
If these terms seem good, you’ll want your allies
to come here to join negotiations.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADORS
What of our allies? We’ve all got hard ons.
Our allies will agree this is just fine.
They’re all dying to get laid!
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
Ours, as well
—no doubt of that.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
And the Carystians—
they’ll also be on board, by Zeus.
LYSISTRATA
Well said. Now you must purify yourselves.
We women will host a dinner for you
in the Acropolis. We’ll use the food
we brought here in our baskets. In there
you will make a oath and pledge your trust
in one another. Then each of you
can take his wife and go back home.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
Let’s go—
and hurry up.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR [to Lysistrata]
Lead on. Wherever you wish.
ATHENIAN AMBASSADOR
All right by Zeus, as fast as we can go.... "
Aristophanes "Lysistrata" Translated by Ian Johnston (2008)
Garden of Priapus - 348
Closing scene: Boss lady and two Asians over a rare black male ass - second Asian roughly mounting missionary style.
That was a high energy scene - but that seems to be generally true - "futa" or phallic Amazon sex generates more energy that regular sex
- The closest non-sexual thing is probably high energy Brazilian Samba ... Both feature Amazon fire ...
***
Closing peace and reconciliation song - which in addition to praising the Greek goddesses also salutes Nysa - and the god of Nysa - Bacchus - which tells me those phallic Aphrodite orgies were originally black African!
***
[The Chorus now sings to the assembled group, as the wives and husbands are rejoined.]
CHORUS
Lead on the dance, bring on the Graces,
and summon Artemis and her twin, Apollo, the god who heals us all,
call on Bacchus, Nysa’s god,
whose eyes blaze forth
amid his Maenads’ ecstasy,
and Zeus alight with flaming fire, and Hera, Zeus’s blessed wife,
and other gods whom we will use
as witnesses who won’t forget
the meaning of the gentle Peace
made here by goddess Aphrodite. Alalai! Raise the cry of joy,
raise it high, iai!
the cry of victory, iai!
Evoi, evoi, evoi, evoi!
LYSISTRATA
Spartan, now offer us another song, match our new song with something new.
SPARTAN AMBASSADOR
Leave lovely Taygetus once again
and, Spartan Muse, in some way
that is appropriate for us
pay tribute to Amyclae’s god,
and to bronze-housed Athena,
to Tyndareus’s splendid sons, who play beside the Eurotas.
Step now, with many a nimble turn,
so we may sing a hymn to Sparta,
dancing in honour of the gods,
with stamping feet in that place
where by the river Eurotas
young maidens dance,
like fillies raising dust,
tossing their manes,
like bacchants who play
and wave their thyrsus stalks,
brought on by Leda’s lovely child,
their holy leader in the choral dance.
But come let your hands bind up your hair.
Let your feet leap up like deer, sound out the beat
to help our dance. Sing out a song of praise
for our most powerful bronze-house goddess,
all-conquering Athena!
[They all exit singing and dancing]
Aristophanes "Lysistrata" Translated by Ian Johnston (2008)
Garden of Priapus - 349
Boss lady and a friend over a penis caged mount - missionary style.
More evidence in Aristophanes Lysistrata that loose sex was female not male in ancient Greece. - The magistrate complains about the cults of Sabazius and Adonis which were both wine and phallic cults run by women ...
“ …. MAGISTRATE
Has not our women’s lewdness shown itself
in how they beat their drums for Sabazius,
that god of excess, or on their rooftops
shed tears for Adonis? That’s what I heard one time in our assembly. Demostrates—
what a stupid man he is—was arguing
that we should sail to Sicily. Meanwhile,
his wife was dancing round and screaming out
“Alas, Adonis!” While Demostrates talked, saying we should levy soldiers from Zacynthus,
the woman was on the roof top, getting drunk
and yelling out “Weep for Adonis! Weep.”
But he kept on forcing his opinion through,
that mad brutal ox, whom the gods despise.
That’s just the kind of loose degenerate stuff
that comes from women.
LEADER OF MEN’S CHORUS
Wait until I tell you
the insolent things these women did to us—
all their abuse—they dumped their water jugs on us. So now we have to dry our clothes.
We look as if we’ve pissed ourselves.
MAGISTRATE
By Poseidon, god of the salt seas, it serves you right.
We men ourselves share in the blame for this.
We teach our wives their free and easy life,
and so intrigues come flowering out from them.
Here’s what we tell some working artisan,
“O goldsmith, about that necklace I bought here—
last night my wife was dancing and the bolt slipped from its hole. I have to take a boat
to Salamis. If you’ve got time tonight,
you could visit her with that tool of yours
and fix the way the bolt sits in her hole.”
Another man goes to the shoemaker,
a strapping lad with an enormous prick,
and says, “O shoemaker, a sandal strap
is pinching my wife’s tender little toe.
Could you come at noon and rub her strap,
stretch it really wide?” That’s the sort of thing that leads to all this trouble. Look at me,
a magistrate in charge of finding oars and thus in need of money now—these women
have shut the treasury doors to keep me out.
But standing here’s no use. …”
Aristophanes "Lysistrata" Translated by Ian Johnston (2008)
***
- Adonis was the sex object of a phallic Aphrodite before his death - the Greek Dumuzi to the phallic Innana.
- Sabazius may be related to ancient Saba or Ethiopia. It was a Jewish version of the rites of the phallic Cybele and her castrated consort Attis:
" ... SABAZIUS, a Phrygian or Thracian deity, frequently identified with Dionysus, sometimes (but less frequently) with Zeus. His worship was closely connected with that of the great mother Cybele and of Attis. His chief attribute as a chthonian god was a snake, the symbol of the yearly renovation of the life of nature. Demosthenes (De corona, p. 313) mentions various ceremonies practised during the celebration of the mysteries of this deity. One of the most important was the passing of a golden snake under the clothes of the initiated across their bosom and its withdrawal from below - an old rite of adoption. From Val. Max. i. 3, 2 it has been concluded that Sabazius was identified in ancient times with the Jewish Sabaoth (Zebaoth). Plutarch (Symp. iv. 6) maintains that the Jews worshipped Dionysus, and that the day of Sabbath was a festival of Sabazius. Whether he was the same as Sozon, a marine deity of southern Asia Minor, is doubtful. Some explain the name as the "beer god," from an Illyrian word sabaya, while others suggest a connexion with 2aFo (god of "health") or GrOas. His image and name are often found on "votive hands," a kind of talisman adorned with emblems, the nature of which is obscure. His ritual and mysteries (Sacra Savadia) gained a firm footing in Rome during the 2nd century A.D., although as early as 139 B.C. the first Jews who settled in the capital were expelled by virtue of a law which proscribed the propagation of the cult of Jupiter Sabazius. See J. E. Harrison, Prolegomena to Greek Religion (1908), p. 414; H. Usener, Gotternamen (1896), p. 44; F. Cumont, "Hypsistes" in Revue de l'instruction publique en Belgique, xl. (1899); C. S. Blinkenberg, Archdologische Studien (1904). ... " theodora
Garden of Priapus - 350
More Boss lady and a friend over a penis caged mount - missionary style.
The Fibula or penis cage was the reason Egypt was not a colonial power - Rome too - the emphasis was stability and peace in order to keep phallic wives content.
Lysistrata lays out how women will keep the peace:
“ … LYSISTRATA
O Aphrodite born on Cyprus
and, you, sweet passionate Eros, breathe
sexual longing on our breasts and thighs
and fill our men with tortuous desire
and make their pricks erect. If so, I think
we’ll win ourselves a name among the Greeks
as those who brought an end to warfare.
MAGISTRATE
What will you do?
LYSISTRATA
For a start, we’ll stop
you men hanging around the market place
armed with spears and acting up like fools.
OLD WOMAN A
Yes, that’s right, by Paphian Aphrodite!
LYSISTRATA
Right now in the market they stroll around
among the pots and vegetables, fully armed,
like Corybantes.
MAGISTRATE
Yes, that’s right—
it’s what brave men should do.
LYSISTRATA
It looks so silly—
going off to purchase tiny little birds
while carrying a Gorgon shield.
OLD WOMAN A
By god,
I myself saw a cavalry commander—
he had long hair and was on horseback—
pouring out some pudding he’d just bought
from an old woman into his helmet.
Another Thracian was waving his spear
and his shield, as well, just like Tereus,
and terrifying the woman selling figs
while gobbling down the ripest ones she had.
MAGISTRATE
And how will you find the power to stop
so many violent disturbances throughout our states and then resolve them?
LYSISTRATA
Very easily.
MAGISTRATE
But how? Explain that.
LYSISTRATA
It’s like a bunch of yarn. When it’s tangled,
we take it and pass it through the spindle
back and forth—that’s how we’ll end the war,
if people let us try, by sending out ambassadors here and there, back and forth.
MAGISTRATE
You’re an idiot! Do you really think
you can end such fearful acts with spindles,
spools, and wool?
LYSISTRATA
If you had any common sense,
you’d deal with everything the way we do
when we handle yarn.
MAGISTRATE
What does that mean?
Tell me.
LYSISTRATA
First of all, just as we wash wool
in a rinsing tub to remove the dirt,
you have to lay the city on a bed,
beat out the rascals, and then drive away
the thorns and break apart the groups of men
who join up together in their factions
seeking public office—pluck out their heads.
Then into a common basket of good will comb out the wool, the entire compound mix,
including foreigners, guests, and allies, anyone useful to the public good.
Bundle them together. As for those cities
which are colonies of this land, by god,
you must see that, as far as we’re concerned,
each is a separate skein. From all of them,
take a piece of wool and bring it here.
Roll them together into a single thing.
Then you’ll have made one mighty ball of wool, from which the public then must weave its clothes.
MAGISTRATE
So women beat wool and roll it in balls!
Isn’t that wonderful? That doesn’t mean
they bear any part of what goes on in war.
LYSISTRATA
You damned fool, of course it does—we endure
more than twice as much as you. First of all,
we bear children and then send them off
to serve as soldiers.
MAGISTRATE
All right, be quiet.
Don’t remind me of all that.
LYSISTRATA
And then,
when we should be having a good time, enjoying our youth, we have to sleep alone
because our men are in the army.
Setting us aside, it distresses me
that young unmarried girls are growing old
alone in their own homes.
MAGISTRATE
Don’t men get old?
LYSISTRATA
By god, that’s not the same at all. For men,
even old ones with white hair, can come back
and quickly marry some young girl. For women
time soon runs out. If they don’t seize their chance,
no one wants to marry them—they sit there waiting for an oracle.
MAGISTRATE
But an old man
who can still get his prick erect . . .
LYSISTRATA [interrupting]
O you—
why not learn your lesson and just die? It’s time. Buy a funeral urn. I’ll prepare the dough
for honey cakes.Take this wreath.
[Lysistrata throws some water over the Magistrate.]
OLD WOMAN A
This one, too—
it’s from me!
[Old Woman A throws more water on the Magistrate.]
OLD WOMAN B
Here, take this garland!
[Old Woman B throws more water on the Magistrate.]
LYSISTRATA
Well now,
what do you need? What are you waiting for?
Step aboard the boat. Charon’s calling you.
You’re preventing him from casting off.
MAGISTRATE
I don’t have to put up with these insults!
I’ll go to the other magistrates, by god,
and show myself exactly as am!
[The Magistrate exits with his attending slaves.]
LYSISTRATA [calling out to him as he leaves]
Are you blaming us for not laying you out
for burial? Well then, on the third day,
we’ll come and offer up a sacrifice
on your behalf first thing in the morning.
[Lysistrata and the old women with her return inside the Acropolis.] … “
Aristophanes "Lysistrata" Translated by Ian Johnston (2008)
Garden of Priapus - 351
The General working over an "OG" or old guy
The sexuality of the Greek female is still classified as sexually submissive to males - but Greek statues very often attach a phallus to the female form ... Vases too - almost every time a nude winged muse or goddess or "genius" is depicted in ancient Greece - she has a penis - And the opening conversations of "Lysistrata" are female sexualized banter - eight inch leather penises seem to have been a casual possession of the Greek woman ...
