Romanus the Proconsul inscribed her self on her husbands Tomb this Epitaph To God to Prince wife kindred friend the poor Religious loyall true kinde stedfast dear In zeal faith love blood amity and store He that so liv'd and so deceas'd yes here Pompeia Paulina the wife of Seneca when she heard of the Tyrant Nero's sentence of death that Monster who ript up his own mother to see the place where he had lain on her husband she caused her own veins to be opened being resolved not to survive him whom she loved so dearly This Epitaph might have been inscribed on her Tomb To these whom death again did wed This Grave 's the second marriage bed For though the hand of Fate could force T'wixt soul and body a divorce It could not sever man and wife Because they both liv'd but one life Peace good Reader do not weep Peace the Lovers are asleep They sweet Turtles folded lye In the last knot that love could tye Let them sleep let them sleep on Till this stormy night bee gone And th' eternall morrow dawn Then the Curtains will bee drawn And they waken with that light Whose day shall never sleep in night Rathean Herpin carried her husband Christopher Thaeon strook by an Apoplexie in all his limbs and members with an invincible constancie at severall journies the space of one thousand three hundred English miles to a Bath for his recoverie This was about the time that Marquis Spinola entred the Palatinate Sir Henry Wotton being the when English Ambassador in those parts Dr. Hackets wife was a religious woman and a loyal and loving wife to her husband as this her Epitaph denotes Drop mournful eyes your pearly trickling tears Flow streams of sadness drown the spangled sphears Fall like the tumbling Cataracts of Nile Make deaf the world with cryes let not a smile Appear let not an eye be seen to sleep Nor slumber onely let them serve to weep Her dear lamented death who in her life Was a religious loyal loving wife Of children tender to an husband kinde Th' undoubted symptomes of a vertuous minde Which makes her glorious 'bove the highest pole Where Angels sing sweet requiems to her soule She liv'd a None-such did a None-such dye Ne'r none-such here her corps interred lye In the time of the second Punick War when the Romans were overthrown many that were reported to bee assuredly dead returning home unexpectedly to their mothers such infinite joy oppressed them at the very instant that betwixt the kisses and embraces they suddenly expired The wife of Aruntius the Roman slew her self hearing that her sonne was drowned The rumor of the great slaughter at the lake of Thrasimenes being published one woman beyond all hopes meeting her son at the City gate who was safely returned from that general defeat cast her self into his arms where in that extasie of joy she instantly expired Another hearing that her sonne was slain in the battel after much sorrow for his death sitting in her house and spying her sonne coming towards her safe in health she was overcome with a sudden joy that not being able to rise and give him a meeting she dyed as she sate in her chaire The Matrons of Carthage when their sonnes were selected to be sent as Hostages into Sicilia with weeping and lamentations followed them unto the Sea-side and kept them so fast hugged in their close imbraces as they suffered them not to goe aboard untill they were forcibly plucked from them and sent unto the ships yet then many of these lamenting mothers opprest with extremity of sorrow cast themselves headlong into the sea and there were drowned Agrippina the mother of that cruel Domitius Nero enquired of the Chaldeans and Astrologers whether by their calculations it were possible to find out whether or no her son should be created Caesar They returned her this answer that by their Art they found for certain that he should be Emperour but withall that he should be the death of his mother to whom she answered Interficiat modo imperet I care not though he kill me so he may attain to the Empire Harpalice the Daughter of Harpalicus rescued her Father in battel defeated the enemy and put him to flight Hypsipile the daughter of Thoas gave life unto her Father when he was utterly in despair of hope or comfort Erigone the daughter of Iearus hearing of the death of her father strangled her selfe Agane the Daughter of Cadmus slew the King Lycotharsis in Illyria and repossest her Father of his before usurped Diadem What a stock of piety lived in the breast of Tyro the daughter of Salmoneus may be easily conjectured since she condescended to the losse of her onely and dearly-beloved children for to save her Father Niconus or as some will have it Cimonus being a straight prisoner and there adjudged to be starved to death his daugbter Xantippe fed him through the iron-grates with the milk of her own breasts What