Montesquieu: Sumptuary Laws, Luxury, and the Condition of Women

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* NOW - Buy this resource online! Click here * Sumptuary Laws, Luxury, and the Condition of Women1. Of Luxury.2. Of sumptuary Laws in a Democracy.3. Of sumptuary Laws in an Aristocracy.4. Of sumptuary Laws in a Monarchy.5. In what Cases sumptuary Laws are useful in a Monarchy.6. Of the Luxury of China.7. Fatal Consequence of Luxury in China.8. Of public Continency.9. Of the Condition or State of Women in different Governments.10. Of the domestic Tribunal among the Romans.11. In what Manner the Institutions changed at Rome, together with the Government.12. Of the Guardianship of Women among the Romans.13. Of the Punishments decreed by the Emperors against the Incontinence of Women.14. Sumptuary Laws among the Romans.15. Of Dowries and Nuptial Advantages in different Constitutions.16. An excellent Custom of the Samnites.17. Of Female Administration. FOOTNOTES
   1. The first census was the hereditary share in land, and Plato would not allow them to have, in other effects, above a triple of the hereditary share. See his Laws, v.
   2. "In large and populous cities," says the author of the Fable of the Bees, i, p. 133, "they wear clothes above their rank, and, consequently, have the pleasure of being esteemed by a vast majority, not as what they are, but what they appear to be. They have the satisfaction of imagining that they appear what they would be: which, to weak minds, is a pleasure almost as substantial as they could reap from the very accomplishment of their wishes."
   3. Chapters 3, 4.
   4. Fragment of the 36th book of Diodorus, quoted by Constantine Porphyrogenitus, in his Extract of Virtues and Vices.
   5. Cum maximus omnium impetus ad luxuriant esset. -- Ibid.
   6. De Moribus Germanorum, 44.
   7. Dio Cassius, liv. 16.
   8. Tacitus, Annals, iii. 34.
   9. Malta duritiei veterum melius et latius mutata -- Tacitus,Annals, iii. 34.
   10. Opulentia paritura mox egestatem. -- Florus, iii. 12.
   11. Constitution of James I in the year 1234, art. 6, in Marca Hispanica, p. 1429.
   12. They have prohibited rich wines and other costly merchandise.
   13. Lettres persanes, 106. See below, xx. 20.
   14. Luxury has been here always prohibited.
   15. In an ordinance quoted by Father Du Halde, ii, p. 497.
   16. History of China, 21st Dynasty, in Father Du Halde's work, i.
   17. In a discourse cited by Father Du Halde, iii, p. 418.
   18. "In respect to true love," says Plutarch, "the women have nothing to say to it." In his Treatise of Love, p. 600. He spoke in the style of his time. See Xenophon in the dialogue intitled Hiero.
   19. At Athens there was a particular magistrate who inspected the conduct of women.
   20. Romulus instituted this tribunal, as appears from Dionysius Halicarnassus, ii, p. 96.
   21. See in Livy, xxxix, the use that was made of this tribunal at the time of the conspiracy of the Bacchanalians (they gave the name of conspiracy against the republic to assemblies in which the morals of women and young people were debauched.)
   22. It appears from Dionysius Halicarnassus, ii, that Romulus's institution was that in ordinary cases the husband should sit as judge in the presence of the wife's relatives, but that in heinous crimes he should determine in conjunction with five of them. Hence Ulpian, tit. 6, 9, 12, 13, distinguishes in respect to the different judgments of manners between those which he calls important, and those which are less so: mores graviores, mores leviores.
   23. Judicio de moribus (quod antea quidem in antiquis legibus positum erat, non autem frequentabatur) penitus abolito. Leg. 11. Cod. de repud.
   24. Judicia extraordinaria.
   25. It was entirely abolished by Constantine: "It is a shame," said he, "that settled marriages should be disturbed by the presumption of strangers."
   26. Sextus Quintus ordained, that if a husband did not come and make his complaint to him of his wife's infidelity, he should be put to death. See Leti, Life of Sextus V.
   27. Nisi convenissent in manum viri.
   28. Ne sis mihi patruus oro.
   29. The Papian law ordained, under Augustus, that women who had borne three children should be exempt from this tutelage.
   30. This tutelage was by the Germans called Mundeburdium.
   31. Upon their bringing before him a young man who had married a woman with whom he had before carried on an illicit commerce, he hesitated a long while, not daring to approve or to punish these things. At length recollecting himself, "Seditions," says he, "have been the cause of very great evils; let us forget them." Dio, liv. 16. The senate having desired him to give them some regulations in respect to women's morals, he evaded their petition by telling them that they should chastise their wives in the same manner as he did his; upon which they desired him to tell them how he behaved to his wife. (I think a very indiscreet question.)
   32. Tacitus, Annals, iii. 24.
   33. This law is given in the Digest, but without mentioning the penalty. It is supposed it was only relegatio, because that of incest was only deportatio. Leg., si quis viduam, ff. de quœst.
   34. Tacitus, Annals, iv. 19.
   35. Ibid., ii. 50.
   36. Dec. 4, iv.
   37. Marseilles was the wisest of all the republics in its time; here it was ordained that dowries should not exceed one hundred crowns in money, and five in clothes, as Strabo observes, iv.
   38. Fragment of Nicolaus Damascenus, taken from Stobœus in the collection of Constantine Porphyrogenitus.
   39. He even permits them to have a more frequent interview with one another.
   40. Edifying Letters, coll. xiv.
   41. Voyage to Guinea, part the second, p. 165, of the kingdom of Angola, on the Golden Coast.