***
"The Greek reads “we need Pellene,” an area in the Peloponnese allied with Sparta. But, as Sommerstein points out ... , this is undoubtedly a pun invoking a word meaning vagina or anus. In the exchanges which follow, the Spartans are depicted as having a decided preference for anal sex. ... " - Ian Johnston
***
In this scene from the Lysistrata the Amazons of old are invoked - my guess is that was not an ancient vision but basic to a penis caged Greek nation:
“ … [The Old Men take off their remaining clothes, hold up their shrivelled phalluses, and threaten the women.]
If one of us gives them the slightest chance
there’s nothing these women won’t continue
trying to work on—building fighting ships,
attacking us at sea like Artemesia.
If they switch to horses, I draw the line.
For women are the best at riding bareback—
their shapely arses do a lovely job.
They don’t slip off when grinding at a gallop.
Just look how Micon painted Amazons
fighting men on horseback hand to hand.
So we must take a piece of wood with holes,
and fit a yoke on them, around their necks.
CHORUS OF OLD WOMEN
By the two goddesses, if you get me roused,
I’ll let my wild sow’s passion loose and make
you yell to all the people here today how I’m removing all your hair.
LEADER OF WOMEN’S CHORUS
You ladies,
let’s not delay—let’s take off all our clothes,
so we can smell a woman’s passion
when we’re in a ferocious mood.
[The Old Women take off their clothes.]
WOMEN’S CHORUS
Now let any man step out against me—
he won’t be eating garlic any more, and no black beans. Just say something nasty,
I’m so boiling mad, I’ll treat you the same way
the beetle did the eagle—smash your eggs. … “
"This is a reference to an old story in which the dung beetle got its revenge against an eagle by smashing its eggs. The old woman obviously threatens the man’s testicles as she says this. " - Ian Johnston
Aristophanes "Lysistrata" Translated by Ian Johnston (2008)
Garden of Priapus - 352
More of the General working over an "OG" or old guy
Martial LXII
“ … LAEVINA was a stricter prude
Than Sabine dames of old,
And e'en her husband's rigorous mood
Was not a whit more cold.
Alas, to bathe she loved to go
And thus was she undone,
'For Tunbridge Wells enhanced the woe
That Cheltenham had begun.
'Twas there she felt the amorous flame,
And fled with gallant gay:
So 'twas Penelope that came,
But Helen went away. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
***
Roman public baths tuned prudish Roman "Penelopes" into amorous "Helens"
Helen of Troy was originally Helen of Sparta - As revealed above, Spartan men prefered anal sex. - That's assumed to be male on female anal - or homosexual sex - but with the Fibula or penis cage, it was more probably female on male anal sex ... Helen was the sexual domme over the catamite and penis caged Paris ...
Garden of Priapus - 353
More of the General working over an "OG" or old guy - balls in hand
Martial BOOK SIX* II
“ … ON DOMITIAN'S REVIVAL OF THE LEX JULIA
ONCE 'twas a sport to break the marriage vow
And gelding was a pastime: not so now.
Both thou forbiddest, Caesar; and hereby
Hast rid from shame unborn posterity.
No eunuchs, no adulterers, we see
Here, where e'en eunuchs once with wives made free. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
***
From Juvenal book six we learn that Roman wives had a habit of gelding young male slaves to prevent unwanted pregnancy. The clear implication is the male phallus and balls were not neccesary for sex! Roman wives inherited the Greek "luxury" of female on male anal sex
- (Nov 4, 2021) That's the female phallus - I saw it last night as a curved image in the earth - It's not accessible for the most part ... In both males and females that's "childhood's end" - the fire snake or serpent or dragon is for adults only
- Gelding of Roman men came back after the adoption of Cybele as the Roman state religion. The fire serpent or dragon is the female phallus - but for men that pathway is through the ass chakra - That's why at the end of the Roman empire emperors were proudly calling themselves "Galla" - or castrated ...
Garden of Priapus - 354
Roman baths: The general and an Amazon in black leather about to have toilet sex with two penis caged and blindfolded male "dogs"
- I've seen that Amazon in black leather image in the dream space - Usually associated with red hot Amazon sex - I guess is symbolizes Amazon integration of the black earth
PRIAPUS, who dost these few acres guard,
With phallus and with sickle keeping ward;
Never may hoary thieves these fences break,
But only boys and girls thy apples take. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
The phallus of Priapus is the female phallus or Mentule - The garden of Priapus and the Roman baths and the Roman brothels or "stews" were her domain
Garden of Priapus - 355
Roman baths: end of first session with the General and an Amazon
First version blocked! Still not sure what that means - but I press on anyway - That serpent can cause great harm if not tended to ...
***
Martial XXI
“IANTHIS AND STELLA
WHEN Venus knit the bond that tied
lanthis to her poet,
' No greater gift is mine,' she cried,
' On Stella I bestow it.'
So spake she for the bride to hear,
Anon, her craft betraying,
She murmured low in Stella's ear,
'Thou rogue, beware of straying;
The wanton war-god oft hath known
The wrath of vengeful Venus,
Before he was my spouse alone
When rivals came between us.
Now wedded, none disputes with me
My sway supreme and royal,
And Juno well may wish that she
Could boast a mate as loyal.'
She ceased and gave the blow unseen,
From which no hearts recover;
Now smite alike, 0 gracious queen,
The lady and her lover.”
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
***
I assume the “blow unseen” was the Fibula or penis cage - Romans and Greeks accepted female promiscuity and male chastity
Sounds outrageous, but the texts bear it out. Greco-Roman men were receiving something in return that we cannot see …
My guess is torrid sexual energy - the cause of the famous Roman and Egyptian "dog-leash tan" found only in male husbands of noblewomen
Garden of Priapus - 356
Roman baths - General and Amazon over a blindfolded and penis caged "dog"
-as Roman men were "belted and bound" to their wives at the wedding ceremony
***
Martial Book XI:16 I’m readable
"... You can leave now, Reader, over-severe,
go, where you please: I write for the city;
my page, now, runs wild with Priapic verse,
strikes the cymbals, with a dancing-girl’s hand.
O, how you’ll beat your cloak in rigid vein,
though you’re weightier than Curius, Fabricius!
You too, that read naughty jokes in my little book,
you’ll be wet, girl, though you’re from moral Padua.
Lucretia would have blushed, and shut my volume,
while Brutus was there; but when he left: she’d have read. ... "
"O, how you’ll beat your cloak in rigid vein" - I guess that means you still have access to the dragon ... That's what the Fibula or penis cage was for - access to the fire into old age - It's very easy to lose access to that ...
- The first inner dream image after posting this toilet series was a sudden change from cold water to hot water!
A mixture of inner disgust, overcome by healing warmth
Garden of Priapus - 357
The General having a go from behind in the toilet - as her penis caged dog orally serves her Amazon friend
Martial Book X:47 The good life
" ... These, my dearest Martialis, are
the things that bring a happy life:
wealth left to you, not laboured for;
rich land, an ever-glowing hearth;
no law, light business, and a quiet mind;
a healthy body, gentlemanly powers;
a wise simplicity, friends not unlike;
good company, a table without art;
nights carefree, yet no drunkenness;
a bed that’s modest, true, and yet not cold;
sleep that makes the hours of darkness brief:
the need to be yourself, and nothing more;
not fearing your last day, not wishing it. ..."
- "an ever-glowing hearth" - The Roman aristocrat "OG" or old guy - kept in the fire into old age by phallic Amazons ... Socrates and his two wives - one a phallic Tribade wife was the model
Garden of Priapus - 358
The General and her Amazon friend in the toilet - getting ready to work on the second blindfolded and penis caged dog
***
Do not go gentle into that good night -
" ... Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light. ... "
From The Poems of Dylan Thomas
***
- (Nov 6, 2021) To me that's an end of Rome poem - but in my case it's from a portal that opened up to me in high school in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia in 1981-1985 - I believe a few Roman spirits have been marooned in the Ethiopian highlands for a long, long time
Garden of Priapus - 359
The General and her Amazon friend in the toilet - a version of the blocked shot - Amazon friend over first penis caged OG.
That was Greek "Luxury" - but if you trace the record its older than that - Its Etruscan and Phrygian (Trojan) and Minoan and Syrian and Babylonian and Egyptian and also from Nysa - or black African ... All designed to hold onto the chthonic fire into old age ...
***
The lusty Roman matron and the chaste Roman OG or "old guy"
Martial Book XI:71 A weighty cure
" ... Leda tells her aged spouse she suffers from nerves,
and cries that she absolutely has to be fucked;
but, with tears and moans, sighs nothing is worth that,
and declares she’s reconciled to dying instead.
He begs her, live, not lose her years of youth,
and lets be done what he can’t do now himself.
The female doctors leave, males take their place,
her knees are raised. O weighty remedy! ... "
- Not sure of the assumed reading of this poem - straight male female sex. The "weighty remedy" was probably a mentule in a male rectum ... Roman male prostitutes were "Spintra" - or anal - and all Roman men were in the bronze Fibula - or penis caged
Garden of Priapus - 360
Boss lady in a raw toilet sex scene - ravishing a penis caged slave with a large black phallus - or a Roman "weighty remedy"
I do not have that fetish, but for many people that's the only outlet for the snake-fire ... That's the toilet inner image that has come to me
***
Martial: LIX TO FLACCUS
“… THE most luxurious baths on earth, Rich marbles to recline on, And then a wretched florin's worth is all I got to dine on! Ah, give me Lupus' dingy den; 'Tis little consolation To bathe in luxury-and then To perish of starvation. …”
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 361
More boss lady in a raw toilet sex scene - ravishing a penis caged slave with a large black phallus - that's the penis key on her neck - an ancient African or Sumerian innovation I'm sure ...
Martial: BOOK ONE * LXXIII TO CAECILIANUS
" ... WHEN you offered your wife to each passer-by free, Not a soul ever wanted to try her. You have learnt wisdom now: kept beneath lock and key She has crowds of men waiting to buy her. ..."
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- Kind of like the bronze Fibula or penis cage! Locking up the penis drove Roman women wild with lust.
The wife Martial is talking about is probably the caged penis - Roman matrons did as they pleased - They could not be locked up ... And the men waiting to buy her is probably a reference to the Roman "weighty remedy" - the female phallus or mentule
Garden of Priapus - 362
Closing boss lady in a raw toilet sex scene - ravishing a penis caged slave with a large black phallus - one leg raised up on slaves back
Martial: LXIX TO COSCONIUS
" ... IN your poems there's nothing the modest to vex, Not a line in the lot that makes mention of sex. For myself, I confess it, my books are too free, And I praise and I wonder at your purity. Let ladies of pleasure and naughty young men And amorous elders delight in my pen: But the chaste decent verses, which to us you sing, For vestals and children will be quite the thing. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- Vestals and children were all that was chaste in ancient Rome! - and even the Vestals daily guarded the icon of the ever erect Fascinus! - In my view the Fascinus was the ever aroused Roman female phallus
Garden of Priapus - 363
Boss lady's husband under some "weighty remedies" from her friends
A white hot scene !
***
Roman men and boys were sex toys of phallic matrons::
Martial: Book VII:14 True loss
“ … Aulus, atrocious tragedy’s struck my girl;
she’s lost her plaything and her fond delight:
not such as Catullus’ tender mistress wept for
his Lesbia, bereft of worthless sparrow,
nor, sung by Stella, his Ianthis grieves for,
whose black dove wings it through Elysium:
She’s not won by such loves, such nonsense,
mea lux: they don’t stir my lady’s heart:
she’s lost a slave boy hardly twelve years old,
his member not yet eighteen inches long….”
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 364
More boss lady's husband under some "weighty remedies" from her friends - breaking the "fourth wall" - That's a real thing !
Martial: LXXXI 'CIRCUMSTANCES ALTER CASES'
“ … FABULLA had read what I wrote long ago, Complaining that girls don't know when to say 'no.' So when for her favours I humbly applied, Once, twice, and three times my request was denied. Noes should not be final, I freely confess: There's a time, dear Fabulla, when girls should say 'yes.' … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- Yes to the Mentule! Roman men were addicted to "something else"...