will not love invent or true zeale penetrate What more unheard or unexpected thing could be apprehended then for a Father to be fed from the breasts of his Daughter Who would not imagine this to be against Nature but that we see by proof true Natural pietie transcends all bounds and limits Hyas a young man being devoured of a Lyon the Hyades his sisters deplored his death with such infinite sorrow that they wept themselves to death The Prince Intaphernes being condemned to die with all the male-issue of his race for having cut off the eares and nose of one of the Waiters who rudely put him back from entring into the Chamber of Darius the Emperor of Persia and the execution being hourly expected the Wife of Intaphernes prevailed so far with her teares accompanied with such passionate words as were able to mollifie flint or soften marble That Darius commanded one only whomsoever she would choose to be ransomed for the continuance of the memory of their name family after some meditation contrary to the expectation of all men she demanded the life of her Brother The King somewhat amazed at her choice sent for her and demanded the reason why she had preferred the life of a Brother before the safety of such a Noble Husband or such hopeful Childrens To whom she answered Beholdo King I am yet but young and in my best of years and I may live to have another Husband and consequently more Children but my Father and Mother are both aged and should I lose a Brother I should for ever be deprived of that sacred name At which words the King exceedingly moved to see with what a fraternal zeal they were spoken he not only released the Brother but likewise the eldest of her Sonnes This history is more amply related by Sabeâ—licus A nother History doth here represent it self to my remembrance which I have read in Marul lib. 3. cap. 2. where he relates that two Virgins the one whereof seeing her Bed-fellow lying upon her death-bed
fell upon her knees devoutly besought the Almighty that she might not survive her but as they had lived together as one soule divided into two bodies in all sanctity and sisterly love so their chaste bodies might not be separated in death God was pleased to grant her the effect of her prayer for both dyed in one day and they were both buried in one sepulcher being fellows in one house one bed and one grave and now questionlesse joyful and joint-inheritors of one everlasting Kingdome Their goodnesse doth bereave of a voice to proceed any further But as Aristotle being not able to comprehend the ebbe and flow of an Arm of the Sea threw himself into it so do I drown my self in such a multitude of wonders not willing any longer to measure their loves by the inch of my knowledge I am transported in this great Labyrinth of wonders and cannot at last but break forth and say that those Satyrists who assume to themselvs such an unbrideled liberty to inveigh without all limitation against this most worthy Sexe are horrid Monsters whose Understanding is a pit of darknesse whose Reason is a shop of malice whose will is a Hell where thousands of passions outragiously infest them their Tongue an instrument of cursing lying and slandering their Face a painted hypocrisie their Body a sponge full of envy and to conclude they seem to have no Faith but infidelity no Lord but their passions no God but their belly who would if they were able in their gluttony exceed the Prince Hugotio Fagiolanus who at one dinner devoured the two rich Dukedomes of Luca and Pysa nay Smindrides who for the furniture of one Table entertained a thousand Cooks a thousand Bird-catchers and a thousand Fishermen But as they consume their time in pleasures which slide away like waters occasioned by a storm so they will sind themselves destitute and ashamed so many golden harvests which time presented to them are passed away and nothing is left but sorrow for having done ill and impotence to do well what then remains but to say with that miserable King who gave away his Scepter for a glasse of water Alas must I for so short a pleasure lose so great a kingdome And besides there is a place ordained for the wicked the great lake of Gods wrath an eternal fire a bottomlesse depth where there is no evil but must be expected to be found nor any good that can be hoped for Happy therefore all those who do attain to that everlasting blessed Kingdome where there is no more poverty no sickness no grief no calumny no persecution where the blessed see God face to face in a body as impassible as an Angel as subtile as the beams of light as swift as the wings of thunder as bright as the Sun where they do enjoy a delicious torrent of unspeakable content Voices and Musick which time cannot ravish away Odours which are never dissipated a Feast which is never consumed a blessing which though