Part 5

(Nor yet utterly villainous is he, but he has discovered yet another device; for he polluted his own tongue with foul delights, _in the stews licking up the abominable dew_, defiling the hair on the upper lip, and tumbling the girls’ _nymphae_).

In the following Epigram[96] of an unknown author λείχω is found used absolutely, without any supplementary words:

_Χείλων_ καὶ _λείχων_ ἴσα γράμματα· ἐς τί δὲ τοῦτο; _Λείχει_ καὶ _Χείλων_, κἂν ἴσα, κἂν ἄνισα.

(Χείλων,—a proper name, also means _of the lips_,—and λείχων,—licking,—have the like letters; now what does this point to? Chilon licks lips, whether lips like his own, or whether unlike). In explanation of this Epigram _Forbiger_ says (loco citato p. 326.): “Lusus in Chilonem cunnilingum. Hunc ait iure quodam suo lingere, qui vel nomine iisdem literis constante prae se fert lingentem et lingentem quidem tum labra oris, ut labris ligentis similia, tum cunni, ut dissimilia.” (Pun on the name of Chilon, a _cunnilingue_. The poet says he (Chilon) licks by a sort of inherent right of his own, who even in his name, made up of the same letters, proclaims himself as licking, and licking now the lips of the mouth, which are like the lips of the licker, now those of the female organ, which are unlike). Χεῖλος was in fact used also of the lips of a woman’s organ, the _nymphae_; the Scholiast on τὰς ἐσχάρας (the _nymphae_) in the passage from Aristophanes given a little above, interprets this word by τὰ χείλη τῶν γυναικείων αἰδοίων (the lips of the female privates). According to _Schneider_ in his Lexicon χείλων (adj.) signifies _thick-lipped_. Perhaps it was this very Epigram that led _Lambert Bosius_ to make the statement that χείλων arose by a mere transposition of the letters from λείχον.

Now if λείχην,—for we consider it should be thus accented,—is derived from λείχω (I lick), we cannot but regard it as meaning: something _produced by licking, a complaint brought on by licking_, and particularly _by the licking of the cunnilingue_! Surely the Greeks could hardly have expressed themselves more clearly. Then the fact that the name came from the mouth of the common people is the very best reason for its not having been understood by the educated. Yet all the while an entirely similar form of expression has grown up in the mouth of the German common people, the real meaning of which very few have fathomed, but which most certainly arose in the same way as the Greek λείχην. No doubt many of my readers have again and again heard it said of some one with an eruption round the mouth, that is, someone suffering from _Herpes labialis_ (Creeping eruption of the lips): “Well! you _have_ been licking!”—for which educated people substitute the obviously insufficient, “You _have_ been picking!” Very commonly again one may hear: “You _have_ been licking _greben_, or picking _greben_; and this word _greben_ is understood as being identical with _grieben_,—_greaves_ in English, i. e. the remnants of lard that has been cut up into pieces and fried, because the separate pustules of the _herpes labialis_ resemble in appearance the _greaves_. So people sometimes also say still more explicitly, “You _have_ been licking, or picking, _greaves_; and one of them has been left sticking to your mouth, to prove your greediness!”

This explanation may seem a very likely one to many; nevertheless we incline to believe the word to be of later origin, and to have arisen from ignorance of the actual facts. We consider it more probable that _greben_ owes its origin to some corruption of language growing out of _gremium_, the bosom. We have been led to this conjecture by a statement of _Adelung’s_ in his Dictionary, Article “Grieben”, where he says: “In middle-Latin _grieben_, (greaves), were called, in accordance with a common interchange change of the letters b. and m. _gremium_”,—though indeed we cannot regard the word as solely and entirely mediæval Latin, for it is found occurring as early as _Pliny_ (Hist. Nat. XII. 19.) and _Columella_ (Res Rust. XII. 19. 3.), and is evidently connected with _cremare_ (to burn). So just as in this case _cremium_ and _gremium_ may have been used interchangeably, has _grebe_ grown out of _greme_ in German, and the latter come to be used as a synonym of _griebe_,—the latter words according to this having as little in common with one another as the former. However those better practised in the science of word formation must here decide!