Garden of Priapus - 365
Blond muscle Amazon again - roughly working a large black mentule from behind
Martial: LVII COMPARISONS
“ … THERE is nothing worn smoother than Hedylus' cloak: Not the neck of a mule that has long known the yoke, Not the handle of some old Corinthian jar, Not the ramshackle wheel of a slow-moving car, Not the leg that for ten years a fetter has borne, Not the hoe that long usage in vineyards has worn, Not pebbles nor ruts on our northern highway, Not a pauper's wan toga who's seen his last day, Not a bison's posterior scraped by the cage, Not the tusk of a boar savage in his old age; Yes, there is just one thing: and he will not deny it; The place where he sits on's more smooth, if you try it. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
The smooth ass was a Roman fetish - a Roman female fetish - what is gay culture today was female phallus/male fibula or sex cage sex in the Roman empire
The mainstreaming of gay culture is going to dim the fire though - the trend is to copy straight culture - and that has only one meaning ...
# Me-too values are already entering gay and lesbian culture - What's going to happen is back to toilet sex - That's what gay sex was before the Stonewall riots ...
Or no sex at all - Like what all humans are before puberty - That's not a crazy thought ... Young kids are male/male and female/female "couples" only - That's the pre-snake world
Garden of Priapus - 366
More blond muscle Amazon again - roughly working a large black mentule from behind
- Martial's prayer for Tucca to heat up a Roman bath - that's a rare glimpse of what Roman baths were for - But all those statues of phallic woman in Roman baths is clear enough for me
- Tucca is listed as a"he" - but Roman baths were mostly built by "she" - Augusta's usually
Martial: ON TUCCA'S BATH
“ … No flint, no ashlar, here are seen, No brick like that wherewith her Queen Built Babylon's great wall; It is of timber, planks, and lath, This cooling room in Tucca's bath That is not cool at all; So closely all the timbers fit That if he chose to sail in it 'Twould make a perfect boat. The hot room's rich with pillars wrought By Phrygian quarrymen or brought From Afric lands remote, Though Sparta sent her marbles rare, Though rich Euboea's gems are there Perfect in hue and form, 'Tis always chill that marble tomb; O Tucca, use the cooling room To make the hot one warm.…“
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 367
More blond muscle Amazon again - roughly working a large red mentule from behind - Riding crop and penis cage ...
Martial: BOOK FOUR I DOMITIAN'S BIRTHDAY
“ … O HAPPY day, more hallowed than the morn When on consenting Ida Jove was born, Come oft I pray and Nestor's years outrun, Matching our Emperor's glory with thy sun. Long may he Pallas court, in Alba's gold, Long in proud hand the oak-leaf garland hold, And even when a hundred years have flown May the Great Games still see him on the throne. A wondrous gift, yet owed to earth by fate! And for a god so high no vows can seem too great. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Reigned from 81 to 96 AD. That was a time of undiluted Roman power - or Trojan power - or Amazon power!
- "No brick like that wherewith her Queen Built Babylon's great wall" - from poem above - Rome was probably a new Babylon - that's what the Christians called it ... a walled off Amazon power
Garden of Priapus - 368
More blond muscle Amazon - galloping - riding crop and penis cage
" ... MARTIAL MARCUS VALERIUS MARTIALIS was born about the year A.D. 40, during the short reign of the Emperor Caius. in the Spanish town of Bilbilis. The name by which he is now commonly known was probably due to the accident of his birth occurring on the first of March: ' Marcus Valerius' forms part of the Roman dress which his countrymen soon after the time of Julius Caesar had so readily adopted. In the first century of our era Spain passed through one of those periods of intellectual activity which diversify the torpor wherein that strange land normally reposes, and Martial is but one of the group of brilliant Spaniards who are among the chief glories of the silver age of Latin literature. Two of the galaxy, the critic Quintilian, born at Calagurris A.D. 40, and the poet Lucan, born at Cordova A.D. 39, were his close contemporaries, and when, abandoning Bilbilis and the rushing Salo, he came to Italy to seek his fortune in 63, Seneca had reached the highest point of his long and magnificent career and seemed all-powerful at Rome. As a humble dependent of the Senecas, and through them of the Pisos, the most literary of all the great Roman families, Martial made his first entry into Roman life; and when in 65 AD. on the discovery of the conspiracy Seneca and Piso were involved in a common ruin, the young stranger from Spain shared their downfall in his small degree, and was thrown upon his own resources. For many years existence for him must have been as hard a struggle as it was for Charles Dickens in his youth, and both writers owe much of their power to the forced realization of the most important fact in life, that a man must in some way or another get enough to eat. Being a Roman citizen Martial had a certain value as a client if he could find a patron willing to employ him-but a client's pay, whether it took the form of rations or dole, was almost as scanty and precarious as that which a sandwich-man or a 'super' earns to-day. Moreover, competition in that particular branch of social service was excessively severe, for anyone then could be a client just as anyone now can be a clerk: there were only three requisites, a respectable appearance, a decent suit of clothes, and a dislike for hard manual labour. Probably it was his pen that saved Martial from starvation, and the couplets that now appear as Books Thirteen and Fourteen of the Epigrams, tags written to order, like our cracker mottoes, for the presents that were usually given at the Saturnalia, performed at least one useful function; they kept our poet alive. Moreover they gained for him some sort of reputation, and when the Colosseum was opened by the Emperor Titus in the year A.D. 80 a publisher was found ready to risk his first small book ' Liber Spectaculorum ', a set of thirty-two short poems describing the games, the contests, and all the other wonders of the great building. ' The Spectacles ' mark the turning-point in Martial's fortunes. Though they are of small literary value they had a considerable success, and, attracting imperial notice, brought to Martial such privileges as accompanied the grant of ' father's right ', ius trium liberorum. His social position was now assured and his poetical fame also quickly increased, so that he was able in A.D. 84 to publish and sell the collection of his gift verses which we now possess. By the beginning of 86 he was ready for a more ambitious flight and published the first two books of the Epigrams, mostly composed of poems referring to the reigns of Vespasian and Titus. After this date he must have been in fairly easy circumstances, for he was raised to equestrian rank, acquired a house on the Quirinal, and a small estate at Nomentum, had many rich friends, and always remained a bachelor. But old habit was strong and he is never tired of enlarging on his poverty and the discomforts of life at Rome. On one occasion, at least, he retired for a time to Forum Corneli in Gaul, and there published the third book of the Epigrams in A.D. 87. He soon, however, returned to the capital again and brought out Books IV, V and VI, in the next three successive years. Book VII announces the coming return of Domitian from his Sarmatian campaigns, and must therefore have appeared about the end of 92, while the next three books came out at yearly intervals. The death of Domitian decided Martial to leave Rome for good, and after sending the Emperor Nerva a selection from Books X and XI he finally returned to Bilbilis in 98. A Spanish lady, Marcella, gave him an estate, and there he ended his days, his last volume, Book XII, being mostly written in Spain, and published late in A.D. IOI. The date of his death can be approximately fixed by a letter of Pliny the younger, written 104, which is so characteristic of that very superior person that it is worth quoting in full: "I was very grieved," Pliny writes to his friend, Cornelius Priscus, " to hear of Martial's death. He was a talented fellow, of shrewd and vigorous understanding, his writings well seasoned with wit and sarcasm, and yet good-humoured withal. I did him the compliment of providing his travelling money when he left Rome: that I owed both to our friendship and to some trifles of verse which he wrote about me. It was an ancient custom to honour and reward those writers who sang the praises of individuals or states; but in our times this, like many other excellent habits, has gone completely out of use. Since we have ceased to do praiseworthy deeds, we think that praise itself is silly. You ask what are the verses for which I thus repaid him. I would refer you to his book, but as a matter of fact I remember some of them: if you like these, you may look up the others later. He is addressing his Muse and tells her to seek my house on the Esquiline, and to knock respectfully. 'But do not with strong liquor flown Knock at a time that's not your own. His days to study he must give Composing speeches, that shall live With Tully's best, to please the ears And win a verdict from the Peers. More safe 'twill be to go a-calling If lamps are lit and night is falling. That is your hour, when reigns the rose, When brows are wet, and Bacchus flows; For when the Wine God wildly rages Stern Catos well may read my pages.' "As he wrote thus about me was I not right then to speed him on his way, and am I not right now to mourn for a true friend's death? He gave me what he could; he would have given more if he had been able. And yet what greater gift can a man receive than glory and praise and eternity of fame? You may say that Martial's verses will not gain eternity: perhaps they will not; but he wrote them with the supposition that they would."
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 369
More blond muscle Amazon - galloping topless - mentule from the rear
Martial: CIX ON A LITTLE DOG
" ... CATULLUS of a sparrow sung: But Issa's neater. A kiss is sweet from ringdove's tongue: But Issa's sweeter. She's nicer than the nicest girl, She's dearer than the dearest pearl; No pet can beat her. Whene'er she whines, you'd think that she Was talking sadly. Sometimes she cries, sometimes in glee She barks out gladly. And when she needs herself to ease, She lifts her paw and says-' Sir, please, I want to badly.' ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- " when she needs herself to ease" was probably the "weighty remedy" or a female Mentule in a penis caged male ass
Garden of Priapus - 370
More blond muscle Amazon - mounting topless - doggystyle
" ... If she is sleeping on your bed You do not hear her; Nor will she soil the blanket spread, You need not fear her. So modest is she, we can't find A suitor of the canine kind To let come near her. Lest death should take her from our eyes, A picture giving Her very self in shape and size Portrays her striving. Put dog and picture both together; You'll wonder which is paint, or whether They both are living ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
- Doggystyle Trojan style - ie with the Fibula and Mentule complicaton
Garden of Priapus - 371
Boss lady has a go - Trojan doggystyle - with topless blond muscle Amazon with a large black mentule restraining the dog on a red dogleash - and an even larger mentule on a large topless Amazon in the dogs mouth
- This scene won an erotic movie award
Martial: CXV TO PROCILLUS
" ... THERE'S a maid who pines for me,
Fairer than a swan is she, Naught can rival her.
Silver, lilies, privet, snow, All must yield their pride.
(Now your jealous thoughts, I know, Tend to suicide.)... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
- Penis caged Trojan men like the men of Babylon were pursued by phallic women - Trojan men were the Dumuzi to their female and phallic Innana
Garden of Priapus - 372
More boss lady has a go - Trojan doggystyle - with topless blond muscle Amazon with a large black mentule restraining the dog
This happened to Alexander's armies when he invaded Babylon - Romans credited a Babylonian queen with the penis cage - and castrating young men for sexual pleasure
" ... [Queen of Babylon] Semiramis was generally viewed positively before the rise of Christianity, although negative portrayals did exist. During the Middle Ages, she was associated with promiscuity and lustfulness. One story claimed that she had an incestuous relationship with her son, justifying it by passing a law to legitimize parent-child marriages, and inventing the chastity belt to deter any romantic rivals before he eventually killed her. This was likely popularized in the 5th century by Orosius' Universal History (Seven Books of History Against the Pagans), which has been described as an "anti-pagan polemic." ... Wikipedia
***
"... She by whom my heart is swayed
(Still your angry fright:)
Is a black but comely maid Darker than the night.
Ant or cricket, pitch, or crow, These are not so black;
You'll consent to live, I know. Put that halter back! ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
Halter as in a horse restraint - The Roman woman put a symbolic halter on the Roman man at the wedding ceremony - And an actual halter - the Fibula - on her husbands penis
Garden of Priapus - 373
More boss lady has a go - Trojan doggystyle - with skull over fireplace
Shot Blocked. Used workaround.
That was a long and highly erotic unblocked series - I was in the flow!
