Women’s solo sex can be taboo even today. But in 17th century England it featured in many texts from poetry to medical books, suggesting knowledge or even acceptance of female self-pleasure.
Portrait of Marquis de Sade (1740-1814), whose name and writings gave us the term ‘sadism’
Wikimedia
Erotic spells were a popular form of magic in ancient Greece and Rome. Ancient spells were often violent, brutal and without any sense of caution or remorse.
The “Burney Relief,” which is believed to represent either Ishtar, the Mesopotamian goddess of love and war, or her older sister Ereshkigal, Queen of the underworld (c. 19th or 18th century BC)
BabelStone
Sex was central to life in ancient Mesopotamia. And the authors of Sumerian love poetry, depicting the exploits of divine couples, showed a wealth of practical knowledge about the stages of female sexual arousal.
A fragment of a wall painting showing two lovers in bed from the House of L Caecilius Jucundus in Pompeii, now at Naples National Archaeological Museum.
Wikimedia Commons
From phallus-shaped wind chimes to explicit erotica on lamps and cups, sex is everywhere in ancient Greek and Roman art. But our interpretations of these images say much about our own culture.
Little Lonsdale Street in the 1870s: a number of brothels were located in the area known as ‘Little Lon’.
State Library of New South Wales.
Rubbish excavated from brothels sheds light on sex workers’ lives in the 19th century. Despite the dangers, prostitution offered an independent living free of male control.
Queer women were allowed to serve openly in Australia’s defence force from 1992.
Jaime Pérez
While lesbian women were technically banned from serving in the Australia Defence Force until 1992, many before then found that military life was a place to express their love and desire for the first time.
A painting depicting a debate between Socrates and Aspasia, by Nicolas André Monsiaux, circa 1800.
Wikimedia Commons
In Athenian society, it appears some elite courtesans were better educated than traditional wives. Other sex workers were sold into the role as children.
French engraving of a cuckolded husband.
University of Victoria
‘Cuck’, short for cuckold, is the favoured insult of men’s rights activists today. But the term has a long history: from the 16th to 18th centuries it reflected a deep anxiety about women’s sexual appetites.
Titian’s 1583 painting Venus of Urbino: historically, pleasure was not the only, or even the main, expectation from sex for women.
Wikimedia Commons
Australian women were once largely seen as reproducers, rather than lovers: sexual pleasure was suspect. Attitudes have changed, yet our culture is still troubled by female desire.