Disgraceful Archaeology Read Online Free Page A
Author: Paul Bahn
and Codpiece Alley (now Coppice Alley). Outside the city walls was Cokkeslane. In Paris there was rue Trousse-Puteyne (Whore’s Slit Street) — Mary Stuart is said to have fainted whenever her route took her through there. There was also a rue Grattecon (Scratchcunt street), and rue du Poil au Con (now rue Pélécan), where there were prostitutes who refused to comply with a city regulation requiring them to shave their privates ( 17 ).
A 2000-year-old brothel has recently been unearthed at Salonika in Greece — all kinds of sex toys were found inside, including a small clay dildo, several erotic figurines, and a red pitcher with a phallic spout. There were also innumerable offerings to Aphrodite, the goddess of love. The room containing this material of the 1st century BC conveniently bordered a bath house.
At Pompeii, sometimes taverns had rooms for prostitution upstairs, where the names of waitresses and prostitutes are found scribbled on walls. The graffiti refer to the women’s vices and attractions, and announce that some women can be had for two ‘ as ’ — the price of a loaf of bread. But these may be written as insults, rather than reflect a true price. The highest price of a woman is given as 16 as .
Strabo, the Greek geographer of the first century BC, said Corinth had more than 1000 prostitutes; he tells of a Corinthian courtesan who was reproached for being lazy and refusing to do wool working. In her bawdy reply, she punned on the word ‘ histos ’ which can refer to anything erectable, including a loom: ‘Such as I am, in this short time I have taken down three looms [erections] already’.
A fragment by the fourth-century playwright Alexis of Thurii provides a catalogue of tricks whereby an artful madam prepares her novice slave prostitutes for business, including elevatorshoes and false buttocks to satisfy customers who were partial to women’s rear ends. They must also have charming manners: ‘Does she have healthy teeth? By force she’s kept laughing, so that the customers see what a dainty mouth she has. If she doesn’t like to laugh, she must spend the day indoors, with a twig of myrrh upright between her lips, just like the goats’ heads displayed in this way at the butcher shops so that the customers will buy them. That way in time she smiles whether she likes it or not.’
18
Prostitutes in the ancient port of Ephesus wore sandals with reversed lettering on the sole, so they stamped ‘Follow me’ on the sand as they walked. A carved stone footprint of this kind can be seen in the city ruins ( 18 ).
19
In the entrance hall of a Pompeii brothel is a painting of a man holding a double penis, maybe one for action and one for luck. Pompeii had 12,000 inhabitants and 34 brothels. One Roman word for a prostitute was ‘Nonaria’ — ninth hour — which, as they counted time from dawn, meant 4 pm, the time when brothels opened. One painting of sex in a Pompeii brothel has ‘ Lente Impelle ’ written above it, ‘Push Slowly’ ( 19 ).
MISOGYNISTS
According to Herodotus, the Greek historian of the fifth century BC, the women of ancient Egypt were all unfaithful. When a son of Ramesses II had been blind for 10 years, an oracle from the city of Buto declared to him that the time of his punishment was drawing to an end, and that he should regain his sight by washing his eyes with the menses of a woman who had never had intercourse with any man but her own husband. Pheros made a trial with his own wife first, but still remained blind, even though he tried with all women, one after the other. When he finally recovered his sight, he took all the women whom he had tried, gathered them in one town, and burnt them and the town — but he married the woman by whose means he had recovered sight.
In a Mesopotamian Cuneiform wedding contract testimony, arguing about the return of the house as part of the dowry, Iddin-aba backs out, saying ‘Your daughter I shall not marry. Tie her up
A 2000-year-old brothel has recently been unearthed at Salonika in Greece — all kinds of sex toys were found inside, including a small clay dildo, several erotic figurines, and a red pitcher with a phallic spout. There were also innumerable offerings to Aphrodite, the goddess of love. The room containing this material of the 1st century BC conveniently bordered a bath house.
At Pompeii, sometimes taverns had rooms for prostitution upstairs, where the names of waitresses and prostitutes are found scribbled on walls. The graffiti refer to the women’s vices and attractions, and announce that some women can be had for two ‘ as ’ — the price of a loaf of bread. But these may be written as insults, rather than reflect a true price. The highest price of a woman is given as 16 as .
Strabo, the Greek geographer of the first century BC, said Corinth had more than 1000 prostitutes; he tells of a Corinthian courtesan who was reproached for being lazy and refusing to do wool working. In her bawdy reply, she punned on the word ‘ histos ’ which can refer to anything erectable, including a loom: ‘Such as I am, in this short time I have taken down three looms [erections] already’.
A fragment by the fourth-century playwright Alexis of Thurii provides a catalogue of tricks whereby an artful madam prepares her novice slave prostitutes for business, including elevatorshoes and false buttocks to satisfy customers who were partial to women’s rear ends. They must also have charming manners: ‘Does she have healthy teeth? By force she’s kept laughing, so that the customers see what a dainty mouth she has. If she doesn’t like to laugh, she must spend the day indoors, with a twig of myrrh upright between her lips, just like the goats’ heads displayed in this way at the butcher shops so that the customers will buy them. That way in time she smiles whether she likes it or not.’
18
Prostitutes in the ancient port of Ephesus wore sandals with reversed lettering on the sole, so they stamped ‘Follow me’ on the sand as they walked. A carved stone footprint of this kind can be seen in the city ruins ( 18 ).
19
In the entrance hall of a Pompeii brothel is a painting of a man holding a double penis, maybe one for action and one for luck. Pompeii had 12,000 inhabitants and 34 brothels. One Roman word for a prostitute was ‘Nonaria’ — ninth hour — which, as they counted time from dawn, meant 4 pm, the time when brothels opened. One painting of sex in a Pompeii brothel has ‘ Lente Impelle ’ written above it, ‘Push Slowly’ ( 19 ).
MISOGYNISTS
According to Herodotus, the Greek historian of the fifth century BC, the women of ancient Egypt were all unfaithful. When a son of Ramesses II had been blind for 10 years, an oracle from the city of Buto declared to him that the time of his punishment was drawing to an end, and that he should regain his sight by washing his eyes with the menses of a woman who had never had intercourse with any man but her own husband. Pheros made a trial with his own wife first, but still remained blind, even though he tried with all women, one after the other. When he finally recovered his sight, he took all the women whom he had tried, gathered them in one town, and burnt them and the town — but he married the woman by whose means he had recovered sight.
In a Mesopotamian Cuneiform wedding contract testimony, arguing about the return of the house as part of the dowry, Iddin-aba backs out, saying ‘Your daughter I shall not marry. Tie her up
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