Blockchain technology is trying to get past this issue of censorship - My guess is the problem is here to stay - It's really self censorship coming out of an obvious internal conflict
Martial: CIII TO SCAEVOLA
" ... 'WOULD heaven I were a millionaire,' you cried, Ere yet for knighthood you were qualified; ' Well would I lodge and sumptuously fare.' Then gaily laughed the Gods and heard your prayer. Yet is your raiment shabbier than before, Your shoes more patched and clouted than of yore, Ten wretched olives serve you for a feast, And out of these you save the half at least, Two meals from every dish you try to squeeze, And drink Veientan to its muddy lees, Two pence a day is all that you expend, One on cold pulse, one on your lady friend. Live decently henceforth, you cheating knave, Or else return to heaven the wealth it gave. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
- That's the dick free world represented by the skull over the fireplace - my saying is "ingress but no egress" - what I call the money dragon ... or "moneypoverty"
- The snake or dragon does not just disappear because we will it to - it controls eros - "dick" - but it also controls capital and can have devastating consequences if left out there to do it's own thing
Garden of Priapus - 374
More boss lady has a go - Trojan doggystyle - over a with a bound or locked penis
Shot Blocked. Used workaround.
That's probably a scene out of the all female Roman Bona Dea festival. A few men were invited after drinking parties - but they had to come dressed as women and obviously penis caged - and true to life sexual re-enactments followed ...
Martial: CIV THE HARE AND THE LIONS
" ... THE spotted pard, although the yoke be slight, Doth bow his neck thereto; the tiger's might, For all his rage, is by a rod controlled, And the wild ass doth champ a curb of gold; The Libyan bear is guided by a bit, And monster bisons to the rein submit; A purple halter guides a mighty boar Vast as the brute in Calydon of yore; Obedient to a swarthy master's will Leviathan displays a dancer's skill! Who would not deem a miracle was here? Yet doth a marvel greater still appear. See how the lordly lions condescend On swift but timid hares their might to spend; They catch, set free, and gambol with the prey That safe within their gaping maw doth play. Freely the quarry passes to and fro Through fangs that seem to dread the puny foe; In sooth 'tis generous shame that doth restrain The might that late a lordly bull hath slain. Could human art have taught them pity? Nay, 'Tis Caesar's law of mercy these obey. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
- Martial is probably talking about the penis cage or bronze Fibula - "Caesar's law of mercy" that compels mighty lions to submit to meek but swift hares
Garden of Priapus - 375
More boss lady has a go - Trojan doggystyle - over a with a bound or locked penis - climax!
Shot Blocked. Used workaround.
Martial: XXXV TO CORNELIUS
" ... You say my verses are not fit
So loose and frivolous their wit
For pedagogues to read in school;
Cornelius, you forget the rule
That little verses such as these,
Like wives and husbands, cannot please
Would you say 'Write me a wedding-song,
but pray Be grave as in a funeral dirge '?
At Flora's feast would any urge
That every light o' love should be Veiled with a matron's modesty?
These merry songs, to win success, Need just a touch of wantonness;
A dullard would Priapus be If made a priest of Cybele. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
Garden of Priapus - 376
More blond muscle Amazon - roughly working a large black mentule from behind
Martial LXIX
“… TARENTUM worships Canius now,
Of old she worshipped Pan;
And thus the merry God doth bow
Before the merry man. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram"
"Worshipped Pan" means she became Pan - with Pan's massive phallus - the mentule !
" ... In ancient Greek religion and mythology, Pan ... is the god of the wild, shepherds and flocks, nature of mountain wilds, rustic music and impromptus, and companion of the nymphs. He has the hindquarters, legs, and horns of a goat, in the same manner as a faun and a satyr. With his homeland in rustic Arcadia, he is also recognized as the god of fields, groves, wooded glens and often affiliated with sex; because of this, Pan is connected to fertility and the season of spring. The word panic ultimately derives from the god's name.
In Roman religion and myth, Pan's counterpart was Faunus, a nature god who was the father of Bona Dea, sometimes identified as Fauna; he was also closely associated with Sylvanus, due to their similar relationships with woodlands. ... " Wikipedia
" ... In Roman religion and myth, Pan's counterpart was Faunus, a nature god who was the father of Bona Dea ..."
- That's a woman's religion! The Roman phallus was locked up but not extinguished - it became the property of women!
Garden of Priapus - 377
"... Go, little book, to greet my friend for me,
Do reverence in Proculus' bright halls;
And if thou ask the way, I'll tell it thee
Pass Castor's shrine and Vesta's ancient walls,
That guard the Virgin Goddess' sacred home;
And thence a reverent temple thou shalt see
Fair with the statues of the Lord of Rome.
Near is the vast Colossus decked with rays
Wherewith the Rhodian marvel may not vie;
Yet hasten on and tarry not to gaze,
And pass the shrine of gay Lyaeus by:
Hard by the fane of Cybele, aglow
With Corybants, in colours all ablaze
Stands the fair house and lofty portico.
Go near thereto,'tis never barred with pride,
But Phoebus and the muse it holdeth dear;
To these its door is ever opened wide.
But, if 'tis asked why Martial is not here,
Say ' He doth weave thy praises into song
And may not spare an hour to aught beside,
For, had he come, his verse had suffered wrong.... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram"
- The eternal flame of "Virgin Goddess" Vesta was the fire of locked phallus of the Roman male - Greece and Egypt and Babylon probably had a similar eternal flame
- The Greek version was probably the goddess Artemis covered in human balls ...
Garden of Priapus - 378
More from the award winning movie: tall and topless Amazon working a large mentule missionary style...
“ … CHILDREN he wants, but fears the marriage bond;
Yet his dislikes and fancies correspond;
For kindly handmaids set the matter right;
The fields and mansions of the worthy knight
Are well supplied with slavelings knightlings rather;
To each of whom he is a proper father. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram"
The Roman marriage bond was more severe than is presently assumed - through the Fibula or penis cage the husband submitted to his wife like a horse submits to its rider! And Augustus made it illegal not to marry ...
- That's the bond with the "jinn" - The penis cage is a literal link to the fire-kingdom of the Roman "genius" - who was usually a nude winged goddess with a penis - Moslems call this the fiery realm of the "jinn"
- Early Islam was the heir of the Roman empire - Christians do not have access to the "jinn"
Garden of Priapus - 379
Nude Genius of Emperor Domitianus, with the aegis and a cornucopia. circa 199 AD ( Genius of Emperor Domitian 81-96 AD )
Marble, Palazzo dei Conservatori, first floor, hall of the Horti Lamiani - From the area near the Via Labicana, Esquiline, 1882
- That's a woman with a penis! The physical correspondent of that was the Augusta
The whole Roman empire from 100AD to 200AD was sexually sizzling - Roman sculpture during thie period was openly female phallus focused!
Garden of Priapus - 380
Raw boss lady scene - with a large black mentule and the penis cage.
(Nov 11, 2011) That's a secret doorway to the sleep world ... The "jinn" were demanding something tonight - I felt an intense and heavy drowsiness - which magically vanished when I went to work ...
- To the Christian world, the fiery world of the "jinn" is literally hell ! That's why the west forgot about them long, long ago ... Romans and Greeks called them their "Genius" - early Moslems and Jews - "jinn" - King Solomon was guided by the "jinn"
***
" ... TO QUINTILIAN GUIDE of our wayward youth,
Is Rome's delight and boast, if I am wrong
In making haste to live whilst poor and young,
Forgive me; others dally all too long
These gather gold beyond their fathers' dreams,
Ancestral busts their crowded halls might fill
To me my smoke-stained cot more pleasant seems,
The earth's wild verdure and the running rill,
A comely slave, a kind but simple wife,
Nights of soft sleep and days unmarred of strife. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
- A comely slave! Probably like Socrates Martial had a Tribade to service him from the rear -
That's why the Roman and Greek "Genius" was a winged woman with a penis - that's truth being telegraphed over 2000 years - and the cause was the Fibula or bronze penis cage
- That's also why the "jinn" are associated with fire ... Eros is the fire ...
Garden of Priapus - 381
Boss lady over a penis-bound black ass - more rare inter-racial erotica!
***
- Through his muse or "jinn" Martial was allowed to live wifeless and granted state support for 3 children.
Roman men had to marry - or had the assume the halter and penis cage under their wife
- I suppose Martial as a poet was haltered like a horse by his "Genius" - and it's true !
Martial: XCI TO THE EMPEROR TITUS:
" ... A PETITION THOU glory of the world, our destinies,
Our very faith in heaven, are stayed on thee.
Should verse of mine find favour in thine eyes,
Though often writ in haste, 'twill plead for me:
Grant me a father's right; though fate's decree
Deny me fatherhood, that wrong redress;
If I have failed, may this my comfort be,
And this the generous guerdon of success.
XCII THE PETITION GRANTED
" ... Now with the rights of children three
Caesar rewards my Muse and me,
And mateless I'll remain.
The boon that one alone can give
By his divine prerogative
Must not be made in vain. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
Garden of Priapus - 382
More boss lady over a rare penis-bound black ass
" ... 'WHERE'S number ONE,' you say, 'if this book's TWO?
' My first is shy, so what am I to do?
But if in this the First you'd rather see,
Take one away, and then it ONE will be. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigram
- Probably an inside joke about female on male ass sex. Number one - the penis, was shy for Greeks and Romans. For the Roman man, number one was the ass !
Garden of Priapus - 383
More boss lady over a rare penis-bound black ass - Trojan doggy style
- That's probably the Greek "Lioness on the Cheese Grater" position mentioned above in the introduction to the "Lysistrata" - In the "Lysistrata" Greek sex was clearly the domain of sexually aggressive women
***
" ... IN THE COUNTRY OF THE BLIND
'TIS one-eyed Thais sets his love aglow;
She is half-blind - and he entirely so. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- That's the "Jinn" to me - my "inner eye"
- Maybe Martial is speaking of the mystical "eye of Osiris" that is the promised fruit of the Egyptian Djed pillar ... That requires handing over the phallus for long periods though ...
Garden of Priapus - 384
Closing scene - More boss lady over a rare penis-bound black ass - Trojan doggy style
She seems to be having fun! - Still not sure how the eight inch Greek leather dildo that was standard for Greek women gave pleasure - but this seems to have been one of the ways
- There's a fire chakra in the male ass if we are to believe the Hindu's ... And it's true - I've experienced it from a "jinn" and its much stronger erotically than the phallus "number one"
***
Martial: LI WOMEN'S TRICKS
“ … PHYLLIS, YOU rob me every day,
It is my foolish love that lets you,
The cunning, too, that you display,
Wherein your lying maid abets you
She hints of ring or mirror lost,
Of scent all gone, or missing jewel,
Or smuggled silk at trifling cost,
To miss so rare a chance were cruel!
You need a cask of wine-the best
To help some witch's charm (or gullet?),
Or else an unexpected guest
Has come and you want pike or mullet.
I pray you, Phyllis, show some small
Regard for truth, and frankly use me,
Remembering, if I give my all,
Whate'er I ask you can't refuse me. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- She "robbed him" every day - Martial was a rich matrons "Spintria" or male ass ! He wrote elsewhere that he could take four mentules a night ...
Garden of Priapus - 385
Bonus boss lady over a rare penis-bound black ass - Trojan doggy style - Bonus since there are so few of these black male /white female scenes ...
***
Roman inter-racial love - A "painted" or tribal Briton maiden marries a noble Roman lord:
Martial: LIII ON CLAUDIA RUFINA
" ... THOUGH from the painted Britons Claudia came,
Her noble soul befits the Roman race,
Her kinship dames of Italy might claim,
Greeks laud her beauty; and by heaven's grace
Offspring she hath; so ere her lovely face
Hath lost its youth, they too shall wed, and she
Loving her lord, in him shall ever place
Her trust, rejoicing in her children three. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- That's funny! Tribal Britons ...
(Nov 12, 2021) Most Roman slaves were probably Britons - a captive and savage colony - The darker southern nations were poor hunting grounds for slaves as they were settled and ancient - Egypt, Nubia, Libya. And most eastern nations were already much richer that Rome...
Buying a Greek slave was a luxury purchase whereas buying a Briton was probably very affordable - like modern day Africans warring tribes were a good source for free manpower
It's like the history books have been wiped clean
-Pott & Wright's : Martial was published in the 1930's at the height of the British Empire - The introduction makes an explicit comparison of Rome and the British empire - so I am surprised that this epigram was translated at all - They chose to leave all the Mentule epigrams in Latin ...