Now as to the word _Mentagra_ (Tetter, Scab). This was evidently a word first framed by the Romans, as is distinctly stated not alone by _Pliny_, but by _Galen_ as well (De compos. medic. secundum locos Bk. V., edit. Kühn Vol. XII. p. 839.). The latter says: Ἐκδόριον λειχήνων· ταύτῃ Πάμφιλος χρησάμενος ἐπὶ Ῥώμης πλεῖστον ἐπορίσατο _ἐπικρατούσης ἐν τῇ πόλει τῆς μεντάγρας λεγομένης_. (Blister for Lichenes (Scabs); in this way Pamphilus in his practise at Rome made most headway against _the Mentagra as it was called, then prevalent in the city_). It is usually considered to be formed on the analogy of _Podagra_, _Chiragra_ (gout of the feet, gout of the hands) etc. from _mentum_, the chin, and ἄγρα, the act of catching, seizing hold of,—so a disease that attacks the chin. But more probably all these words are compounded not with ἄγρα at all, but with ἄλγος (suffering). That is to say just as ἀλγαλέος, by Attic interchange of letters, becomes ἀργαλέος (grievous), κεφαλαλγία becomes κεφαλαργία (head-ache), and ληθαλγία, ληθαργία (drowsiness, lethargy), so from ποδαλγία we get ποδαργία, and then by metathesis ποδάγρα (gout). (Comp. _Doederlein_ “Lateinische Synonyme und Etymologien”,—Latin Synonyms and Etymologies Pt. 4. p. 424.). The remark _Pliny_ adds however “_ioculari primum lascivia_” (at first by way of jesting mockery) evidently points to some ambiguity underlying the word. But whether this consists in the recognition of the likeness in sound between _mentum_, the chin, and _menta_, or _mentula_, the virile member, or is to be looked for in the ἄγρα, it might be difficult to determine. Still it seems probable, but without wishing to entirely exclude the former hypothesis, that the latter is the case, as will appear directly.

_Galen_[97] distinguishes between λειχὴν ἁπλοῦς and λειχὴν ἄγριος (simple _lichen_, and malignant _lichen_) in his enumeration of Skin-diseases, and still more plainly in another place[98] he says: “λειχὴν is likewise a Skin-disease; there are two forms of it, ὁ μὲν ἥμερος καὶ πρᾳότερος, ὁ δὲ ἄγριος καὶ χαλεπώτερος (the one benignant and milder, the other malignant and more serious). But in both of them minute scales are detached from the skin, and the part of the skin underneath the scales is reddened and almost ulcerated. The affection arises from a salt phlegmatic humour (φλέγματος ἁλμυροῦ) and yellow gall, hence the scales fall from the skin as in glazed pottery-ware (? ἐπὶ τῶν ἁλμῶν τῶν κεραμίων). The affection is cured by internal phlegmagogues and external embrocations.” We have already on p. 139. above, in the footnote on ἄγριος (wild, savage) and χαλεπός (hard, harsh), noted how these words are used with special reference to the vice of paederastia, but they are also applied generally to the vice, the different forms of which we have been examining here. This follows from _Plato_[99] and _Plutarch_[100], at any rate so far as ἄγριος is concerned, which indeed we may conveniently render by _vicious_. The original meaning being overlooked, λείχην and λιχὴν had been taken as synonymous,—possibly the Latin _lichenos_ first led to the mistake; then naturally enough an appropriate epithet was sought, to signify the _lichen_ which was the result of licking in a vicious fashion. But this according to the already existing mode of speech could be nothing else than ἄγριος[101] again,—λειχὴν ἄγριος, with which λειχὴν ἁπλοῦς, _lichen insons_, (simple, innocent _lichen_) was naturally contrasted.

