if an archaeologist says an artifact was probably for “ritual purposes” it means “i have no fuckin clue”
but if they say it was for “fertility rituals” they mean “i know exactly what it was for but i dont want to say ‘ancient dildo’”
Back in the day I worked at a certain very famous and very high caste art museum in the US as a junior curator. Part of my job was to catalog the objects in the museum database. This includes details like provenance, measurements, and a visual description of what the object looked like.
Like I said, the museum was a pretty snotty institution. It’s got a LOT of objects it’s way famous for possessing, but nobody knew about the absolutely massive collection of Moche erotic pottery it had because the curators were totally embarrassed by this stuff.
Some examples:
Pretty hot shit, right? They never, ever put any of this stuff on public view or published it in any catalogues but – we legit had like several hundred pieces of Moche ceramics in the “dirty pots” category. Anyway, I was left alone to just do my job with regard to the database for several years, ok? And I figured, well, these’re accessioned objects in the museum’s collection – better get down to bidness.
I catalogued every goddamn bestiality, necrophiliac, cocksucking, buttfucking, detached penis, and giant vulva drinking cup in that collection. I’d be like,
A drinking vessel in form of a standing man wearing a tunic and cap. He holds an oversized erection in his hands and stares into the distance (note I did not say “like he’s hella-constipated”). The vessel has a hole at both the tip of the penis as well as around the rim of the figure’s head, thus forcing the drinker to drink only from the penis or risk spilling wine all over themselves from the top of the vessel. Red and orange slip covers the surface of the piece.
Pretty straightforward, right? Apparently the deep seated fear of these objects that the curators exhibited was meant to spread to me as well, but – no one ever gave me that memo, because I guess Midwesterners reproduce asexually. When the curators understood that I had catalogued all of these objects in addition to the other, non-sexy pieces in the collection, they were apparently livid, but knew they had no legs to stand on in terms of getting pissed at me for it.
I visited the museum’s online public access database a few years back and – every single description I wrote of these pieces has been totally neutered to say something like Male figural vase.
Long story short? Just call a dildo a fucking dildo. It’s all gonna be ok, I swear.
I’ve done cataloguing of figures where the previous cataloguer had looked at this figure and had written:
Wooden figure of a man. c.1800 BC. Middle Kingdom. Provenance unknown. Object likely to have been part of a tomb model, though what type is unknown. Partial remains of paint still evident on the face. Arms show some signs of warping. One leg is missing, but other two are still intact.
Looking at this figure, it was clearly one of a naked man who was now missing a leg, but still had one leg and one intact penis. Needless to say I amended the entry to make sure the fact that the figure had a penis very much apparent to future readers.
Even funnier, those pots were almost certainly found in graves. Someone was buried with that. Why. I’d like to read that paper.
I have a mighty need in my life for erotic pottery.
Then it’s time to custom order some of that shit on Etsy
“I think it might be of interest to the family that their slave-in-chief, their pillar of virtue, has secreted within the confines of his cubicle Rome’s most extensive and diversified collection of erotic pottery.” –A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
Went to the British Museum to see a special exhibition of Egyptology. There was a section on the mysteries of Osiris. Osiris sarcophagi had erections. No mention of this on any placards to my recollection. Seemed to me it was the elephant in the room. I did my own research and as far as I can tell it has something to do with fertility of the Nile delta, and something to do with the story that Osiris was murdered by his brother Set, and chopped into pieces, and Osiris’s sister-wife Isis went looking for the pieces and found all except for his penis which had been devoured by a fish. So she mummified Osiris to keep all his parts together and then she and Thoth had another dick made for Osiris and then Isis transformed herself into a bird (a kite, specifically) and did the do with her mummified husband and his detachable penis and conceived Horus the Younger. Why she had to be a bird for this I don’t know.
But maybe I WOULD if the renowned egyptologists at the damned BRITISH MUSEUM said something about it!!
NO SEX PLEASE WERE OUTDATED ANTIQUARIANS
(To the tune of “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General” from The Pirates of Penzance)
Don’t bring these matters up to an outdated antiquarian; They’ve spent their adult lives learning the arts humanitarian, And they can date a stela and with aplomb they can answer the Questions that arise from any shattered bits of amphora But if you try to date them or engage in saucy diatribe They’ll clutch their pearls and clam up like the shell beads of the Maya tribes So do not speak of phallic Greek or yonic Indo-Arian, It enrages and embarrasses the outdated antiquarian.
Beltainefaerie's Flights of Fancy 