the zodiac, and never after war ...
Ananga Ranga of Kalyanamalla (Stage of the Love God), by the Indian poet Kalyan Mall (16th century)
Hot weather
Cold weather
Any time, in fact that’s not springtime or the rains
Daytime – unless it’s your woman’s favourite time
When ill with fever
When tired from travel
When observing a religious rite
At the new moon
When the sun or a planet passes from one side of the zodiac to another
In the evening
When tired from warfare
Geddinthere! (Times she might be in the mood)
Koka Shastra (The Scripture of Koka), by the Indian poet Kokkoka (12th century)
When tired from travel
Convalescing from a fever
Weary from dancing
The sixth month of pregnancy
A month after giving birth
Etiquette: when to introduce a new mistress to your wives
Chinese householder’s notebook (c. 16th century)
Recently I heard about a certain official who took unto him a new concubine. He locked himself in with her behind double doors and did not appear for three days. All his wives and concubines were highly incensed at this behaviour. This is indeed the wrong way.
The right method is for the man to control his desire and, for the time being not approaching the newcomer, concentrate his attention on the others. Every time he has sexual intercourse with his other women, he should make the newcomer stand at attention by the side of the ivory couch. Then, after four or five nights of this, he may for the first time copulate with the newcomer, but only with his principal wife and the other concubines present. This is the fundamental principle of harmony and happiness in one’s women’s quarters.
Owning a sex manual was not something you would shout about in ancient Greece: it was considered a sin against moderation, the primary virtue of the ancient world, and linked by critics to other faux pas such as gluttony, drunkenness and using prostitutes.
Greek writers of sex manuals were treated like the tabloid journalists of the day and labelled with the snappy title of anaiskhuntographo – ‘writers of shameless things’.
This did not deter aspiring sex advisors from putting pen to papyrus, though, and writing love guides became a feminine speciality. An AD 10 lexicon claims that the first Greek to have published a sex manual was Astyanassa, whose official job title was Helen of Troy’s ‘body servant’. She is credited with being both the first person to discover all the workable positions for intercourse and the first to write them down. She was followed by Elephantis and Philaenis. Elephantis, the prostitute-poetess, is supposed to have detailed nine different postures. The Emperor Tiberius is said to have been an avid reader, but tantalizingly, although these postures are often mentioned in classical texts, they remain lost somewhere beneath the mattress of time.
The other leading writer, Philaenis, is also believed to have been a woman (though it might possibly have been a man pretending, in order to boost sales). Only a few fragments from a papyrus of hers, from 2 BC, survive. In her preamble, she claims to have written it all from her own experience, as an objective and scientific guide. On flattery, she recommends, ‘Tell an older woman that she looks young. Tell an ugly woman that she looks “fascinating”. Pick the woman’s worst feature and then make it appear desirable.’ Other writers who appear to have flourished at the time include Paxamus, a general hack who wrote the Dodecatechnon, a book of twelve erotic postures – which is once again sadly lost.
We have more luck with the Romans, particularly the celebrated writer Lucretius, who at around 50 BC seems to have stumbled on the ‘Love Hurts’ idea so beloved of pop songs. The fourth section of his On the Nature of the Universe, dedicated to sex and sensation, warns readers that they must dodge Cupid’s darts: ‘The wounded normally fall in the direction of their wound: the blood spurts out towards the source of the blow. So, when a man is pierced by the shafts of Venus, whether they are launched by a lad with womanish limbs or a woman radiating love from her whole body, he strives towards the source of the wound and craves to ejaculate the fluid drawn from out of his body into that body. His speechless yearning foretells his pleasure.’ Messy.
Lucretius recommends that you try your best to avoid all this. His solution is to evade true love by embarking on a promiscuous sex spree: ‘If you find yourself thus passionately enamoured with someone, you should keep well away from images that remind you of them. Thrust from you anything that might feed your passion, and turn your mind elsewhere. Ejaculate the build-up of seed promiscuously and do not hold on to it – by clinging to it you assure yourself the certainty of heartsickness and pain ... Do not think that by avoiding romantic love you are missing the delights of sex. No, you are reaping the sort of profits that carry with them no penalty.’
The Roman period also brought us the first example of a sex-manual martyr. Poor old Ovid (aka Publius Ovidius Naso) is only the first of a long line of authors whose sullied reputations, trashed careers and broken lives litter the pages of this book. He got himself banished to a far fringe of empire for writing a bawdy guide to sexual postures, theirs amatoria (The Art of Love), which is a lads’-mag treasury of tips on grooming, sex and seducing your friends’ wives.
Ovid was born in 43 BC in Sulmo – modern-day Sulmona in central Italy – and studied in Athens before moving to Rome where he dutifully worked his way up to a decent civil service job. He then decided on a radical career move into the world of art and became a full-time poet. The gamble paid off handsomely and his writing and wit soon won him imperial fame and fortune. But at the age of 40 he made a rather less popular move, by treating his Roman readers to a pornographic poem. The Ars amatoria begins innocently enough: ‘If anyone among this people know not the art of loving let him read my poem and having read be skilled in love. By skill, swift ships are sailed and rowed, by skill nimble chariots are driven: by skill must love be guided.’ But its long closing passage was particularly risqué, suggesting sex-position tips for women that would show off their best parts (viz, if you’ve long legs, put them on your partner’s shoulders; if you’re saggy from childbirth, let him take you from behind; if you’re short, go on top, and so on).
The verses mortally offended the somewhat strait-laced Emperor Augustus. The poem, along with another, undisclosed error, got him banished to the freezing cold, primitive town of Tomis on the Black Sea. (He cryptically wrote, ‘two crimes, a poem and a blunder have brought me to ruin. I must keep silent.’) He continued writing poetry and begging to be allowed home, but to no avail. Ovid died in exile eight years later, in AD 17. The persecution