Yet while _Criton_, as cited in _Aëtius_, simply and quite correctly interpreted Mentagra by ἄγριος λειχὴν (fierce, malignant lichen), _Galen_ appears to have been still ignorant of the special meaning. This is shown by the words ἥμερος and πρᾳότερος (gentle, benignant,—milder), which obviously are correct opposites of ἄγριος only _if_ the latter is understood, as it is in _Celsus_, as equivalent to _ferus_ (fierce, malignant), but in no way account for the ἁπλοῦς (simple, innocent), which Galen no doubt found already established as distinguishing epithet of λιχὴν. How little he fathomed the nature of the evil, is proved by his ætiology of it, which makes the complaint result from the φλέγμα ἁλμυρὸν (salt phlegmatic humour) and the χολὴ ξανθὴ (yellow gall). The unprofessional _Martial_ had a better word to say on the subject when he wrote his _sordidique lichenes_ (filthy, squalid-looking lichens). Similarly it would seem the _agra_ in Mentagra should be taken as pointing to ἄγριος (fierce, malignant). Can it be perhaps that in this way the μολύνων τὴν ὑπήνην (polluting the hair on the upper lip) of _Aristophanes_, the Latin _barbam inquinare_ (to pollute the beard), have come to be used as synonyms for _cunnilingere_? _Martial_ seems to imply it by his _triste mentum_, _mentum periculosum_ (disfigured chin, perilous chin). Perhaps too the _Sycosis menti_ (Sycosis,—fig-like eruption, of the chin) of _Celsus_ and the later Greek medical writers should likewise be regarded as coming under this head. At a matter of fact, _Archigenes_ says so in so many words, as cited in _Galen_ (De comp. med. secundum locos. Bk. V. edit. Kühn Vol. XII. p. 847.), ἐπὶ δὲ τῶν _συκωδῶν τῶν ἐπὶ τοῦ γενείου, λεγομένων δὲ μενταγρῶν, ὑπὸ δέ τινων λειχήνων ἀγρίων_, ποιεῖ κ. τ. λ. (but in the case of the sycotic, or fig-like, eruptions on the chin, which are called mentagrae, and by others malignant lichens, he proceeds as follows, etc.), and calls the affection of the chin, as do other Physicians, generally ἐξανθήματα ἐν τοῖς γενείοις (efflorescences, eruptions on the chin),—p. 824.

If we have thus succeeded in establishing the meanings of _lichens_ and _mentagra_, the rest of the passage of _Pliny_ will admit of easy explanation. The disease in many cases it seems invaded the whole face, in the same way as the _atra lues_ (black contagion) in the passages quoted above from _Martial_ under _fellation_. Perhaps all of these,—indeed, _Pliny_ also says _lues_,—are the be referred, as is actually done by _Farnabius_ in his notes, to _mentagra_, seeing that the disease could perfectly well, though certainly much seldomer, arise equally from the practise of _fellation_. The _double entendre_ between _mentum_ (the chin) and _menta_ or _mentula_ (the virile member) would so acquire all the more point.

The expression _foedo cutis furfure_ (with a horrible scurf of the skin) appears to have led a number of authors to believe that this was the capital characteristic of the complaint, and that the distinction between λιχὴν and λείχην was merely one of degree. This view was advocated in particular by _Willian_[102], who ascribes it also to _Paulus Aegineta_[103] as well as to _Oribasius_[104] though both of these authors limit themselves to saying that the moderately siccative remedies are of no benefit in λείχην ἄγριος (malignant lichen), whereas the more violent ones aggravate it, and that for this reason it was called ἄγριος. Hence Willian’s _Lichen agrius_ (malignant lichen) has nothing in common with the _lichen_ of the Greeks and Romans but the mere name, for it follows clearly from the words _foediore cicatrice_ (with a more horrible scar) that occur a little further down in _Pliny_, that a process of skinning over by ulceration was part of the disease, and did not owe its existence solely to the caustic remedies employed.

The _immunity of women_[105] equally admits of easy explanation, for in the first place women were not likely to have readily conceived the idea of acting after the manner of a _cunnilingue_[106], and even if _fellation_ is admitted to be an occasionally concurrent cause of _mentagra_, still it would seem, as already stated, to supervene much less often as a consequence of the latter vice; while in cases where it does, it is of a milder form and it is rather the internal parts of the mouth that are imperilled. Besides, it is to be remembered that women generally speaking suffer less frequently from pustulous disorders of the cutaneous glands affecting the face than men do, as is well seen at the present day with Acne. In the parts neighbouring on the genitals this is exactly reversed. Still this immunity of women must not be insisted on too far, as those persons of the female sex who used to practise _fellation_, the Summoenianae (women of the suburbs) lay too completely outside the range of _Pliny’s_ observation.