Eternity bestoweth yet shall not Eternity ever see an end thereof Of chaste Women and Virgins TArquine the Proud having been invited by Collatine husband to the chaste Lucretia to a supper hee was fairly welcommed by Lucretia who apprehended no deceit having supt hee withdrew himself to his lodging and when hee thought that all were fast asleep he came with a naked dagger in his hand to the place where Lucretia lay having recourse to the instruments of hatred for his assistance in love and he who was wont by the sword to vent his angry passions knows not how to lay it aside in tendrest affections he laies his hand upon his breast he threatens her he speaks her fair and seeing her rather to imbrace death than him ready rather to lose her life then honour he threatens to kill some servant close by her to make her be beleeved a foul adultress See how this wicked one threatens to bereave her of her honour that he might bereave her of it Lucretia thus assaulted with the same weapons wherewith shee defended her chastity yeelded to Tarquins prevailing lust Tarquin departs triumphant saddest Lucretia remains overwhelmed with grief shee sends for her father and her husband acquaints them with what is past adding thereunto these her last words And what could unfortunate Lucretia do if shee had dyed that shee might have lived chaste you would have thought her slain for having been unchaste O most cruel law of Honour which savest not the innocent a law never descended from Heaven but come from the deepest abysse of Hell I who would have mine honesty known to all have more studied glory then chastity and whilst I sought after the name of chaste I am with infamy becom unchaste I thought death the worst of all evils I thought it the cure of all mis-fortunes I feared nothing since I feared not to dye yet now I was inforc't to chuse life not to lose mine honour and by living have lost it I am resolved to dye if not for what hath already befaln mee at least for what may hereafter happen unto mee But what then If I dye I shall seem to acknowledge to have done amiss they will say my guilty conscience kill'd mee If I live you will beleeve I have done amiss you will say I consented out of too much desire of life O of all others most unfortunate Lucretia whose innocencie neither life nor death can justifie This soul O Collatine whose delight was chastity abhors now that body which is polluted and as being wholly thine cannot endure that that part of mee should have any longer being which can no more be onely thine But what was it in mee that encouraged that wicked one to so great a mischief perhaps my honesty which hee thought greater then that of others Most sacred honesty Art thou then become an inciter to lust and instead of defending offendest Dost thou instead of bridling desires edge on to fury and violence His heart where cruelty is harboured which can kill none but the innocent is likewise a receptacle of lust which can covet none but the chaste to have what they desire is not that the Tarquins do desire they finde no pleasure where they use no force and like lightning rend most where they finde most resistance And whether can unfortunate Lucretia go for revenge to the Kings family who hath injured me mine own friends whom I have injured You gods of hospitality it is you I call upon but to what purpose call I you since you have permitted it Revenge mee you infernal powers but why invoke I you who were his assistants I my self will revenge my self and will by death take greater revenge on this mine enemy then by living I will dye not to lessen my faults but to aggravate his not for that I have sinned but to shew that shee did not subject her self to sense who voluntary deprives her self of sense I will dye that I may not live in so
Olympia Fulvia Morata a famous Italian woman was the ornament and glory of our latter times shee had an exquisite knowledge in the Greeke and Latine tongues and shee writ many learned and elaborated works Jane Gray an incomparable Princess whom no Nation nor Age can parallel was very learned in the Hebrew Greek and Latin tongues Christian de Pisa a Gentlewoman of Italy was endowed with such divine graces and shee did so far excell in wisdome that her works have made many learned men ashamed The Kingdoms of France Spain and Portugal do abound with many examples of famous Ladies and Gentlewomen which have excelled most men of this Age in knowledge and humain Sciences Helisian of Crennes a French Lady did so excell in Learning that shee was admired by the wisest men and hath bequeathed unto posteritie several of her excellent works Duema Ligua a Spanish Lady one of the Maids of honour unto Lady Mary sister unto the King of Portugal was wonderfully verst in five sundry Languages viz. the Hebrew Greek Latine Chaldean