distributed in the evening among the guests assembled at the bridegroom's house. A Roman marriage by confarreatio is denoted, in many antiquities, by a man and woman standing; she gives her right hand to the man, and in her left holds three wheat ears. The man wears a toga, the woman a stola and peplum, thrown over her shoulders. Her hair is rolled and raised round her head, as in Diana and Victory, a fashion usual with virgins and brides. Hands touching each other, with wheat ears, are also emblems of marriages by confarreatio. There are many bas-reliefs of marriage in Montfaucon. In one of the Villa Borghese, and another of the Justiniani Palace, the bride is veiled, and an old woman by her side is probably the nurse, the constant attendant of young girls. The gall was taken out of the animal which was slaughtered at the marriage, so that no bitterness might follow the union.

The bride was conducted to the house of her husband in the evening. She was taken with apparent violence from the arms of her mother, or of the person who had given her away. On her way she was accompanied by three boys or bride-knights, dressed in the prætexta, and whose fathers and mothers were still alive. One of them, or sometimes a virgin attendant, carried before her a torch of white thorn or pine wood. The two other boys walked by her side, supporting her by the arms; and she carried a distaff of flax, and a spindle of wool. A boy, called Camillus, carried in a covered vase the so-called utensils of the bride and playthings for children. Besides those persons who officiated on the occasion, the procession was attended by numerous friends of both parties. Plutarch speaks of five wax candles which were used at marriages; if these were borne in the procession, probably they were to light the company which followed the bride, but it may be that they were lighted during the marriage ceremony in the bride's house. The bringing

home of the bride was regarded in the later days of the Roman empire as one of the most important parts of the marriage ceremony.

When the procession arrived at the bridegroom's house, the door of which was adorned with garlands and flowers, the bride was carried across the threshold by men who had been married to only one woman. It is said by some that this custom was a relic of the usage of capture or force in marriage, and by others that it was to indicate that the bride lost her virginity unwillingly; while others say that it was followed so that the bride might not strike her foot against the threshold, and thus cause an evil omen. Probably the first is the correct reason. Before she entered the house, she wound wool around the doorposts, and anointed them with lard or wolf's fat, in order to avert enchantments. Her husband received her with fire and water, which she had to touch. This was either a symbol of purification, for the couple washed their feet in the water, or of welcome. The bride saluted her husband with the words, "Ubi tu Caius, ego Caia." Having entered, she was placed upon a sheepskin, and the keys of the house were delivered into her hands. The nuptials were also confirmed by a kiss.

A repast, given by the bridegroom to all the relations and friends who accompanied the bride, generally concluded the ceremonies of the day. Many ancient writers mention a very popular song, called Talasius or Talassio, which was sung at weddings, but whether it was sung during the repast, or during the procession, is not certain, although we may infer, from the story respecting the origin of the song, that it was sung while the latter was proceeding to the bridegroom's house.

A variety of jests and railleries took place sometimes, and Ovid mentions obscene songs which were sung before

the door of the bridal apartment by girls, after the company had gone. These songs were probably the old Fescennina, and are called also Epithalamia. At the end of the repast the bride was conducted by matrons who had not had more than one husband to the lectus genialis, or bridal-bed, in the atrium, or hall, which was magnificently adorned and strewed with flowers and evergreens for the occasion.

On the following day the husband sometimes gave another entertainment to his friends, and the wife, who on this day undertook the management of her husband's house, performed certain religious rites, probably consisting of sacrifices to the Penates. Both parties gave presents to those friends who had negotiated or favored their marriage. At Roman weddings the bridegroom threw nuts about the room for boys to scramble, as a token that he relinquished his childish diversions. The classical epithalamia refer to this custom, and some authors say the nuts which were so scattered were walnuts. Pliny says that, in his time, the circos, a kind of lame hawk, was accounted a lucky omen at weddings.

The position of a Roman woman after her marriage was very different from that of a Greek woman. The former presided over the whole household, and shared the honors and respect shown to her husband. She also, at least during the better times of the Republic, occupied the most important part of the house, the atrium. The Roman ladies usually bound their heads with fillets, as a mark of their chastity, which common women were not allowed to do. Seduction under promise of marriage, marriage for mere money, and the prejudice against mothers-in-law, were common among the Romans.

The ancient Etruscans always were married in the streets, before the door of the house, which was thrown

open after the ceremony. In the "Memoirs of the Etruscan Academy of Cortona" is a drawing of a picture found in Herculaneum, representing a marriage at which a sorceress is practising divination with five stones.

The Syracusan virgins, when about to enter the matrimonial state, used to go in procession to the Temple of Diana, the goddess of chastity, preceded by chanters, musicians, and persons carrying flowers and vessels of incense, and accompanied by tamed tigers, leopards, and the like animals. Theocritus, in his second "Idyll," alludes to this

custom.

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CHAPTER III.

Scythian Marriages.-Lydian Marriages.-Lycian Marriages.-Rhodian Marriages.-Parthian Marriages.-Nestorian Marriages.-Chaldean Marriages. -Fire Custom.-Assyrian Marriages.-Babylonian Marriages.-Women put up for Sale.—Marriage at Nimroud.—Coins stuck on the Bridegroom's Head.-Egyptian Marriages.-Copt Marriages.-Moorish Marriages.—Algerian Marriages.-Morocco Marriages.-Barbary Marriages.--Arabian Marriages.-Marriage for a Term.-Wives in Common.-Bedouin Marriages.-Green Leaf Symbol.--Marriages near Mount Sinai.--Wife-capturing.-Wife-escaping.--Marriages by the Medes.--Persian Marriages.— Marriage to the Dead.-Marriage of a Persian Prince.-Caubul Marriages. -Wives lent.-Sabean Marriages.-Marriage in Georgia and Circassia.Sewing the Couple together.-Sham Fights at Circassian Marriages.--Armenian Marriages.

THE

HE ancient Scythians, being a warlike people, would not marry a maiden who had not killed an enemy. Polygamy was prevalent among them, and marriage with. the wife of another man was allowed. Some tribes had wives in common. The more modern Scythians, however, had a horror of conjugal infidelity, and their laws rigorously punished that crime with death.

Among the Lydians the gains of prostitution furnished a marriage portion for their women. So at Carthage female prostitution was recommended as an act of piety, and the profits of it served as the woman's fortune.

The children of the Lycians took their names and conditions, not from their fathers, but from their mothers; so that if a free woman married a slave, her children were free like herself; but if a man who was free married a slave, the children were slaves like the mother.