Note 326 — FIRST SECTION. (continued 2)

Tribades dictae a τρίβω, frico, frictrices, sunt quibus ea pars naturae muliebris, quam clitoridem vocant, in tantam magnitudinem excrescit, ut possint illa pro mentula vel ad futuendum vel ad paedicandum uti. “Tribades”, so called from τρίβω,—I rub, women that rub, are such as have that portion of the woman’s parts which is called the clitoris grown to a size so excessive that they can use it as a penis whether for fornicating or for paederastia. So says Forberg, loco citato p. 345. Comp. Hesychius ἑταιρίστριαι τριβάδες (lewd women, tribades.) The Lesbian women were especially notorious for it. Lucian, Dialog. meretr. 5., τοιαύτας (ἑταιριστρίας) ἐν Λέσβῳ λέγουσι γυναῖκας, ὑπὸ ἀνδρῶν μὲν οὐκ ἐθελούσας αὐτὸ πάσχειν, γυναιξὶ δὲ αὐτὰς πλησιαζούσας, ὥσπερ ἄνδρας. (such women—tribades, they say there are in Lesbos, who will not suffer it from men, but themselves go with women, as if they were men). But we must beware of connecting the word λεσβιάζειν (the act the Lesbian) with this; it means something quite different, as we shall see later on. The Milesian women were skilled Tribades, employing an artificial penis made of leather, which was called by the Greeks ὄλισβος. Aristophanes, Lysistrat. 108-110.,

(Since when the Milesians betrayed us, I have never seen even an eight-inch olisbos, that would have been a leathern succour for us.) Suidas, s. v. ὄλισβος· αἰδοῖον δερμάτινον, ᾧ ἐχρῶντο αἱ μιλήσιαι γυναῖκες, ὡς τριβάδες, καὶ αἰσχρουργοί. ἐχρῶντο καὶ αὐτοῖς καὶ αἱ χῆραι γυναῖκες.—s. v. μισήτης· μισῆται δὲ γυναῖκες ὀλίσβῳ χρήσονται. (under the word ὄλισβος: a member of leather; which the Milesian women used, such as tribades and bad women. They were used by widows also.—under the word μισήτης (lewd person): and lewd women will use the olisbos.) Comp. the Scholiast to the passage of Aristophanes quoted. There were also cakes shaped like an olisbos and called ὀλισβόκολλοξ (olisbos-loaves)—Hesychius, which remind us of the cakes in the shape of a penis that were sold in Italy at the feast of SS. Cosmus and Damian. (see Knight, loco citato p. 62.)