and Arabian Isabella Rosera a Spanish Lady did so excell in Learning that shee did not onely publickly read but expounded the hard and difficult works of Lescost and unto her Auditory the Cardinals and the wisest men of Rome were Assistants Dona Margarita de Noronha a Lady of Portingal was exceeding well verst in severall Languages shee writ with great eloquence many excellent Discourses and shee had attained to a great perfection in Painting and severall other Arts. Queen Elizabeth of late memory whose wonderful knowledge and Learning was admired by all the Christian Princes that flourished in her time shee was so well verst in the Hebrew Greek Latin Italian Spanish and French languages that shee needed no Interpreter but gave her self answer to all such Ambassadors in their own Language of which those learned Orations in the Latine tongue which shee delivered by her own mouth in the two famous Universities do bear a sufficient record in her behalf Margaret of Vallois Queen of Navarre was endowed with eminent knowledge and Heroical vertues The Princess Elizabeth eldest daughter to the Queen of Bohemia who is justly stiled the Queen of Hearts and the best of Queens whom all degrees honour and all Nations reverence is a Saba for her Wisdome an Harpalice for Magnanimity an Amalasuntha for her Temperance a Cleopatra for her Bounty and a Zenobia for her learning and skill in Languages Anna Maria Schurmans living at Vtrech in Holland is endowed with such a wonderfull knowledge and learning that she is admired by all men There have been likewise many Ladies and Gentlewomen of our Nation whose learning and knowledge may wel be parallel'd with the before-named Let me therefore trespass Gentle and Courteous Reader so much on thy patience as that I may upon so just and good an occasion insert in this place some of their names With what Praises and Statues ought we to dignifie and celebrate the memory of these following excellent Ladies The Countess of Pembrook sister to the unmatchable Sir Philip Sidney The four Daughters of Sir Anthonie Cook The Lady Burleigh The Lady Russel The Lady Bacon Mrs Killegrew And those other Ladies which at present are endowed with learning and generous education whose abilities as they are a proof to the present times so will they remain as examples to posteritie Wherefore if many women do not the like it may bee inferred that it is not out of a defect of wit or judgment but because they will not apply their minds thereunto or that they cannot by reason of other diversions Let it therefore suffice that those who have been called to so great a Function by so speciall an instinct have eminently excell'd I shall not any longer insist on the wisdome and learning of this most worthy Sex but proceed to their Constancie and Courage Of Constant and Couragious Women COnstancie is the ornament the end and confirmation of all vertues Courage contemneth all perils despiseth calamities and conquers death These following famous Women being consident of the immortality of their soules encountred dangers offered up their lives on all occasions and sacrificed themselves as it were on the altar of Glory their life was unto them but an apprentiship to die well and their Sepulcher was as it were their Cradle imitating the Pelican that revives again out of her own blood If I should Courteous Reader relate unto you the constant resolution of all the women Martyrs amongst which there were those who in the midst of the flames and tortures cryed out with a resolute voice Tyrant you lose your time here wee are alwayes at our ease where are those pains where are those torments with the which you did threaten us our Constancie will make you suffer more then wee do by your crueltie make us complain make us yeeld if you can encourage your Sergeants your Executioners for they are faint-hearted edge them to all cruel and bloody courses against us c. Whole volumes would not bee able to containe their names therefore I shall onely relate unto you some of them Felicula was by the command of Flaccus Comes shut up in a Jakes and when by no perswasions nor threats promises or torments shee could bee forced to renounce the Christian faith shee was there stifled to death Apollinia a Virgin of Alexandria for speaking boldly in the defence of her Faith had her teeth plucked all out by the Tormentors and afterwards threatning to burn her instantly unless shee would renounce her Christianity she seeming to pawse a little as if shee meant better to consider of the matter when they least suspected leapt suddenly into the fire and was there consumed to ashes Julia Cathaginensis because she would not bow to Idols and adore the false heathen gods was nailed unto a Cross and so ended her life partly with the smoak which the Executioners made at the foot of