I do not know why the ancient authorities, without having thoroughly considered the subject, conferred upon women the right of acting as witnesses. It was, indeed, well known, and they themselves could not fail to be aware that it was dishonorable for them to appear frequently before the eyes of men, and that those who were modest and virtuous should avoid doing so. For this reason, as I have previously stated, I do not understand why they permitted them to be called as witnesses, a privilege which resulted in their frequently being associated with great crowds of men, and holding conversation with them of a character very unbecoming to the sex. Did they think that in public matters the statements of women should be heard, when they had been admitted to give evidence as men do; like the Scythian women who We know were in the habit of arming themselves in company with their husbands, for the purpose of making war? And, in addition to the monstrous absurdity of such a practice, is it not clear that it brings about confusion of the sexes, by rendering the qualities which distinguish them common to both, and thereby causes perplexity, as well as the destruction of their distinctive attributes; for do not such customs violate the modesty and the virtue peculiar to women, who should always assemble in their own houses with decorum, and never dissolutely or familiarly? And, indeed, the power to act as witnesses in the numerous assemblies of men with which they mingle, as well as taking part in public affairs, gives them the habit of speaking more freely than they ought, and, depriving them of the morality and reserve of their sex, encourages them in the exercise of boldness and wickedness which, to some extent, is even insulting to men. For is it not an insult, and a very serious one, for women to be authorized to do something which is especially within the province of the male sex? Wherefore, with a view to reforming not only the errors of custom, but also of law, We hereby deprive them of the power of acting as witnesses, and by this constitution forbid them to be called to witness contracts under any circumstances. But, so far as matters in which they are exclusively interested are concerned, and when men cannot act as witnesses, as, for instance, in confinements, and other things where only women are allowed to be present, they can give testimony as to what is exclusively their own, and which should be concealed from the eyes of men.