Garden of Priapus - 386
More Raw boss lady scene - with a large black mentule and the penis cage.
- That was probably a popular feature of "painted" Britons for Roman men - raw sexual power ...
I'm out here on my own - Wikipedia says it was considered highly offensive for Roman men to be sexually penetrated - But the dream images and texts like the Priapea, Juvenal, Martial, the "Satyricon" and the "Lysistrata" all tell another story ...
Roman and Greek women, not men, were the sexual aggressors - or as Plato wrote on Erastes / Eromenos - Women were Erastes or tops and men were Eromenos or bottoms - and the reason was the caged penis or Fibula
***
Martial LXII
“ … BOUGHT PLEASURES
SHE never gives herself for love?
No doubt.
She has to buy her loves or do without! … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- Roman women were Erastes - or sexual tops
Garden of Priapus - 387
I accidentally censored myself! Will repost
More Raw boss lady scene - with a large black mentule and the penis cage and a cigarette
Martial: LXXVI TO BASSUS
“ … A MAID you scorn, a crone for mistress have,
And court old dames with one foot in the grave.
Yours must indeed an amorous frenzy be.
Hecuba you love, you hate Andromache. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Roman female lust continued into old age - The mentule is mentioned attached to ancient crones in the Priapea
" .... Hecuba was a queen in Greek mythology, the wife of King Priam of Troy during the Trojan War . She had 19 children, who included major characters of Homer's Iliad such as the warriors Hector and Paris, as well as the prophetess Cassandra. ...." Wikipedia
Garden of Priapus - 388
I accidentally censored myself! Will repost
- Nude Greek maiden with a basket of large dildos c 490 BC
" ... A belly amphora painting by the Flying Angel Painter, now in the Petit Palais, Paris, depicting a woman holding a "phallos-bird" and uncovering a jar or basket of phalli ... " Wikipedia
- I was saying that the inner dream images are that the classic eight inch Greek dildo was not large enough for most women. In the Priapea the standard size was twelve inches - The rectum does not really have a size limit ...
Those could be "bread dildos":
"The bread dildo is a dildo prepared using bread, allegedly made in the Greco-Roman era around 2,000 years ago. ... The Ancient Greek term kollix refers to bread, olisbos refers to a dildo, and the term olisbokollix is found as a hapax legomenon in the Ancient Greek lexicon of Hesychius "written in the fifth century A.D." ... " Wikipedia
- The "phallos-bird" is probably a Fascinum - but also looks like a strap-on Dildo
The bread dildo also existed in a Babylonian context
" ... The Babylonian Talmud offers another example where bread is used as a means to cause ejaculation.
Here the bread is used for medicinal purposes. In the text, Abba ben Joseph bar Hama, often referred to as "Rava" in the Talmud, asks Rav Yosef bar Hiyya a question about what to do if a man's urinary meatus, also known as the external urethral orifice, is obstructed.
Rav Yosef suggests the following remedy: "We bring warm barley bread and place it upon his anus, and owing to the heat he emits semen, and we observe what happens and see whether or not the perforation remains closed." ... " Wikipedia
Garden of Priapus - 389
A more refined boss lady scene - with a large black mentule and the penis cage.
The mentule relieved the pain of an aroused but caged phallus by causing ejaculation - but it also activated the "third eye" through the anima - which is an internal psychic structure that is the same in all men..
For women, I see raw lust ! In Rome women paid men to have sex with them ... I think that was caused by the penis cage - Like taking away food and water makes you hungry and thirsty ...
***
Another way to relieve the pain of the Fibula was to join the priests of Cybele:
Martial : XCI THE PRIESTS OF CYBELE
A SOLDIER was coming back home to Ravenna
With Achillas, a pretty young runaway, when a
Band of effeminate priests came along
And the soldier joined up with the castrated throng.
The priests asked the boy where in bed the pair lay;
For they thought that on him a foul trick they would play.
But he saw their intention and cunningly lied'
My place,' he declared, ' is the outermost side.'
After supper the priests, when the two were asleep,
Took a knife and in silence towards them did creep,
And proceeded the outermost partner to geld
While the boy his safe place on the inner side held.
We have seen how a stag saved the maiden of old:
But here for a stag we a phallus behold. …”
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
The priests of Cybele could still have sex - they were a risk free way for amorous phallic Roman matrons to sate their lusts:
" ... Such an act as neither the quivered Semiramis perpetrated in the Assyrian realms, or Cleopatra flying dejected in her Actian galley. Among this crew there is neither decency of language, nor respect for the proprieties of the table. Here is the foul license that Cybele enjoins, the lisping speech, the aged priest with hoary hair, like one possessed, a prodigy of boundless appetite, open to hire. Yet why do they delay? since long ago they ought after the Phrygian custom to have removed with their knives the superfluous flesh. ... " Juvenal, Satire II
Garden of Priapus - 390
More blond muscle Amazon - enjoying a large black mentule from the rear.
From Juvenal 2 above we get the suggestion that the male penis was vestigial in Asia Minor, Egypt and Babylon. And he's probably right - the male anal sex zone was more important in these lands - and the Amazon mentule
- In this Epigram Martial condemns an aged Roman crone who still chases after young men after 200 marriages! The Mentule lust did not diminish with age for Roman women
Martial: XCIII TO VETUSTILLA
OF consuls you have seen quite fifteen score,
Of hairs you've three, of teeth you've only four,
Grasshopper's breast, ant's legs and colour pale,
Forehead more wrinkled than a woman's veil.
Your breasts hang loose as spiders' webs, the while
Your mouth gapes open like a crocodile.
Ravenna's frogs and gnats may be no joke
But they are more agreeable than your croak.
An owl in daylight can see just as well,
A he-goat has a more attractive smell.
Your back should to a skinny duck belong,
Your front a Cynic even finds too strong.
The bathman has to put his lantern out
Ere you can join the drabs who roam about
The tombs at night in search of some stray lover.
For you in August winter's still not over,
And even fever cannot now suffice
To warm your limbs and melt your ancient ice.
But yet you yearn for marriage, I am told,
After two hundred trials and are bold
Enough to think a man will feel desire
For your cold ashes and your burnt-out fire.
Bid such a one the solid rock to hoe;
For how could you your wifely duties do,
When you as 'grandmother' are now addressed?
Nay, if you want your shaking limbs caressed,
Go, get a bedstead from the realms beneath
And let your bridegroom be the Lord of Death,
While body-burners tend the new-made bride
And with their torches warm your wrinkled side.
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 391
Another blond muscle Amazon - enjoying a large black mentule from the rear.
***
In this epigram Martial fails to convince a woman to sodomize him in the baths
Martial : LI TO GALLA
“ … WHENE'ER I praise your legs and arms,
Your eyes and rosy cheeks admire,
You whisper low-' My hidden charms
A deeper wonder will inspire.'
And yet whenever I suggest
A bath together, you say no.
Perhaps you fear that when undressed
Without my clothes I shall not do. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Martial, like Marc Anthony was a Spintria or male ass for hire …
Although modern readings of this epigram assume gay sex - In Ancient Rome the Fibula meant the active sex partner was usually female
Garden of Priapus - 392
Closing blond muscle Amazon - enjoying a large black mentule from the rear.
In this epigram, Martial says the Roman wife and her mentule did as she pleased sexually
Martial: XXVI TO CANDIDUS
“… THE harvest of your vast estate
And all the hoarded wealth you own,
Your cup of gold and priceless plate
Are all reserved for you alone.
Your Massic and Opimian rare
For others are too exquisite,
And no man is allowed to share
The products of your learned wit.
These things are yours, I don't dispute
So plain a fact: upon my life
Your ownership is absolute
In all you have-except your wife. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 393
Another blond muscle Amazon - enjoying a large black mentule from the rear - balls on hand.
You don't need to geld those - America does that automatically - mainly through projection onto the Negro...
Life is probably more peaceful without the intrusions of the Freudian "Id" - smoother and more orderly. That's one of the lessons from the ancient Roman Fibula ...
Nature has its own version of that smooth and orderly peace - but its not easy to get there - the Greek "hieros gamos" or mystical marriage
***
Martial: L SPLENDID ISOLATION
“ … You own a spacious bath that none may share,
And groves of bay and plane and towering pine,
A hundred-pillared portico, where shine
Rich onyx pavements with their dusky glare,
Drives where the clattering hoofs resound, and where
The plashing streams and fountains leap in foam,
But not a chamber for a guest is there
O gorgeous palace!
Splendid lack of home … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- That's a trend now and 2000 years ago - Freud's "Id" is mostly a ghetto dweller - that's where the "pleasure principle " lives!
" ... The functional importance of the ego is manifested in the fact that, normally, control over the approaches to motility devolves upon it. Thus, in its relation to the id, [the ego] is like a man on horseback, who has to hold in check the superior strength of the horse; with this difference, that the rider tries to do so with his own strength, while the ego uses borrowed forces. The analogy may be carried a little further. Often, a rider, if he is not to be parted from his horse, is obliged to guide [the horse] where it wants to go; so, in the same way, the ego is in the habit of transforming the id's will into action, as if it were its own. ... " Sigmund Freud
***
I prefer my term "dragon" to Freud's "Id" - Dragon is self-activating - well known everywhere ...
Also Freud is wrong about the lack of mind in the Id - he sees it as pure instinct and all darkness - dark mud ...
The American Indians knew that's where the inner sun lives! That black mud is potentially a life giving inner sun! -"Raven steals the sun" in the American northwest and the sun/moon twins in the Mayan "Popol Vuh" - but first you have to get past the Xibalbans - or Death Lords
***
" ... The Id is the instinctual component of personality that is present at birth, and is the source of bodily needs and wants, emotional impulses and desires, especially aggression and the libido (sex drive). The id acts according to the pleasure principle — the psychic force oriented to immediate gratification of impulse and desire — defined by the avoidance of pain. Freud said that the Id is unconscious, by definition:
It is the dark, inaccessible part of our personality, what little we know of it we have learned from our study of the dreamwork, and, of course, the construction of neurotic symptoms and most of that is of a negative character, and can be described only as a contrast to the ego. We approach the id with analogies: we call it a chaos, a cauldron full of seething excitations. . . . It is filled with energy reaching it from the instincts, but it has no organization, produces no collective will, but only a striving to bring about the satisfaction of the instinctual needs subject to the observance of the pleasure principle.
contrary impulses exist side by side, without cancelling each other. . . . There is nothing in the id that could be compared with negation . . . nothing in the id which corresponds to the idea of time.
Developmentally, the id precedes the ego; the psychic apparatus begins, at birth, as an undifferentiated id, part of which then develops into a structured ego. While "id" is in search of pleasure, "ego" emphasizes the principle of reality. Thus the id:
contains everything that is inherited, that is present at birth, is laid down in the constitution — above all, therefore, the instincts, which originate from the somatic organization, and which find a first psychical expression here (in the id) in forms unknown to us.
The mind of a newborn child is regarded as completely "id-ridden", in the sense that it is a mass of instinctive drives and impulses, and needs immediate satisfaction. The "id" moves on to what organism needs. Example is reduction of tension which is experienced.
The id "knows no judgements of value: no good and evil, no morality. ...Instinctual cathexes seeking discharge—that, in our view, is all there is in the id." It is regarded as "the great reservoir of libido", the instinctive drive to create—the life instincts that are crucial to pleasurable survival. Alongside the life instincts came the death instincts—the death drive which Freud articulated relatively late in his career in "the hypothesis of a death instinct, the task of which is to lead organic life back into the inanimate state." For Freud, "the death instinct would thus seem to express itself—though probably only in part—as an instinct of destruction directed against the external world and other organisms" through aggression. Freud considered that "the id, the whole person...originally includes all the instinctual impulses...the destructive instinct as well", as eros or the life instincts. .... " Wikipedia
Garden of Priapus - 394
Another blond muscle Amazon - enjoying a large black mentule from the rear - Trojan doggy style
The Greek "Hieros Gamos" almost certainly derives from the Sumerian Dumuzi/Innana or Cretan Adonis/Aphrodite mating ...
