ans of old, they will prostitute their wives and
daughters (which Chalcocondila, a Greek modern writer, for want of better
intelligence, puts upon us Britons) to such travellers or seafaring men as
come amongst them by chance, to show how far they were from this feral vice
of jealousy, and how little they esteemed it. The kings of Calecut, as
[6227]Lod. Vertomannus relates, will not touch their wives, till one of
their Biarmi or high priests have lain first with them, to sanctify their
wombs. But those Esai and Montanists, two strange sects of old, were in
another extreme, they would not marry at all, or have any society with
women, [6228]"because of their intemperance they held them all to be
naught." Nevisanus the lawyer, _lib. 4. num. 33. sylv. nupt._ would have
him that is inclined to this malady, to prevent the worst, marry a quean,
_Capiens meretricem, hoc habet saltem boni quod non decipitur, quia scit
eam sic esse, quod non contingit aliis_. A fornicator in Seneca
constuprated two wenches in a night; for satisfaction, the one desired to
hang him, the other to marry him. [6229] Hierome, king of Syracuse in
Sicily, espoused himself to Pitho, keeper of the stews; and Ptolemy took
Thais a common whore to be his wife, had two sons, Leontiscus and Lagus by
her, and one daughter Irene: 'tis therefore no such unlikely thing. [6230]A
citizen of Engubine gelded himself to try his wife's honesty, and to be
freed from jealousy; so did a baker in [6231] Basil, to the same intent.
But of all other precedents in this kind, that of [6232]Combalus is most
memorable; who to prevent his master's suspicion, for he was a beautiful
young man, and sent by Seleucus his lord and king, with Stratonice the
queen to conduct her into Syria, fearing the worst, gelded himself before
he went, and left his genitals behind him in a box sealed up. His mistress
by the way fell in love with him, but he not yielding to her, was accused
to Seleucus of incontinency, (as that Bellerophon was in like case, falsely
traduced by Sthenobia, to King Praetus her husband, _cum non posset ad
coitum inducere)_ and that by her, and was therefore at his corning home
cast into prison: the day of hearing appointed, he was sufficiently cleared
and acquitted, by showing his privities, which to the admiration of the
beholders he had formerly cut off. The Lydians used to geld women whom they
suspected, saith Leonicus _var. hist. Tib. 3. cap. 49._ as well as men. To
this pu