Her venal charms were abandoned to a promiscuous crowd of citizens and strangers of every rank, and of every profession: the fortunate lover who had been promised a night of enjoyment, was often driven from her bed by a stronger or more wealthy favorite; and when she passed through the streets, her presence was avoided by all who wished to escape either the scandal or the temptation.

The satirical historian has not blushed [23] to describe the naked scenes which Theodora was not ashamed to exhibit in the theatre.

[24] After exhausting the arts of sensual pleasure, [25] she most ungratefully murmured against the parsimony of Nature; [26] but her murmurs, her pleasures, and her arts, must be veiled in the obscurity of a learned language.

After reigning for some time, the delight and contempt of the capital, she condescended to accompany Ecebolus, a native of Tyre, who had obtained the government of the African Pentapolis.

But this union was frail and transient; Ecebolus soon rejected an expensive or faithless concubine; she was reduced at Alexandria to extreme distress; and in her laborious return to Constantinople, every city of the East admired and enjoyed the fair Cyprian, whose merit appeared to justify her descent from the peculiar island of Venus.