the Gallows Flavia Euphronia Theodora Sabina Amonaria and Dionisa all Roman Virgins have been more ready to receive death for to maintain the glory and honor of God then the Tyrants could minister the torments to them Clara a Widow of threescore years of age was in the year 1526. on the 9. of December burnt in Bokemia because she would not deny the faith of the Gospel Martha Porzizia in the next year after suffered the pains of the fire with an invincible constancie Besides many others related in Fox his History of Martyrs O rare wonderful Patience O sufferance worthy of everlasting remembrance O constancie the like whereof cannot be elsewhere found their Crowns are glorie and their praisâ—â— are not to bee expressed by the pen or tongue of man Let their names bee as sacred to us on Earth as their souls live eternally enjoying a heavenly bliss As for their Courage Deborah a Warlike woman was a Prophetess and judged Israel by whose Counsel and Courage they were not onely freed from the incursions of their neighbour
valour and encouragement in presenting herself upon the walls to the violence of their arrows and engines the City was preserved The women of Bellovaca being besieged by Charles the great Duke of Burgundy most resolutely defended the walls tumbling the Assailants down headlong from their scaling-ladders to the everlasting honour of their Sexe and reproach of the Enemy Elphleda sister to King Edward before the Conquest sirnamed the fourth was present in the Battaile which was fought against the Danes at Toten-Hall in Stafford-shire and at the mighty overthrow at Wooddensfield where two Kings were slain two Earls and many thousands of the Danes She not only tamed the Welch-men but chased the Danes This Epitaph hath been left as a memorial over her Tombe Oh Elphlede mighty both in strength and minde The dread of men and Victress of thy kind Nature hath done as much as nature can To make thee maid but goodnesse makes thee man Yet pity thou should'st change ought save thy name Thou art so good a woman and thy fame In that growes greater and more worthy when Thy feminine valour much outshineth men Great Caesar's acts thy noble deeds excell So sleep in peace Virago-maid farewell Queen Margaret Henry the sixth's wife whose courage resolution and magnanimity deserves an immortal praise she was personally in all those Battails which were fought against the House of York nor are the English Chronicles sparing in commending her more then womanish spirit to everlasting memory In times past the Romans honoured even for private and common services their ordinary Souldiers some with Cirick Crowns or Garlands others with Lances headed with Gold Golden Chaines Statues of Ivory others with Triumphs Praises Acclamations Gratulations c. If these things were allowed to men only with what Elogies Enconomiums Crowns Garlands Statues Sepulchers and Monuments shall we then celebrate the memory if it were possible beyond all posterity of these ever to be admired Constant and Couragious Women Of Faire Women BEauty is the Image of the Creator and the Rhetorick of Heaven it delights the eye contents the mind and the more it is seen the more it is admired That of Venus was so extraordinary as that Apelles who was the best of Painters could not with all his art though he had set before him a hundred choice and selected Beauties all naked and had taken from one a charming Eye another an amorous Lip from a third a pleasing smile and a modest blush from a fourth a graceful Nose a fifth a fair Hand and from each of them that special Lineament in which she most excelled represent such an Angelical Face such charming Eyes such amorous coral Lips such snaring Tresses such captivating Hands or such a pure Alabaster Skin as Venus had How should I then by my rude stile dare to expresse that which Apelles could not represent with severall Colours I know I am unable to express the least part of that which represents the wonderfull work of God and though I were able yet would I make a scruple to trace out miracles with ink Nor shall I enlarge on the great influences which the famous Beauties have had in former Ages over men Neither dare I presume to name those of these later times who are admired and adored by all men save such as are wilfully blind lest I should by the alleadging of their power run the same hazard as Antiochus did who was seized with a Feaver meerly by the rehearsal of Stratonica's extraordinary Beauty such divine gemmes did sparkle about her Or as Tyrasius King of Thebes who was struck blinde by his onely beholding of Diana as she was bathing herself For my part I am already not onely amazed but even transported if not lost with wonder by the bare rehearsall of the forementioned famous womens heroick acts And though I could aver how that their