As to the _servi_ (slaves) and _Plebs humilis_ (Commons of humble station), these were surely unlikely, however little restraint they may have put on their sensual appetites, to have readily fallen into suchlike forms of vice,—forms which spring as a rule from the brain of unoccupied, rich idlers. We have only to appeal to modern experience to substantiate this. How many individuals of the lowest and middle classes have the records of forensic medicine to show as having been paederasts and so on? Wild aberrations in morals have at no period begun with the common man! So we see it was the Proceres (Nobles) who were in an especial degree attacked by the _mentagra_.

At the same time the most conspicuous cause of _mentagra_, the practice of _cunnilingere_ was by no means the _only_ way of getting it, for the malady, like _condylomata_ on the genital organs, was evidently connected with a contagion,—a fact which is clearly enough brought out by the layman _Pliny_, whereas the Physicians say nothing about this. Accordingly the disorder was capable of being disseminated by _kissing_ from one individual to another. But it was not the _velox transitus osculi_ (swift transmission of a kiss) that was instrumental in spreading the disease, but rather the _basium_ (wanton kiss),—which depended on some yet unidentified lascivious device[107], sucking, playing with the tongue or the like. Still we must remember that at the very time the _mentagra_ was spreading with such terrible rapidity, a perfect _mania for kissing_ had broken out at Rome. _Martial_ describes this admirably in the two following Epigrams, which are of the very highest importance in connection with our subject:

_Book XII. Epigram 59:_

DE IMPORTUNIS BASIATORIBUS.

Tantum dat tibi Roma basiorum Post annos modo quindecim reverso, Quantum Lesbia non dedit Catullo. Te vicinia tota, te pilosus Hircoso premit osculo colonus. Hinc instat tibi textor, inde fullo, Hinc sutor modo pelle basiata, Hinc _menti dominus periculosi_, Hinc defioculusque et inde lippus, Fellatorque recensque cunnilingus. Iam tanti tibi non fuit redire.

(_Of pestilent Kissers_: Rome bestows more kisses on you, on your return to her after fifteen years’ absence, than ever Lesbia gave Catullus. The whole neighbourhood kisses you, and the hirsute countryman presses you in his goaty embrace. One side the weaver is upon you, the other the fuller, here the cobbler who but now kissed his leather; here comes _the owner of a perilous chin_, here the one-eyed man and here the blear, and the _fellator_, and the _cunnilingue_ fresh from work. Now surely to return was not of such importance to you as all this.)

_Book XI. Epigram 98:_

AD BASSUM.

Effugere non est, Basse, basiatores. Instant, morantur, persequuntur, occurrunt Et hinc et illinc, usquequaque, quacunque. _Non ulcus acre pustulaeve lucentes_, _Nec triste mentum sordidique lichenes_, Nec labra pingui delibuta ceroto, Nec congelati gutta proderit nasi. Et aestuantem basiant et algentem, Et nuptiale basium reservantem. Non te cucullis asseret caput tectum, Lectica nec te tuta pelle veloque, Nec vindicabit sella saepius clausa. Rimas per omnes basiator intrabit. Non consulatus ipse, non tribunatus, Saevique fasces, nec superba clamosi Lictoris abiget virga basiatorem. Sedeas in alto tu licet tribunali, Et e curuli iura gentibus reddas: Ascendet illa basiator atque illa: Febricitantem basiabit et flentem: Dabit oscitanti basium natantique, Dabit et cacanti. Remedium mali solum est Facias amicum, basiare quem nolis.

(_To Bassus_: Escape the kissers, no! it is not to be done, Bassus. They set upon you, wait for you, pursue you, meet you, here, there, and everywhere, in every street, at every corner. _Neither acrid ulcer nor shiny pustules, neither disfigured chin_ nor foul scabs, nor lips anointed with pink salve, nor the drop at the tip of a frozen nose will save you. They kiss a man sweating with heat and starving with cold, nay! even a man keeping his lips pure for the nuptial kiss. A head muffled in hoods will not exempt you, nor a litter guarded with rug and curtain, nor the sedan kept closed most of the time get you off. The kisser will in by every chink. Not the very consulship, not the tribuneship, not the stern fasces and threatening rod of the shouting lictor will keep away the kisser. Though you sit exalted on the high tribunal, or give laws to the people from the curule seat, both to one and the other the kisser will climb up. He will kiss a man shaking with fever, and drivelling with cold. He will give a kiss to a man gaping, to a man swimming, even to a man shitting! The one and only cure for the plague is to make a real friend, whom you will not need to kiss).

