And yet the poet deems it necessary to tell a sweetheart that—
“By forgiving him at first sight, you foolish girl, you deprived yourself of many pleasures—of his prostration at your feet [a trace of Gallantry], of a kiss passionately stolen.”
The sadness of separation thus finds utterance:—
“As is sickness without a physician; as living with relatives when one is poor—as the sight of an enemy’s prosperity—so is it difficult to endure separation from you.”
Thus we find in Ancient Aryan Love some of the leading features of modern romantic passion.
GREEK LOVE
The Greeks, too, were Aryans, and they were the most refined and æsthetic nation of antiquity; yet we look in vain in their literature for delineations of that Romantic Love which, according to our notions, ought to accompany so high a degree of culture.
FAMILY AFFECTIONS
Conjugal tenderness and the other family affections appear; indeed, to have been known and cherished by the Greeks at all times, in the days of Athenian supremacy, when women were kept in entire seclusion, no less than in Homeric times, when they seem to have enjoyed more liberty of action. Plutarch tells us in his Conjugal Precepts that “With women tenderness of heart is indicated by a pleasing countenance, by sweetness of speech, by an affectionate grace, and by a high degree of sensitiveness;” and Mr. Lecky thus eloquently sums up the evidence that the Greeks appreciated the various forms of domestic affection:—
“The types of female excellence which are contained in the Greek poems, while they are among the earliest, are also among the most perfect in the literature of mankind. The conjugal tenderness of Hector and Andromache; the unwearied fidelity of Penelope, awaiting through the long revolving years the return of her storm-tossed husband, who looked forward to her as the crown of all his labours; the heroic love of Alcestis, voluntarily dying that her husband might live; the filial piety of Antigone; the majestic grandeur of the death of Polyxena; the more subdued and saintly resignation of Iphigenia, excusing with her last breath the father who had condemned her; the joyous, modest, and loving Nausicaa, whose figure shines like a perfect idyll among the tragedies of the Odyssey—all these are pictures of perennial beauty, which Rome and Christendom, chivalry and modern civilisation, have neither eclipsed nor transcended. Virgin modesty and conjugal fidelity, the graces as well as the virtues of the most perfect womanhood, have never been more exquisitely portrayed.”
NO LOVE-STORIES
But Mr. Lecky, ignoring, like most writers, the enormous difference between conjugal and romantic love, forgets to notice the absolute silence of Greek literature on the subject of pre-matrimonial infatuation. Not one of the Greek tragedies is a “love-drama”; romantic love does not appear even in the writings of Euripides, who has so much to say about women, and who named most of his plays after his heroines. Had Love been known to Sophokles and Euripides, as it was known to Shakspere and Goethe, we should no doubt have a Greek Romeo and Juliet and a Greek Faust. For although there were certain limitations as to the scope and the dramatis personæ of a Greek play, there was nothing whatever to exclude a love-story. And when we consider how the sentiment of Love colours all modern literature; how almost impossible it is for a play or a novel to succeed unless it embodies a love-story: the absolute ignoring of this passion in Greek literature forces on us the inevitable conclusion that Romantic Love was unknown to them, or only so faintly developed as to excite no interest whatever.
And this conclusion harmonises with the dictum of the best Greek scholars. It is true that Becker, in his Charikles, referring to the frequency with which the comedians introduce a youth desperately enamoured of a girl, faintly objects to the statement that “There is no instance of an Athenian falling in love with a free-born woman, and marrying her from violent passion,”—made by Müller in his famous work on the Dorians. But he makes the fatal admission that “Sensuality was the soil from which such passion sprang, and none other than a sensual love was acknowledged between man and wife.” No one, of course, would deny that sensual passion prevailed in Athens; but sensuality is the very antipode of Romantic Love.
WOMAN’S POSITION
How are we to account for this anomaly—the absence of sexual romance in a nation which was so passionately enamoured of Beauty in its various forms?
The answer is to be found in the non-existence of opportunities for courtship, and the degraded position of woman. The following sentences, culled at random from Becker’s classical work, show how the Greek men regarded their women, whom they considered inferior to themselves in heart as well as in intellect. Iphigenia herself is made to admit by Euripides that one man is worth more than a myriad of women:—
εἶς γ’ ανὴρ κρείσσων γυναικῶν μυρίων.
“The ἀρετή (virtue) of which a woman was thought capable in that age differed but little from that of a faithful slave.” “Except in her own immediate circle, a woman’s existence was scarcely recognised.” “It was quite a Grecian view of the case to consider a wife as a necessary evil.” "Athenians, in speaking of their wives and children, generally said τέκνα καὶ γυναῖκας, putting their wives last: a phrase which indicates very clearly what was the tone of feeling on this subject" (Smith).
Women “were not allowed to conclude any bargain or transaction of consequence on their own account,” though Plato urged that this concession should be made to them; and it was even “enacted that everything a man did by the counsel or request of a woman should be null.” “There were no educational institutions for girls, nor any private teachers at home.” “Hence there were no scientifically-learned ladies, with the exception of the Hetæræ.”
CHAPERONAGE VERSUS COURTSHIP
In such an arid, rocky soil Love of course could not grow or even germinate. Still more fatal to the romantic passion, however, was the absolute seclusion of the sexes, precluding all possibility of courtship and free choice among the young. Greek women were not allowed to enjoy the society of men, nor to attend “those public spectacles which were the chief means of Athenian culture,” and which would have afforded the young folks an opportunity of seeing and falling in love with one another. The wife was not even permitted to eat with her husband if male visitors were present, but had to retire to her private apartments, so absurd was the jealousy of the men. “The maidens lived in the greatest seclusion till their marriage, and, so to speak, regularly under lock and key,” which had the “effect of rendering the girls excessively bashful, and even prudish,” and so stupid, in all probability, that no wonder the men considered marriage a punishment, and sought entertainment with the educated Hetæræ—as to-day in France. Even young married women were obliged to have a chaperon. “No respectable lady thought of going out without a female slave.” “Even the married woman shrank back and blushed if she chanced to be seen at the window by a man.”