Beauty doth ravish beholders that their complexion is clearer then the Skie their Faces borders of Lillies interwoven with Roses how that the lustre of their Eyes surpasses the Diamond their Lips the Coral in redness that their Tresses are like the coloured Hyacinths of Arcadia their Necks as white as Snow their Breast as pure as Allabaster their Arms as ruddy as the Rose and that all their parts are most rare their whole bodies beautified with more then Terrene perfections how that they have more strength then the moistened Torpedoes which do not onely charm the hand but the heart also and that not onely the Lybian Lion loses his strength in beholding their beauty but the Basilisk his senses and though I should adde thereunto that they represent the lively Image of the Creator that they are the miracle of the world and the marvel of marvels after all this what say I more then each man knows and is by all men confest Were not the very feet of Thetis as bright as silver and the ankles of Hebe clearer then Chrystal Are they not admired and beloved even of unreasonable creatures was not a Virgin in Leucadia so beloved of a Peacock as that the enamoured Bird never left her whilst she lived and accompanied her in death for seeing the young Damsell dead she never would receive food from any hand but so pined away and dyed also Doth not Saxo Grammaticus in the tenth book of his Danish History report how that certain young maids of a Village in Switzerland playing and sporting together in the field upon a holy-day suddenly an huge Hee-bear rushed out of the Forrest and shatched up the fairest amongst them and hurried her away to his Den gently and without any harm where he long gazed on her face as if with a kind of admiration he grew so enamoured with her on the sudden that instead of a Murtherer he became a Lover imparting unto her all the prey he got abroad c. Did not an Fagle which was taken in a Neast and carefully brought up by a Virgn in the City of Sesto being come to full growth take her slight every day abroad and all the Fowle she could catch brought it home and laid it in the lap of her Mistres at length this Virgin dying and her body being born unto the Funeral fire the Eagle still attending it was no sooner exposed unto the flames but the Bird likewise by voluntary flight cast her self amidst the kindled pyle and gave her self as a most grateful sacrifice unto her Mistress Hearse Was not the Queen Suabilda so excelling rare in all the Lineaments of her body as that being doomed unto a wretched and miserable death and bound with thongs of Leather to be trod upon by the hoofs of wild horses her beauty struck such an impression even in those unreasonable creatures that they could not bee forced with their rude feet to leave the least character of violence upon limbs so fair and exquisitely shaped Therefore I shall not insist any longer on the specifying of womens Beauty since as it appears they are beloved and admired even
by unreasonable creatures but proceed to their goodness The love of Women towards their Husbands of Mothers towards their Children of dutiful Daughters towards their Parents and of Sisters that have been kinde to their Brothers THe women of Wynedi in Germany beare such an expressible love towards their husbands that they repair to their sepulchers and holding their lives tedious without them they offer up their bodies wilingly either to the sword or to the fire The like is observed by the Women amongst the Geats the Catheoreans the Herulians a people which inhabite beyond the River of Danube by those of Thrace and the Indies The wife of Pandorus begged of her Husband that before hee hazarded himself to the extremity of of danger he would first take away her feares by taking away her life with his sword which he denyed and so gave the signal of battel in which he was vanquished and slain his Wife surprised and committed into the hands of one of the chief Captains who pitying her teares and sorrow to which her beauty gave no common lustre made suit unto her to make her his wife she put him off with all possible delays but after perceiving that what he could not compass with her good will he would by force she therefore craved some few hours of deliberation which he granted and being retired she first writ in a Note these words Let none report that the Wife of Pandorus harboured so little love as to outlive him Which Note leaving upon the Table she took a sword hanging in the chamber with which she slew herself Alceste wife to Admetus King of Greece gave herself up to a most willing death for to redeem the health and life of her husband Cleopatra Queen of Egypt suffered her breasts to be poysoned with Asps that she might die for the love of her Antony Admirable was the love of her two Handmaids Neaera and