Now we shall be in a position to explain to our satisfaction what _Martial_ meant by _basia lasciva_ (wanton kisses),—XI. 24.—_basia maligna_ (pestilent kisses),—XII. 55.—and _Petronius_ (ch. 23.) by his _conspuere aliquem basio immundissimo_ (to beslobber anyone with a most filthy kiss); and we shall be in no way surprised at the fact that _mentagra_ not only attacked the Roman nobles as a virtual epidemic, but that the _velox transitus osculi_ (the swift transmission of a kiss) was alleged by Pliny as a reason of its communication.

Finally as to the historical factor in connection with _mentagra_,—it is implied in the account Pliny gives that it was _only at Rome_ it was regarded as a new disease. It must have been already known to the Greeks, for they possessed the name _Lichen_ for it. The Greek physicians, of whom several of the ones quoted by _Galen_ lived some considerable time before Claudius, know nothing about the disease being a new one, while _Galen_ himself says simply, _ἐπικρατούσης_ ἐν τῇ πόλει τῆς μεντάγρας λεγομέμης, (when the _mentagra_ as it was called _was prevalent_ in the city). _Plutarch_ again, though he (Symposiaca bk. VIII. Quaest. 9.) wrote a special Chapter on new diseases, with particular reference to Elephantiasis, never mentions _mentagra_ at all. He represents it as having been introduced into Rome from Asia, and it was from Egypt, the _Genetrix talium vitiorum_ (Mother-land of suchlike abominations), the Physicians[108] were imported who understood how to cure the disorder. We have more than once noted that Asia was the breeding place of sexual excesses, and described how vice spread from thence over different countries and how as a result of these practices the affections of the parts naturally concerned that arose first in Asia subsequently passed on to these same countries. For Rome this was in an especial degree the case with Egypt, where the undermining of morality had gone farthest; _Martial_[109] spoke justly when he said “_Nequitias tellus scit dare nulla magis_,” (No other land knows better how to produce finished rascality). But the intercourse with Asia and Egypt arose mainly in the time of Pompey, and became from that period ever more active, while concurrently luxury was on the increase and the old Virtus (manly virtue) of the Romans disappearing more and more every day,—above all when Tiberius by his own example elevated every form of vice into a sort of fancy article demanded by fashion.

Not that the Emperor went unpunished, for he himself probably suffered from _mentagra_. _Julian_[110] says of him, that when Romulus had invited to the feast of the Saturnalia all gods and Caesars, Tiberius appeared with the rest, “but when he turned round to take his seat, on his back could be seen in thousands scars, marks of burnings and scrapings, indurated weals and callosities, results of his excesses and wild lusts, cankers and scabs as it were burnt in”. Nay! according to _Suetonius_[111] his face itself bore _crebri et subtiles tumores_ (a multitude of minute swellings); and _Tacitus_[112] says of him: _Praegracilis et incurva proceritas, nudus capillo vertex, ulcerosa facies, ac plerumque medicaminibus interstincta_, (Tall and of a most graceful, albeit bowed, figure; the head bald, the face covered _with ulcers_, and generally patched with medical plasters). When _Galen_[113] mentions a τροχίσκος πρὸς ἕρπητας ὁ Τιβηρίου Καίσαρος (a lozenge for creeping eruptions, Tiberius Caesar’s), this does not in any way necessarily imply that this was prescribed as a remedy against eruptive symptoms on the _face_, for Tiberius, as we see from the passage quoted from _Julian_, suffered from eruptions on all the other parts of his body. Even if an affection of the face was intended, the expression ἕρπης (creeping eruption), in view of the marked tendency of the disease to spread to neighbouring parts, was not at all an unnatural one to be used; and we may say, speaking generally, that the view which holds the Greeks to have indicated by the word ἕρπης any one definite and distinct form of eruption is entirely mistaken. _Bertrandi_[114] indeed endeavours to show that _mentagra_ was a form of malignant tetter. That the application of plasters as a remedy in _mentagra_ was frequently recommended and employed is shown both by _Galen_ and _Aëtius_[115].