Curiositates eroticae physiologiae, or, Tabooed subjects freely treated in six essays, viz. : 1. generation. 2. chastity and modesty. 3. marriage. 4. circumcision. 5. eunuchism. 6. hermophrodism, and followed by a closing essay on death / by John Davenport.

  • Davenport, John, 1789-1877.
Date:
1875
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Curiositates eroticae physiologiae, or, Tabooed subjects freely treated in six essays, viz. : 1. generation. 2. chastity and modesty. 3. marriage. 4. circumcision. 5. eunuchism. 6. hermophrodism, and followed by a closing essay on death / by John Davenport. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    and bring forth the tokens of the girl’s virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate “And the damsel’s father shall say unto the elders, ‘I gave my daughter unto this man for wife, and he hateth her ; and lo! he hath given occasion of speech against her, saying, I found not thy daughter a maid, and yet these are the tokens of my daughter’s virginity ’—and they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city:” And the elders of the city shall take that man and chastise him:” “And they shall amerce him in one hundred shekels of silver, and give them unto the father of the damsel, because he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel; and she shall be his wife, he may not put her away all his days.” But if this thing be true and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel ” “Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father’s house, and the men of the city shall stone her with stones, because she hath wrought folly in Israel to play the whore in her father’s house. So shalt thou put evil away from among you.” The reverence which the ancient Romans had for virginity and, consequently, for virgins themselve, is well known, The highest citizens of the state gave way to them in the street; they never went abroad without being veiled, and never showed themselves to strangers in the house of thier parents. These latter scrupulously abstained from indulging in mutual endear¬ ments in their presence, and it is even asserted that a law expressly forbade a virgin’s being punished with death. Hence, no doubt, originated the story of Sejanus’s daughter, a girl only