With the star participant being the mentule or female phallus ... and of course the caged penis ... A radical mirroring of male female energies - And that does not have to be a physical pairing - the "Jinn" can do that for you
***
Martrial: LXVIII: A WARNING TO HIS SPANISH FRIENDS
“ … I FLED from Rome and early calls,
So, Spanish friends, I pray you,
Be wise and seek the lordly halls
Of those who can repay you.
I hate the courts, and legal strife
My lazy mind refuses,
For I am getting on in life
And love to serve the Muses;
Unbroken sleep I love; the stir
And din of Rome destroy it;
But I am going back to her
If here I can't enjoy it. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 395
Boss lady bringing a caged penis to orgasm - Seems incredible to me - but it happened on camera! That's the sex that the bearded Spartans were demanding in the "Lysistrata"
We go around the city doubled up,
like men who light the lamps.
won’t let us touch their pussies, not until
we’ve made a peace with all of Greece."
- No need for walking doubled up if the penis was free to expand - There was also a lot of doubling up in Akhenaten's days too - Egyptian women from Queen Akhenaten on down were walking around naked ... And only the bald men are painted bent over double
- That was the 18th dynasty era of the Minoan bull jumpers - who are really women with large mentules - Crete was the source of the Adonis/Aphrodite myth - with the phallus on Aphrodite not on Adonis ...
- The Cretan Labrys or double headed axe is also the symbol of the Yoruba/Brazilian deity Shago - who to me is a phallic Amazon - not a man
***
Amazon brothels and the Scantinian laws: Martial praisies Emperor Domitian for reviving the Scantinian laws that forbade the gelding of young boys for passive sex in brothels
From reading Martial that cutting was for passive male sex with phallic women - although the assumed meaning is homosexual sex. The universal Fibula or penis cage makes it more likely that the active sexual partner was a sexually ravenous woman like Augusta Messalina who was accused by Juvenal of cutting attractive young boys for sex .
However, in Satire VI Juvenal also notes in the practice of gelding young slaves by Roman matrons to prevent pregnancy remained legal.
- The male Roman penis was a vestigial organ - it was seen as draining away vitality - as opposed to the powerful male ass sex organ which continued to operate even after gelding ...
Martial: ON DOMITIAN'S REVIVAL OF THE
"THEE, O world-father who with conquering sword
The Rhine hast humbled, O most modest lord,
The cities thank for people: in thy time
To bring forth children is at last no crime.
No boy, polluted by a pander's art,
Mourns for his manhood now, no mother's heart
Is wrung by grief when to her child she shows
The pittance which the haughty pimp allows.
The shame our marriage-beds had lost, by thee
Even in brothels we begin to see."
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 396
More boss lady bringing a caged penis to orgasm
Emperor Domitian who revived the Scantinian Laws prohibiting boys from being sexually cut was accused of being a sexual passive as a youth.
This is assumed to be homosexual and maybe it was. But his marble phallic genius - an Amazon mentule (plate 379) - displayed above gives us the true story!
My point is due to the Fibula, it was more probably passive sex with Roman Matrons in the ancient style going back to the Etruscans. ie It was the wife of the offending male and penis caged party who had the actual illegal sex ....
" ... Domitian, we are told, acted against knights and senators guilty of contravening the lex Scantinia de venere nefanda, which proscribed penetrative intercourse with Roman pueri. This is perhaps the most oblique of the charges levelled at Domitian investigated here. The assertion is only intelligible if one considers the implications of Dom. 1, 1, where we are told that Domitian, no longer a puer and thus liable for censure if he did not control the sexual use of his body, allowed himself to be penetrated by his future successor Nerva, in addition to the senator Clodius Pollio. The inference to be drawn, especially in light of accompanying references to his family’s poverty, is that this activity was undertaken for gain. Domitian had therefore prostituted himself. Dom. 1, 1 sets the tone for much of the Vita – Domitian might outwardly appear as a moral conservative, but his private practices cannot bear close scrutiny. One might well adduce the contemporary verse of Juvenal (2, 19-21) on this point, written after Domitian’s death, where he pours scorn on those “who attack such conduct [i.e., passive sexual activity] in the words of Hercules and who swing their bottoms after talking about virtue” (qui talia verbis | Herculis invadunt et de virtute locuti | clunem agitant). At the locus in question, Suetonius alleges that Domitian condemned those who had perhaps performed much the same sin as he had, at least if the law condemned both parties; more so in the case that the penetrated was not a puer or ingenuus. As far as one can tell, Domitian would have been already around seventeen, and thus no longer a puer, when the incidents allegedly took place. According to Richlin, “it seems at least possible that the lex Scantinia allowed scope for the prosecution of an ingenuus, of whatever age, who allowed himself to be used, gratis, as a pathic”. It has also been argued that the law condemned stuprum in general regardless of the gender of the offenders and that it punished the perpetrators of sexual offence, in addition to those who had allowed themselves to be exploited sexually. ... "
The Sexual Hypocrisy of Domitian by Michael Charles and Eva Anagnostou-Laoutides (2010)
***
Martial praises Domitian for banning pedophilia - Again , my guess is the offending parties were Roman Matrons, not men ...
ON DOMITIAN'S LAW PROTECTING CHILDREN
" ... As though, O shame, it did not him suffice
To prostitute our youths to venal vice,
The pander seized our cradles for his prey
And forced young babes to earn him shameful pay,
Till Rome's great father wrathful at the sight
Saved the poor children from their monstrous plight;
E'en as to youths he lately gave his aid
Lest they by cruel lust be sterile made.
Boys, youths, and elders loved thee, Sire, before:
Now infants too thy majesty adore. ... "
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 397
Ginger has a go in the rear of a penis caged slave - with boss lady looking on
The Roman lex Scantinia de venere nefanda proscribed penetrative intercourse with Roman pueri - that being no anal sex with boys under 17.
However, this probably did not apply to slaves. And there are many examples - like the Priapea where there was a clear preference for young unbearded men as the passive sexual partners of Roman matrons. The epigrams of Martial make that pretty clear ... Roman women found the soft adolescent male ass to be highly erotic
I think that was a rite of passage for all Roman and Greek men - and it probably originated in Minoan Crete - the athletic phallic female bull-jumpers probably used those large mentules to break in penis caged Minoan boys into adulthood - Adonis and his phallic Aphrodite was the archetype - the "hieros gamos" :
"The Greeks considered Adonis's cult to be of Near Eastern origin. Adonis's name comes from a Canaanite word meaning "lord" and most modern scholars consider the story of Aphrodite and Adonis to be derived from the earlier Mesopotamian myth of Inanna (Ishtar) and Dumuzid (Tammuz). ... " Wikipedia
" ... Adonis was the mortal lover of the goddess Aphrodite in Greek mythology. In Ovid's first-century AD telling of the myth, he was conceived after Aphrodite cursed his mother Myrrha to lust after her own father, King Cinyras of Cyprus. Myrrha had sex with her father in complete darkness for nine nights, but he discovered her identity and chased her with a sword. The gods transformed her into a myrrh tree and, in the form of a tree, she gave birth to Adonis. Aphrodite found the infant and gave him to be raised by Persephone, the queen of the Underworld. Adonis grew into an astonishingly handsome young man, causing Aphrodite and Persephone to feud over him, with Zeus eventually decreeing that Adonis would spend one third of the year in the Underworld with Persephone, one third of the year with Aphrodite, and the final third of the year with whomever he chose. Adonis chose to spend his final third of the year with Aphrodite.
One day, Adonis was gored by a wild boar during a hunting trip and died in Aphrodite's arms as she wept. His blood mingled with her tears and became the anemone flower. Aphrodite declared the Adonia festival commemorating his tragic death, which was celebrated by women every year in midsummer. During this festival, Greek women would plant "gardens of Adonis", small pots containing fast-growing plants, which they would set on top of their houses in the hot sun. The plants would sprout, but soon wither and die. Then the women would mourn the death of Adonis, tearing their clothes and beating their breasts in a public display of grief.
The Greeks considered Adonis's cult to be of Near Eastern origin. Adonis's name comes from a Canaanite word meaning "lord" and most modern scholars consider the story of Aphrodite and Adonis to be derived from the earlier Mesopotamian myth of Inanna (Ishtar) and Dumuzid (Tammuz). ... " Wikipedia
***
The King of Cyprus was being sodomized by his athletic Amazon daughter Myrrha!
"Aphrodite cursed his mother Myrrha to lust after her own father, King Cinyras of Cyprus. Myrrha had sex with her father in complete darkness for nine nights"
That's Caananite sex and Sumerian sex too and Egyptian as well - the fathers submitted to their daughters at all levels after their Amazon wives passed away !
Kinky Caanan - Anat over her brother Baal - but also Anat over her father El - and Asherah over her son Baal - and so on - the Babylonian penis was clearly in the cage!
***
" ... THOUGH abundant wealth you own
Such a treasure few have known
Yet you sit and brood alone
Like the dragon coiled of old
Round the Colchian fleece of gold,
On your 'son's ' extravagance,
You may cozen fools perchance,
You are right to say your ' son,'
For your life had scarce begun
Ere your soul begot you one,
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
That's what happens once the phallus is beaten into submission ... The dragon is going to turn many a grand dame into a crazy bag lady - "Adonis is dead!"
- To prevent that the Roman's had the Vestal's guarding the eternal flame as well a large ever-erect phallus - the Fascinum - which was ever-present in all Roman homes and baths and public places - Rome was submissive to the erect female phallus of Vesta at all levels!
Garden of Priapus - 398
Blondie has a go on the rear of a penis caged slave - as ginger and boss lady look on ...
Martial: LXXIX TO ATTICILLA
“ … WHAT YOU ask for I always have given-and more;
Yet you still keep on asking, the same as before.
If a man does not know when the word should be ' No,'
It means there's no length to which he will not go. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- Martial retired to one of these in Spain - she gave him a villa in exchange - for ? His ass!
That's how Rome disappeared - the inner image is a "vanishing" once the eros rises above a certain threshold - I saw that image after posting a white Brazilian "bumbum" image on page 134 - the dream made a point of contrasting that with the current white American model
- Still there but parallel worlds - Not that "occult" - most dark skinned immigrants in the US are defacto invisible ...
Garden of Priapus - 399
More boss lady from the rear of a penis caged slave ...
Martial: Book XII:21 Marcella
“ … Marcella, who’d think you hailed from frozen Salo,
that you were born in those haunts of mine?
So rare, so sweet: your flavour. The Palatine,
hearing you once, would name you for its own;
no one born in Subura’s midst, no daughter
of the tall Capitoline Hill could rival you;
nor will a glory of foreign birth, soon show
more worthy of becoming a Roman bride.
You tell me to quell my longing for the City:
you, of yourself, create a Rome for me. … “
Translated by A. S. Kline (2006)
- Thats the Spanish/Roman matron that Martial retired to
"No one born in Subura’s midst" is a brothel reference -
" ... Julius Caesar lived in a family home (domus) in the Suburra until, in 63 BC, he was elected pontifex maximus at the age of 37, as the Suburra had grown up around the property many years before his birth. The poet Martial also lived there. ... " Wikipedia
Sulla and Pompey also had brothel pasts - Large fortunes were produced there.
" ... Sulla, the son of Lucius Cornelius Sulla and the grandson of Publius Cornelius Sulla, was born into a branch of the patrician gens Cornelia, but his family had fallen to an impoverished condition at the time of his birth. The reason behind this was because an ancestor, Publius Cornelius Rufinius, was banished from the Senate after having been caught possessing more than 10 pounds of silver plate.As a result of this, Sulla's branch of the gens lost public standing and never retained the position of consul or dictator until Sulla came. A story says that when he was a baby, his nurse was carrying him around the streets, until a strange woman walked up to her and said, "Puer tibi et reipublicae tuae felix." This can be translated as, "The boy will be a source of luck to you and your state." Lacking ready money, Sulla spent his youth among Rome’s comedians, actors, lute players, and dancers. During these times on the stage, after initially singing, he started writing plays, Atellan farces, a kind of crude comedy. He retained an attachment to the debauched nature of his youth until the end of his life; Plutarch mentions that during his last marriage – to Valeria – he still kept company with "actresses, musicians, and dancers, drinking with them on couches night and day."
