Note 250-2 — Chapter II

Propertius bitterly complains of the corruption prevalent in love affairs in his time. (III, 12.) In the Hellenic world, also, among the successors of Alexander the Great, there was a revoltingly large number of marriages de convenance, so that even the old Seleucos took to wife the grand-daughter of his competitor Antegonos, Lysimachos the daughter of Ptolemy etc. Dante's lament over the anxiety of fathers to whom daughters are born concerning their future dowry: Paradiso, XV, 103. Florentine law of 1509, against large dowries: Machiavelli, Lett. fam., 60. In the United States, marriage dowries are of little importance. (Graf Görtz, Reise um die Welt, 116.)