Comments on: EXTREMES IN SEX BEHAVIOR (Dec, 1961) http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2008/06/13/extremes-in-sex-behavior/ Yesterday's tomorrow, today. Fri, 10 Feb 2012 16:12:29 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.4 By: Blurgle http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2008/06/13/extremes-in-sex-behavior/comment-page-1/#comment-1057044 Blurgle Sat, 14 Jun 2008 23:46:36 +0000 http://blog.modernmechanix.com/?p=4591#comment-1057044 It should be pointed out that the assumption that Maria, Honorius's wife, died a virgin is due to one unsubstantiated passage in Zosimus, who had no way to actually know if Maria was a virgin or not. It's as likely that Honorius was sterile, as his second wife was also childless (although that marriage was short-lived). Zosimus's intent was to discredit Honorius. He was young and healthy, he was Christian, and he had no children: it wasn't a stretch at the time for a pagan like Zosimus to portray Honorius (and consequently his wives) as a virgin and to imply that his virginity was part and parcel of his weakness and apathy. (Pagans of the time had little respect for male virginity and thought Christians were degenerate and depraved for caring about it so much.) Unfortunately for Honorius, he was Emperor at the time the Teutons sacked Rome and the Western Empire fell, and many of his contemporaries blamed him personally for the fall. (He didn't really have much to do with it; Rome had fallen by itself so far over the previous centuries that the Teutons only put the Western Empire out of its misery.) Zosimus continues this tradition. I know this has little to do with the article at hand, but I had fun writing it. :-) It should be pointed out that the assumption that Maria, Honorius’s wife, died a virgin is due to one unsubstantiated passage in Zosimus, who had no way to actually know if Maria was a virgin or not. It’s as likely that Honorius was sterile, as his second wife was also childless (although that marriage was short-lived).

Zosimus’s intent was to discredit Honorius. He was young and healthy, he was Christian, and he had no children: it wasn’t a stretch at the time for a pagan like Zosimus to portray Honorius (and consequently his wives) as a virgin and to imply that his virginity was part and parcel of his weakness and apathy. (Pagans of the time had little respect for male virginity and thought Christians were degenerate and depraved for caring about it so much.)

Unfortunately for Honorius, he was Emperor at the time the Teutons sacked Rome and the Western Empire fell, and many of his contemporaries blamed him personally for the fall. (He didn’t really have much to do with it; Rome had fallen by itself so far over the previous centuries that the Teutons only put the Western Empire out of its misery.) Zosimus continues this tradition.

I know this has little to do with the article at hand, but I had fun writing it. :-)

]]> By: Thundercat http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2008/06/13/extremes-in-sex-behavior/comment-page-1/#comment-1057016 Thundercat Fri, 13 Jun 2008 11:35:51 +0000 http://blog.modernmechanix.com/?p=4591#comment-1057016 Wow, its interesting to look back a mere 40 years from this age of sex in middle school and tons of bizarre internet porn that having normal intercourse twice a day every day was considered extreme. Wow, its interesting to look back a mere 40 years from this age of sex in middle school and tons of bizarre internet porn that having normal intercourse twice a day every day was considered extreme.

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