Note 74 — TALE OF KAMAR AL-ZAMAN.53

Queen Budur’s remark that “Women pray pardon with their legs on high,” (p. 88 ante), finds an echo in Aristophanes’ Lysistrata and The Ecclesiazusæ. In the former play, Athenian women promise Lysistrata that, if forced to intercourse by their husbands, they will not lift their legs in the air; in the latter, we have a woman saying: “How are we going to lift up our arms in the Assembly (i.e., vote), we, who only know how to lift our legs in the act of love?”

Two of the authorities quoted by Havelock Ellis on p. 97 of the foregoing Excursus merit further brief mention. Martin Schurig, author of Parthenologia and numerous other medical works, flourished as a physician in Dresden between 1688 and 1733. Although many of his theories have long since been exploded, his great erudition is much to be admired. His books deal with the most amazing questions; among the many curious passages in Parthenologia will be found the following: “Chastity put to the proof by a hot iron and boiling water”; “Conception without insertion of the penis”; “Andramytes, King of the Lydori, was the inventor of castration of women, and Semiramis of that of men.” Dr. Sinibaldus’ Geneanthropeia, published in 1642, is a very remarkable work on physical love and its aberrations, treating, for example, of “The shape of the Phallus”; “Eunuchism”; “Aphrodisiacs”; “Influence of the Stars on Copulation”; “Effects and manner of Copulation”; “Pleasure of Copulation as enjoyed by man and woman.” Little is known of Sinibaldus’ life beyond that he was a doctor at Rome. His Geneanthropeia, according to Pisanus Fraxi, (Index Librorum Prohibitorum: London, 1877), has been rendered, in a very emasculated form, into English, under the title of Rare Verities. The Cabinet of Venus Unlocked: London, 1658. The volume is rare, but a copy is to be found in the British Museum.