Did Prostitution Really Exist in the Temples of Antiguity?

[mgc1961]

The "ugliest custom" in Babylon, the historian Herodotus wrote (who is believed to have lived between circa 490 to 425 B.C.), was the widespread practice of prostitution in the Temple of Ishtar. Once in their lifetimes, all women in the country were required to sit in the temple and "expose themselves to a stranger" in return for money.

"Rich and haughty" women, the ancient Greek historian railed, arrived in "covered chariots."

The Persians on the Black Sea were apparently involved in similarly nefarious activities. According to the Greek geographer Strabo, "virgin daughters," hardly 12 years old, were dedicated to cult prostitution. "They treat their lovers with such friendliness that they even entertain them."

There are many such reports from classical antiquity. Tribes from Sicily to Thebes are believed to have indulged in perverse religious customs.


Check out the rest of the article at http://www.spiegel.de/international/zeitgeist/0,1518,685716,00.html

[MrModerate]

1. Do bears shit in the woods? n/t

[seattle_blue]

9. Not if they're Polar Bears

:think:

[mrs_p]

2. don't know

but from my Classics courses (my minor), the saying regarding Herodotus was "father of history, father of lies"

[mgc1961]

4. It's tricky, for sure.

The records of antiquity are so scarce and unreliable that educated guesses are often the best we can do.

[Confusious]

3. I don't really see it as perverse

and the OUTRAGE that the women were 12 years old! Well, at that time, you might have had 8 to 13 more years of life, if something didn't mangle you first.

The only people who lived longer were rich, and even they didn't get much more.

[harkadog]

5. That is just not true

If you survived infant-hood and the childhood diseases, and many didn't, at 18-20 you had every expectation to live about what we can expect to live to today. The main determinant of life expectancy is infant mortality. Once that is factored out life expectancy has not changed a great deal in recorded history.

[DFLforever]

6. Childbirth and warfare

also cut life expectancy.

You're right though...if you could survive infancy, childbirth and war, you could expect to live to a ripe old age.

[mikekohr]

11. Exactly! There is an old cemetery nearby here that dates back to the late 1700's

The headstones show three patterns, many women died during childbirth, many children died before age 5, most of the remaining deaths occurred during ages 60-80 years of age.

Death during infancy and childbirth dramatically lowered life expectancy.

mike kohr

[mikekohr]

10. Columbus regulary awarded 9 to 10 year old Native girls to his men for their labor in helping him

enslave the Taino People. Read link below:

From the webpage, "Your Heroes Are Not Our Heroes."
http://www.brotherhooddays.com/HEROES.html

clip-
Other Taino People were levied taxes of food, cotton, and forced sex. Columbus casually noted in his journals that young girls of the ages 9 to 10 were the most desired by his men. 1) A story recorded by Michele de Cuneo is frightening proof of this abomination. After Columbus and his men fought a battle on Santa Cruz with a small band of Native People, Columbus presented Michele de Cuneo with a captured Taino girl that de Cuneo described as, "....most beautiful." The young maiden was taken by De Cuneo to his cabin where the young woman defended herself so fiercely that De Cuneo wrote, "...I wished I had never started. But to tell you the end of it, I seized a rope and beat her well. She cried out in such a way that you would not believe it! Finally we reached an agreement...." 40)
-clip

clipped from the website, "International Brotherhood Days," http://www.brotherhooddays.com/


mike kohr

[Hestia]

7. It wasn't prostitution as we think of it today. Read where no men coming

back from war were allowed into the town until he had visited the priestess at the temple and she restored, which included sex. The woment followers of Ba'al had to go the temples and have sex with a man. If you were unattractive, it could take years!

Sex was as much a sacrament as well, sex. We just don't have the temple priestesses anymore...

I love how they use the word "perverse" religious practices. As if being anointed in blood is not perverse.

Read Barbara Walker's, "Encyclopedia of Women's Myths and Secrets". It's amazing how much of women's history has been made evil or downplayed.

[comtec]

8. Especially consider how feminine deities and religions are down played to the point of nonexistence

calling Gaia and mother earth worship paganism, and bad.
Since when is giving respect to our mother (Earth) a bad thing?

No one ever looks at the prosperity of the Gaia religions.
How war is low or non-existent, and health and general contentment was high under the matriarchy.

While I take issue with the term "The Patriarchy" assuming that I personally have any say whatsoever, I can't think of a better description.

Despite how wonderful the matriarchies may have been in the past, right NOW we are probably closer to gender equality than has existed for at least 3000+ years, if ever.

When you have one gender in control, the other will be down trodden. That's human nature.

The current system is far from perfect, but I do believe it's better than it's been historically. It's worse than under Clinton, imho, for sure. But it's returning to moving in the right direction.

I dunno. I'm just a stupid man, what do I know?