Note 274.1 — Chapter XIII · Babylonian, Anatolian, and Aegean Ritual.

The other custom recorded by Herodotus of Babylon, the consecration of the first-fruits of virginity to the goddess before marriage, which I have considered as distinct from the foregoing, may often have been combined or confused with it; for the temple-harlotry, carried on for some considerable period, might be occasionally a preliminary to marriage. The most exact parallels to the Babylonian custom are found in the records of Byblos, Cyprus, and the Syrian Heliopolis or Baalbec. Lucian attests the rule prevailing at Byblos, that in the festival of Adonis women exposed themselves for purchase on one single day, and that only strangers were allowed to enjoy them; but that this service was only imposed upon them if they refused to cut off their hair in lamentation for Adonis.274.1 Similarly the Byzantine historian Sozomenos declared that at Heliopolis (Baalbec), in the temple of Astarte, each maiden was obliged to prostitute herself before marriage, until the custom and the cult were abolished by Constantine.274.2 The statements about Cyprus, though less explicit, point to the same institution: Herodotus, having described at length the Babylonian practice, declares that it prevailed in Cyprus also, and Justin274.3 that it was a custom of the Cyprians “to send their virgins before marriage on fixed days to the shore, to earn their dowry by prostitution, so as to pay a first-offering to Venus for their virtue henceforth (pro reliqua pudicitia libamenta Veneri soluturas).” The procession to the shore may indicate the rule that intercourse was only allowed them with strangers,274.4 and nothing points to prolonged prostitution. It is probably the same rite that the Locrians of the West vowed to perform in honour of Aphrodite in the event of deliverance from a dangerous war.275.1 But in the worship of Anaitis at Akilisene in Armenia, according to Strabo,275.2 the unmarried women served as temple-harlots for an indefinite time until they married; and Aurelia Aemilia of Tralles may have been only maintaining the same ancient ritual in Lydia. In these two countries, then, it seems as if there had been a fusion of two institutions that elsewhere were distinct one from another, harlot-service for a prolonged period in a temple, and the consecration of each maiden’s virginity as a preliminary to marriage.