Charmione who would by no perswasion survive their Queen but out of an unmatchable zeale to their Mistresse both fell down by her and breathed their last Phila having heard that her Husband K. Demetrius had been defeated in a battail drank poison and so dyed Camma was not onely famous throughout all Galacia for her beauty but for her vertue she did so love her husband and was so constant unto him that she never went forth nor would suffer any man to see her whilst she was married Evadne at the solemnization of her husbands Funerall burnt her self to mingle her ashes with his The Queen Artimesia out of the great love she bore to her husband and inflamed with unspeakable desire and affection towards him took his bones and ashes and drank the powder thereof thinking no Sepulchre so worthy as her own body and for a perpetuall remembrance of her husband Mausolus King of Caria she caused a sumptuous Tomb of marvellous workmanship to be made of four hundred and eleven foot in circuit and forty foot high invironed about with thirty six Pillars wonderfully well carved it was held to be one of the seven wonders of the world Cecilia Barbadica Veneta lived with so great a faithfulness towards her husband Philippus Vedraminus that shee had never any other object of all her passions then her husband his happiness made her joyfull his fear her grief and on her face and in her actions appeared the good or bad fortune of her husband after his death she could not by any counsell comfort or perswasion bee won to taste the least food whatsoever or give answer to any word that was spoken to her in which silence and consumption she after some few daies of unspeakable sorrow breathed out her last The Princess Panthea having been acquainted that her husband Abradratus had been kill'd in Cyrus Camp she resolved to go her self and finde him out and having found him dead amongst a number of dead men she washed her whole body and face with his blood and striking her heart with a dagger she died embracing her husband The City of Wynbergen a free place in Germany being besieg'd by Caesar who grew so implacable that he resolved to take bloody revenge on the men for having defended their lives and honours so valiantly and thereby almost overthrown the greatest part of his Army The Articles being drawn for the surrender of the Town it was onely lawfull for the Matrons and Virgins by the Emperors Edicts to carry out as much as each one could carry of what they best liked The Wives out of an unexpressible love carried on their backs their Husbands and the Virgins and Damsels their Fathers or Brothers This strook such an impression in the heart of Caesar that of a mortall enemy he became their friend Artia Mater seeing her husband Poetus condemned and willing that hee should expire by his own hand rather then by that of the common Hang-man perswaded him to a Roman resolution but finding him somewhat daunted with the present sight of death she snatcht up a sword with which she stab'd her her self and plucking it from her bosome presented it unto her husband onely with these few and last words Paete non dolet Poetus It hath done me no harm and so fell down and dyed Martial in the first book of his Epigrams saith thus in speaking of this couragious Woman Casta suo gladium cum traderet Aria Paeto Quem dedit visceribus traxerat illa suis Si qua fides vulnus quod feci non dolet inquit Sed quodtu facies hoc mihi Paete dolet When Aria did to Paetus give that steel Which shee before from her own breast had tane Trust me saith she no smart at all I feel My onely wound 's to think upon thy pain Portia a famous and excellent Roman Lady having heard that her most dear and beloved husband was dead her bowels burning with an unexpressable fire of love for her husband and finding no knife to kill her self withall nor cord to hang her self nor Well to drown her selfe she went to the fire and with her own hands she cast down her throat burning coals Triara wife to Lucius Vitellus seeing her husband in a dangerous battail she presented her self in the midst of the slaughter killing on all sides till she had hem'd her self in with dead bodies slain by her own hand so bold and magnanimous a spirit had the conjugall love to her husband imprest in her Admirable was the love of Julia towards her husband the great Pompea who seeing onely the gown of her husband which was brought home bespotted with blood and conceiving thereby that some mischance had happened to her husband she fell into a swound and afterwards the trouble of her soul made such a great emotion in her body that she dyed thereof Paula Romana after her husbands death was so far from being perswaded to a second match that she did never eat nor drink in company of any man Proba Valleria Falconia a Roman Matron and wife to Adelphus