The Greeks put out the eyes of the adulterers. In Crete adulterers were covered with wool as an em- blem of their effeminacy, and carried in that dress to the magistrate's house, where a fine was imposed on them, and they were deprived of all their privileges and their share in public business. See Punishment.
4. Modern. — Among savage nations at the present day the penalties of adultery are generally severe. The Mohammedan code pronounces it a capital of- fence. It is one of the three crimes which the prophet directs to be expiated by the blood of a Mussulman. In some parts of India it is said that any woman may prostitute herself for an elephant, and it is reputed no small glory to have been rated so high. Adultery is stated to be extremely frequent in Ceylon, although punishable with death. Among the Japanese and some other nations it is punishable only in the woman. On the contrary, in the Marian Islands, the woman is not punishable, but the man is, and the wife and her relations waste his lands, burn him out of his house, etc. Among the Chinese it is said that adul- tery is not capital ; parents will even make a contract with the future husbands of their daughters to allow them the indulgence.
In Portugal an adulteress was condemned to the flames ; but the sentence was seldom executed. By the ancient laws of France this crime was punishable with death. Before the Revolution the adulteress was usual- ly condemned to a convent, where the husband could visit her during two years, and take her back if he saw fit. If he did not choose to receive her again by the expiration of this time, her hair was shaven, she took the habit of the convent, and remained there for life. Where the parties were poor she might be shut up in a hospital instead of a convent. The Code Na- poleon does not allow the husband to proceed against his wife in case he has been condemned for the same crime. The wife can bring an action against the hus- band only in case he has introduced his paramour into the house where she resides. An adulteress can lie imprisoned from three months to two years, but the husband may prevent the execution of the sen- tence by taking her back. Her partner in guilt is liable to the same punishment. Castration was the punishment in Spain. In Poland, previous to the establishment of Christianity, the criminal was car- ried to the market-place, and there fastened by the testicles with a nail ; a razor was laid within his reach, and he had the option to execute justice on himself or
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remain where he was and die. The Saxons consigned the adulteress to the flames, and over her ashes erect- ed a gibbet, on which her paramour was hanged. King Edmund the Saxon ordered adultery to be pun- ished in the same manner as homicide; and Canute the Dane ordered that the man should be banished, and the woman have her ears and nose cut oft'. In the time of Henry I it was punished with the loss of the eyes and genitals. Adultery is in England con- sidered as a spiritual offence, cognizable by the spirit- ual courts, where it is punished by fine and penance. The common law allows the party aggrieved only an action and damages. In the United States the pun- ishment of adultery has varied materially at different times, and differs according to the statutes of the sev- eral states. Adultery is, moreover, very seldom pun- ished criminally in the United States.
5. Ecclesiastical. — Constantine qualified adultery as a sacrilege which was to be punished with death. His successors went farther, and placed it on a level with parricide. But the definition of adultery remained, in general, confined to the infidelity of the wife and her accomplice, and for a long time the Church did not succeed in establishing with the Romanic nations the conviction that the infidelity of cither party de- served an equal punishment. This principle was, on the other hand, carried through in the codes of most of the Christian Germanic States. The penalty was in all cases very severe, and, if there were aggravating circumstances, death. Later, especially since the eighteenth century, the penalty was reduced in all legislations to imprisonment. The canon law pun- ished both adulterer and adulteress with excommu- nication, and a clergyman who was an accomplice with imprisonment for lifetime. Protestant churches, which are not impeded in the exercise of their juris- diction by a connection with the state, generally ex- clude persons guilty of adultery from church member- ship ; while state churches arc mostly prevented, in this case as in others, from taking any measures. See Decalogue.
According to the canons of the Roman Church a clerk guilty of adultery was punishable by deposition and perpetual imprisonment in a monastery. Since the Reformation clerks have been deprived of their benefices for the sin of adulter)'. (See Stillingfleet, Eccl. Cases, p. 82.) See Celibacy.
In the opinion of the Oriental Churches the mar- riage tie is broken by the sin of adultery, so that the husband of an adulterous wife may marry again during her lifetime. This opinion is founded on Matt, xix, 9. The contrary doctrine is taught by the Western Churches (Augustine, lib. ii, de Adult. Conjug. cap. 13). See Tebbs, Scripture Doctrine of A duller;/ and Divorce (Lond. 1822, 8vo). Compare Matrimony.