Sulla almost certainly received a good education. Sallust declares him well-read and intelligent, and he was fluent in Greek, which was a sign of education in Rome. The means by which Sulla attained the fortune, which later would enable him to ascend the ladder of Roman politics, the cursus honorum, are not clear, although Plutarch refers to two inheritances - one from his stepmother (who loved him dearly, as if he were her own son) and the other from Nicopolis, a (possibly Greek) low-born woman who became rich. ... " Wikipedia
- That's just a trend! The Roman phallic bull matron and prostitute was the defacto ruler of Rome - she ruled through her sons and husbands - the She-wolf was the mother of Romulus and Remus
Garden of Priapus - 400
Ginger has another go over the penis caged slave ...
Martial: XXXI MARCELLA'S GIFT
“ … THE grove, the woven shade of arching vine,
The streams, the runnels in their conduit clear,
Fields, roses-Paestum's hardly vie with mine
The herbs that never know a winter drear,
The pond that teems with eels, the dovecote there,
All snowy-white, for whiter doves a shrine,
My lady gave when I returned to Spain
After long years;
Pheacia's realm divine
Nausicaa should offer me in vain:
'Tis in Marcella's I would choose to reign. …. “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
- Martial was a "kept" man - a Spintira or ass for hire based in the Roman brothel district - until he retired to a Spanish estate
Garden of Priapus - 401
More boss lady - "horse riding" the penis bound slave - Ginger being serviced from the front.
- That's a very common bronze image from Pompeii - the nude Roman matron riding a winged phallus - The fascinum -
- My guess is the locked Roman penis - in its Fibula - meant the phallic energy was transferred to the female rider of the horse
***
- Martial was warming the loins of "idle " Romans as far away as icy Britain
Martial: Book XI:3
Now, a patron would be nice!
Not only idle Rome rejoices in my Muse,
my fragments don’t just fall on empty ears,
no, my book’s thumbed by rigid centurions
stuck to their Martial standards in Getic frost,
and they even say the Britons recite my verse.
What’s the good?
My purse would never know it.
And yet, what excellent pages I could scribble,
what battles my Pierian trumpet could blow,
if while re-incarnating Augustus here on earth,
the kind gods had sent Rome a Maecenas, too! … “
Translated by A. S. Kline (2006)
Garden of Priapus - 402
Muscle blond from behind Trojan doggy style
Marc Anthony, Domitian, Martial, Julius Caesar, Pompey, Sulla - just a small number of Romans with youthful links to the Roman brothel district - the Suburra - and in myth - the Trojan Priam and Nestor and Paris.
The list goes on if you dig a little - the anti-sex Cicero for example was sponsored from a young age by a rich and powerful aunt - and was always married to wealthy young women ...
Due to the Fibula or penis cage - all Roman men were Spintria - or anal sex partners in one form or another
***
Martial - Book XI:62 On the nail
“ … Lesbia swears she’s never been fucked for free.
True.
When she wants to be fucked, she has to pay. ... “
Translated by A. S. Kline (2006)
My guess is the Roman brothel district - Suburra - was more a female brothel than male - The Roman female libido was higher than the male -
The model was the ancient Sumerian Es-dam - or female brothel - the goddess Cybele was mythically once the owner of a Sumerian female brothel
- Rome was polyandrous - like Ostriches and other female phallus dominant big birds like Emus or Rheas - or dragons - the "feathered serpents" ...
Garden of Priapus - 403
More muscle blond from behind Trojan doggy style
- Martial was a night worker - his main occupation was nocturnal service in the Suburra - the "stews" - daytime was sleep time ...
That's also how he avoided violence from Roman husbands - Suburra prostitution was a taxed and state supported institution
Martial - LVII: THE NOISES OF ROME
“ … WHY do I seek my poor Nomentan home
And squalid hearth, my fields by drought oppressed?
Because I cannot find a place in Rome
Where men as poor as I can sleep or rest.
At early dawn the schoolmasters begin,
By nights the pastry-cooks no respite give,
Smiths make the daylight hideous with their din
Of clashing hammers. What a life to live!
Here is a money-changer ringing coins
Upon his dirty counter-lazy cheat
Next door the Spanish goldsmith's shop adjoins,
All day the glittering mallets thump and beat. …”
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 404
Canaan sex: Topless boss lady over a penis caged OG or "old guy"
- The youthful Anat over the elderly El - that was the pre-moses landscape in ancient Israel - That was life beyond the Hebraic "Asherah pole"
***
The Minoan Queen Pasiphae was stricken with lust for a bull by Poseidon - That scene was one of the early spectacles in the new Colosseum that Martial witnessed
- Rome being Troy - that phallus was female, not male ...
Martial - De Spectaculis: 6 On display
“ … Pasiphae really was mated to that Cretan bull:
believe it: we’ve seen it,
the old story’s true.
old antiquity needn’t pride itself so, Caesar:
whatever legend sings,
the arena offers you. … “
Translated by A. S. Kline (2006)
Garden of Priapus - 405
More Canaan sex: Topless boss lady over a penis caged OG or "old guy"
Life in ancient Suburra as seen by Martial - a sex worker…
Martial: BOOK TWELVE
“ … Bellona's frenzied minions howl and rant,
A bandaged sailor begs, a Jewish child,
Taught by his mother, whines his lying cant,
Blear-eyed match pedlars shout and drive me wild.
But who may count the noises of the Town
That murder sleep? Nay, you could count as soon
The clashing cymbal-strokes that try to drown
The Colchian incantation to the moon.
But, Sparsus, you can never know such ills,
Softly you lie and lapped in rustic peace,
Your lowest room is far above our hills,
Long ere they reach you noise and clamour cease.
A country house within the city bounds
Your labourers can live within the wall
With vineyards rich and drives and spacious grounds,
All these are yours and quiet sleep withal.
At will the glaring sunlight you exclude,
Rome throngs about my bed, I start from sleep
To tramping footsteps and to laughter rude,
Till, wearied, to my country cot I creep. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 406
More boss lady over a rare black ass ...
***
An old Roman woman buys a young slave to sate her "un-natural" lusts
- It's safe to assume the young slave had his balls removed before entering service ... Again there's that Roman image of women lusting after men for their rears only ...
Martial: TO GALLA
“… To buy a young minion you've spent all your gold,
And let your three children go hungry and cold,
While you force him on you his male vigour to prove,
Who are long past the age for legitimate love.
May you grow old together, and never another
Embrace you but he, you unnatural mother. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 407
Another boss lady over a rare black ass ...
“ …. Martial, On the Public Shows of Domitian (1897)
1. ON THE AMPHITHEATRE.
Let barbarian Memphis keep silence concerning the wonders of her pyramids, and let not Assyrian toil vaunt its Babylon.
Let not the effeminate Ionians claim praise for their temple of the Trivian goddess; and let the altar, bristling with horns, speak modestly of the name of Delos.
Their mausoleum too, hanging in empty air, let not the Carians with immoderate praise extol to the skies.
Every work of toil yields to Caesar's amphitheatre; fame shall tell of one work for all.
- There was an altar in Delos, said to have been constructed by Apollo of the horns of the stags slain by Diana, or "the Trivian goddess." …”
"Barbarian" Memphis (Egypt), "effeminate" Ionians (Greece), Assyrian toil - all had to bow down before the new Roman wonder - the Colosseum
All three were "effeminate" though - with Babylon being the epitome of the goddess and her female phallus ... Both Martial and Emperor Domitian were Spintria or male ass for hire in teir youth ...
Garden of Priapss - 408
Closing boss lady over rare black ass ...
- Rare why? That's strong energy - that's the dream image ... Or maybe that's why!
***
- Slaves in Rome were luxury goods - So like the black ass in America - they were jealously hoarded!
That's dumb though - eros does not grow when hoarded - it's not like capital - the western capitalist model of "scarcity and competition" does not work when applied to the natural world-
Or maybe I'm wrong - the reason we have national parks is to hoard natural energy ....
Martial: LXX TO TUCCA
“ … How can you endure to sell your poor boys;
Each cost you a thousand, these delicate toys.
Do not their caresses your stubborn heart move,
Their artless complaints, and the signs of their love.
If you want ready money, there's land you can sell,
Your house and your plate, cups and tables as well,
Old slaves of your father's-I'm sure they won't mind
Nothing matters as long as the boys stay behind.
It was reckless to buy them-that none will deny
But to sell them would recklessness greater imply. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 409
Boss lady over her husband - with a very large mentule ... The dream image is modern women are not satisfied with the standard eight inch ancient Greek dildo
- That's both the "jinn" and what the dream images say of regular women
- It's not really a preference - its more a measure of natural energy - the more energy the bigger the dildo .... It kind of makes its own decision
- Kind of like the wand in "Harry Potter" - The wand has a life of it's own
***
Mortal men must yield to the large mentule of the "jinn" - they have rank!
Maybe that's why the strange sex of the Greco - Romans and Babylonians
Martial: BOOK TWO
“ … Though Patrobas should trespass on my field,
He's Nero's freedman, so you bid me yield:
Or if Laronia keep the slaves I lend her,
A rich old widow, you will not offend her.
To serve a servant is a lot abhorred;
Let him be free who is my overlord. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 410
Another muscle blond from behind Trojan doggy style ...
***
Rank - the higher you rise, the less you interact with those below.
Maybe that's why I do not link blond with eros - eros is below and of the earth and blond above and in the sky!
Martial: XL. TO POSTUMUS.
“ … When the halls of the Pisos, and the thrice-illustrious house of the learned Seneca, were displaying long lines of pedigrees, I preferred you, Postumus, to all such high personages; you were poor and but a knight, but to me you were a consul. With you, Postumus, I counted thirty winters; we had one couch in common between us. Now, full of honours, and rolling in wealth, you can give, you can lavish. I am waiting, Postumus, to see what you will do for me. You do nothing; and it is late for me to look about for another patron. Is this, Fortune, your act? Postumus has imposed upon me. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 411
More Asian action - Cigarette and snake tattoo girl working a chained and penis bound slave from the rear with a large black mentule
***
- Even poor Romans got to enjoy the luxury of a pretty slave! - I'm now fairly certain the slaves of Rome were all white and more precisely - all Britons - Martial birthed this insight for me in an epigram above ... (Plate 385)
The best source of affordable slaves was not savage Germany or Africa - it was the captive, closed off and savage British Isles ... Germany was never Romanized - and Africa was way too expensive - Plus Roman Emperors were from Africa - it was not a good source for slaves..
- And Roman men were sodomized by pretty young female slaves - Martial and the Fibula leaves no doubt of that in my mind!
Martial: LXIII TO MILICHUS
“ … YOUR capital was always small,
Yet in the mart you gave
The thousand pounds that made your all
To buy a pretty slave. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 412
More Asian action - Snake tattoo girl working a chained and penis bound slave from above with a large black mentule -balls in hand
The simple Roman country life of a poor Roman - all the basics including at least one pretty slave ...
Martial: LV COUNTRY PLEASURES
“ … DEAR Fronto, famed alike in peace and war,
If you would learn what my chief wishes are,
Know that I crave some acres few to till,
And live at ease as careless as I will.
Why should I always trudge the stony street
And go each morn some haughty lord to greet,
When all the country's spoils are mine to get
Caught in the meshes of a hunting-net?
When I with line could snare the leaping trout
And from the hive press golden honey out,
While Joan my humble board with eggs supplies
Boiled on a fire whose logs she never buys?
May he not love this life who loves not me,
And still in Rome a pale-faced client be! … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 413
More Asian action - Snake tattoo girl working a chained and penis bound slave from above with a large black mentule
Love Roman style - It was really polyandry - phallic and married Roman matrons over penis caged Roman men in the Suburra - That was Martial's main source of income - Poetry does not pay
“… You bid me say what kind of maid
My friend, I hate a forward jade
But loathe a prude as well.
I love the mean: extremes are vain
Love long denied is grief and pain,
While easy favours cloy. … “
Pott & Wright's : Martial, : the twelve books of Epigrams
Garden of Priapus - 414
More Asian action - Snake tattoo girl working a chained and penis bound slave with a large black mentule - missionary style
That's what the "effeminate" Ionians from the poem above were getting from Greek women.
I am fairly sure the example of the sexually ravenous "she wolf" Empress Messalina in the Suburra was closer to the Roman reality than the assumed female sex-worker narrative ...
In Martial we have first hand testimony of a Suburra sex worker ... And it's a man servicing Roman matrons, not a woman servicing men - Again, the cause was the Fibula, or male sex cage
***
Martial on the erect penis - but that does not mean the modern meaning - I think it means the aroused caged phallus - in this case of a male sex-worker
That hyper-active member known to so many girls
has ceased to rise for Linus.
Translated by A. S. Kline (2006)
***
" ... THE chief value of Martial's Epigrams, disregarding for
the moment their literary excellence, lies in the picture
they give us of Roman society towards the end of the
first century A.D., that period in the world's history
which, beyond all others, bears the closest resemblance
to our own times. It is a picture drawn by a realist, and
in its mingling of light and shade far more convincing
than the lurid colours and unrelieved blackness with
which Juvenal and Tacitus present us. Martial is a
Sancho Panza who sees things as they are: the satirist
and the historian have more likeness to the mad knight,
and fired by their righteous indignation tilt as blindly
against the established order of the Empire as Don
Quixote did against his giant windmills. Their moral
earnestness is certainly impressive, and as characters they
are doubtless more deserving of our esteem than is the
easy-going and pleasure-loving epigrammatist; but if we
wish to gain a true idea of Rome and Roman life, about
the year A.D. 90, it is to the pages of Martial, rather than
to Juvenal or Tacitus, that we should turn. Martial has
three great advantages over the other two writers: he
is good-tempered, while they are soured and disappointed
men: he is a Spaniard, to whom the Empire has brought
nothing but benefits, while they are Romans who can
never forget the time when the world was ruled in the
interests of Rome: he is one of the middle class, the
great discovery of the new system, while they belong to
the official hierarchy which had for centuries enjoyed the
doubtful privilege of government.
And so, writing from the outside without temper and
without bias, Martial is able to give us a complete
panorama of Roman society from top to bottom. At
the very summit comes His Most Gracious Majesty, the
Emperor Domitian, ' dominus ei dens ', as he insisted on
being called by the reluctant senate, whose shadowy powers he refused to recognize. ' His most gracious
majesty '-the words make an appropriate inscription
for the portrait of Domitian that Martial gives us We
see, not at all a cruel and detestable tyrant, 'calvus
Nero', but rather a patriotic, popular, and-strangely
enough-a rather Puritanical prince, whose benevolent
activities at Rome run on much the same lines as those
followed to-day by the London County Council. He
curbs the enterprise of the pushing tradesmen who
encroach upon the highway with their stalls; he settles
scales of fees, and regulates theatre accommodation;
he offers handsome prizes at the literary and musical
competitions which take place in his Alban villa; he
employs a young and deserving architect to build for him
a palace which shall be worthy of the world's capital
city; he keeps a strict watch over the morals of the
community, passes laws to protect young children from
vicious degradation, endeavours to preserve the sanctity
of marriage and family life, and discourages all licentiousness in literature, being himself so strict in his
regard for propriety that our poet has to be far more
careful than is his wont when he is writing for the
imperial ear. These are some of the impressions of
Domitian's character that we get from a perusal of the
Epigrams, and although Martial is commonly accused of
shameless flattery and sycophantic adulation, it is well,
for the sake of truth, that we have in him some corrective
to the venom of Tacitus' pen. Domitian had his faults,
but for the historian his unforgivable sin was that,
being himself something of a realist, he refused to acquiesce
any longer in the legal fiction that made the senate
ostensibly a co-partner in empire.
Immediately below the Emperor comes the imperial
entourage: Crispinus, the commander of the bodyguard; Regulus, the great orator, Domitian's most
trusted counsellor; the freedmen, Parthenius, imperial
chamberlain, Sextus, librarian, and Entellus, confidential
secretary; the architect Rabirius, the butler Euphemus,
the cup-bearer Earinos, and the actors Paris and Latinus.
On all of these, high and low alike, Martial lavishes his
most ingenious flattery, receiving in return such small
rewards as the gift of a toga from Parthenius, described
with a wealth of hyperbole in Book VIII, xxviii.
Next we have the leading lights of Roman society, political and literary, with nearly all of whom in their
capacity of patrons Martial seems to have been acquainted,
the word 'friend' in their connection usually rhyming with
" send-me a present" or " lend-me some money ".
Among the high officials, generals, administrators, and
governors of provinces are Licinius Sura, Domitius
Tullus, and his brother Lucanus, the Etrusci father and
son, Macer, Avitus, Paulus, Vestinus, and Antonius
Primus, the most brilliant commander of the Flavian
armies, whose capture of Cremona is described in Tacitus'
Histories. The literary aristocrats include the younger
Pliny, Silius Italicus, author of the Punica, the poet
Stella and his wife Ianthis, the poetess Sulpicia and her
husband Calenus, Frontinus the great authority on
aqueducts, and Polla, widow of Lucan. Of contemporary
writers Quintilian and Juvenal receive complimentary
verses; Statius alone is never mentioned.
Then follows a less distinguished gathering, men and
women of Martial's own station in life, for whom he
shows in many poems a very real and sincere affection.
His dearest friend perhaps is his namesake, Julius Martialis,
on whose suburban villa he writes one of his most charming
pieces; but he has many other intimates, Quintus
Ovidius, his neighbour at Nomentum, the centurion
Pudens and his British wife Claudia, Canius Rufus of
Gades, husband of the learned Theophila, his fellow
poets, Castricus and Cerialis, Faustinus and Flaccus,
his compatriots Decianus, Priscus, Licinianus, and
Maternus. To all of these he writes with genuine warmth,
and for many of them he obviously felt the same tender
regard as inspires the three beautiful epigrams on the
death of the little slave girl Erotion (V, xxxiv, xxxvii,
X, lxi), poems which show that even if Martial was a
bachelor and no great respecter of women, he was a true
And then we are introduced to the more sordid side
of life in the capital, to an anonymous world for whom
Martial invents fictitious names-Zoilus, Caecilianus,
Postumus, Galla, Lesbia, Gellia-a world consisting
chiefly of needy clients and upstart parvenus, of old
ladies of excessive temperament and young ladies of
easy virtue. There is the captator, the adventurer who
tries by flattery and small services to win the good graces
of a childless millionaire, and to secure a legacy in his
will: the delator, a pernicious rascal who makes a trade of spying on his neighbours and accusing them of some
offence against the imperial regime: the Yecilator, less
dangerous than the informer but even more annoying,
the amateur poet who insists on boring his friends with
recitals of his verses. Every aspect of Rome Martial
presents to us. With him we pass through the crowded
streets and the long muddy stairways up the hill-sides,
along which the white-robed client in the early morning
has to trudge his way in order to be present at his patron's
levee. We see the law courts beset by a crowd of litigants
and hear the applause and cheers that greet some brilliant
effort of eloquence by a great advocate. We visit the
baths, public and private, each with its own regular
clientele, and watch the masseurs anointing and rubbing
down their customers, while sly thieves look for their
opportunity to filch some bather's gown. We sit among
the audience in the theatre and smile as Leitus or
Oceanus, the two chief ushers, touch some upstart on
the shoulder and eject him from the rows of seats reserved
for senators and knights. We smell the odour of the
circus mingled of the blood of slain animals, the scent of
liquid saffron and cinnamon, and the press of the great
crowd. And finally we hear all the gossip of the town:
the shameful behaviour of the priests of Cybele, the unfortunate accident that befell an Etruscan at the sacrifice,
how one boy was killed by a falling icicle, another by a
snake lurking within a hollow statue, how a tame lion
mauled the circus attendants, how a hare escaped unharmed from the arena; and so on and so on. There is
hardly any incident however trivial which will not serve
Martial as the subject for an epigram, and he always
treats his theme with the lightest wit and the most
dexterous skill. He is a realist, and one of the most
extreme of that school: he shrinks from nothing, dull,
coarse, and disgusting though it be; and consequently
many of his pieces are extremely offensive to a delicate
reader. But the blame for them, if blame must be
allotted-in this volume they are mostly left in their
original Latin-does not rest solely with Martial: part
must be assigned to the realistic method, part to the
Roman character, and part to life itself.
IN the history of the Epigram Martial is indisputably the
greatest name. As regards bulk of poems, variety of
subject, general interest, and posthumous fame, he easily
surpasses all his Greek rivals, while among his own
countrymen there is no one who in this particular field
can be even compared with him. He is certainly indebted
in some degree-and handsomely acknowledges his debtto Catullus and Ovid for his style; but if it is possible to
improve upon the dainty lightness of the one and the
glittering polish of the other, Martial accomplishes that
miraculous feat. He is the epigrammatist, and it is
largely owing to his predominance that the word
'epigram ' in English bears a somewhat different meaning
from that which it has in Greek. Originally an inscription, whether in verse or in prose, such as might be placed
on a tomb, a statue, or a temple offering, it came to
mean for the Greeks a short poem having, as Mr Mackail
says, " the compression and conciseness of a real inscription, highly finished, evenly balanced, simple, lucid."
To this definition most of the pieces in the Greek
Anthology answer, but to the wit and point which form
the chief essentials of a modern epigram they make
little pretension. It is of Martial that the Oxford Dictionary is thinking when it says: " An epigram is a short
poem ending in a witty and ingenious turn of thought
to which the rest of the composition is intended to lead up."
Martial's reputation as satirist and wit has indeed
rather obscured his more definitely poetical qualities
In the Epigrams he confines himself practically to three
metres, the elegiac couplet, the hendecasyllabic, and the
iambic scazon; and it is interesting to notice the connection that obviously exists between the choice of metre and the writer's thoughts. Though Martial lived most of his days in Rome, he was in a very genuine sense a lover of the country, of the simple life, and of his own native land. When he is treating of these three subjects and writing rather to please himself than his Roman
audience, he is apt to escape from the confined limits of
the epigram, and to employ the 'limping iambic' as his
metre. The bizarre effect obtained by the unexpected spondee at the end of each line probably seemed to him
exactly suitable; for in those days of strained rhetoric
and formal antithesis it was an unusual novelty to have
simple ideas and to express them in simple language.
His model, of course, is the ' Sirmio' of Catullus, and in
several pieces he, at least, equals his predecessor. There
is the beautiful description (III, lviii) of Faustinus' farm,
and of the suburban retreat of Julius Martialis (IV, lxiv),
the outburst on the glories of Spain (IV, lv), and the
ecstatic picture of the seaside at Formiae (X, xxx); best
known of all perhaps the poem on the death of little
Erotion (V, xxxvii), with whom compared, 'inamabilis
sciurus et frequens phoenix.' These poems indeed are
studded with gems of phrasing-' grandes proborum
virgines colonorum', 'sub urbe possides, famem mundam',
' caelo perfruitur sereniore ', 'viva sed quies ponti ',and they show that Martial had latent in him a vein of
imagination not unlike that which Goldsmith worked
when he wrote ' The Deserted Village'.
While the best and longest of the iambic pieces
treat of the picturesque, the most striking of the hendecasyllabics are concerned with personal emotions. Here
again Martial follows Catullus in the 'Passer' poems,
but for him the place of Lesbia is taken by male friends,
above all by his dear Julius Martialis. To him the three
most charming of the series are addressed, the invitation
to holiday, with its reminder of the hours-' qui nobis
pereunt et imputantur' (V, xx); the description of the
happy life and all that it needs (X, xlvii); and the final
poem of farewell written in sorrow from Spain-' nulli
te facias nimis sodalem '.
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