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Clitoridectomy in Ancient Greco-Roman Medicine and the Definition of Sexual Intercourse

  • Chiara Thumiger
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Sex and the Ancient City
This chapter is in the book Sex and the Ancient City

Abstract

What could female genital mutilation surgery, sexual penetration, poeticised forms of human sacrifice and medical examinations have in common? This chapter offers a discussion of sexual intercourse in a historical perspective by analysing a number of narratives and images of violent intervention on a female, or “feminised” body, in order to argue for an extension of the definition of “sexual intercourse” parallel to, and part and parcel of, the rewriting of the concepts of “gender” and “sex” in recent and contemporary philosophical reflections. The romantic representation of the default of “sexual intercourse” as mostly cis-gender and heterosexual, with its matrimonial and reproductive validation and its ideologies, deserves to be made the object of a critical analysis of “gender” and “sex” as products and experiences rather than substances. This analysis is carried out through examples from ancient gynaecology, tragedy and epic poetry, and arguing for the relevance of ancient “images” to the development of the modern ideas of sexual “norm” and “health” with reference to the female body.

Abstract

What could female genital mutilation surgery, sexual penetration, poeticised forms of human sacrifice and medical examinations have in common? This chapter offers a discussion of sexual intercourse in a historical perspective by analysing a number of narratives and images of violent intervention on a female, or “feminised” body, in order to argue for an extension of the definition of “sexual intercourse” parallel to, and part and parcel of, the rewriting of the concepts of “gender” and “sex” in recent and contemporary philosophical reflections. The romantic representation of the default of “sexual intercourse” as mostly cis-gender and heterosexual, with its matrimonial and reproductive validation and its ideologies, deserves to be made the object of a critical analysis of “gender” and “sex” as products and experiences rather than substances. This analysis is carried out through examples from ancient gynaecology, tragedy and epic poetry, and arguing for the relevance of ancient “images” to the development of the modern ideas of sexual “norm” and “health” with reference to the female body.

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter I
  2. Acknowledgements V
  3. Contents VII
  4. List of Figures XI
  5. Sex, Sexuality, Sexual Intercourse and Gender: The Terms and Contexts of the Volume 1
  6. Part I: Aspects of Homoeroticism
  7. Dover’s “Pseudo-sexuality” and the Athenian Laws on Male Prostitutes in Politics 19
  8. Group Sex, Exhibitionism/Voyeurism and Male Homosociality 43
  9. Making the Body Speak: The (Homo)Sexual Dimensions of Sneezing in Ancient Greek Literature 71
  10. “Fell in Love with an Anus”: Sexual Fantasies for Young Male Bodies and the Pederastic Gaze in Rhianus’ Epigrams 89
  11. Silencing Female Intimacies: Sexual Practices, Silence and Cultural Assumptions in Lucian, Dial. Meretr. 5 111
  12. Part II: Sex and Medicine
  13. Clitoridectomy in Ancient Greco-Roman Medicine and the Definition of Sexual Intercourse 141
  14. Sex and Epilepsy: Seizures and Fluids in Greek Medical Imagination 173
  15. Part III: The Use and Abuse of Sex Objects
  16. Some Dirty Thoughts about Chairs and Stools: Iconography of Erotic Foreplay 193
  17. Olive Oil, Dildos and Sandals: Greek Sex Toys Reassessed 221
  18. Statues as Sex Objects 245
  19. Having Sex with Statues: Some Cases of Agalmatophilia in Latin Poetry 263
  20. Part IV: Sexual Liminality
  21. Hephaistos Among the Satyrs: Semen, Ejaculation and Autochthony in Greek Culture 285
  22. Human-animal Sex in Ancient Greece 307
  23. The Womb Inside the Male Member: A Lucianic Twist 323
  24. Part V: Sex and Disgust
  25. Sex and Disgust in Martial’s Epigrams 351
  26. Part VI: The Scripts of Sexuality: Drama, Novel, Papyri and Later Texts
  27. To Voice the Physical: Sex and the Soil in Aeschylus 377
  28. Seminal Figures: Aristophanes and the Tradition of Sexual Imagery 425
  29. The Maiden who Knew Nothing about Sex: A Scabrous Theme in Novella and Comedy 445
  30. Sex and Abuse in Unhappy Marriages in Late Antique Oxyrhynchus: The Case of Two Women’s Narratives Preserved on Papyrus 471
  31. “Asexuality” in the Greek Papyrus Letters 487
  32. From Plato’s Symposium to Methodius’ and Late Antique Hagiography: “Female” Readings of Male Sexuality 509
  33. Notes on Editors and Contributors 529
  34. Index Locorum 531
  35. General Index 535
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110695793-007

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter I
  2. Acknowledgements V
  3. Contents VII
  4. List of Figures XI
  5. Sex, Sexuality, Sexual Intercourse and Gender: The Terms and Contexts of the Volume 1
  6. Part I: Aspects of Homoeroticism
  7. Dover’s “Pseudo-sexuality” and the Athenian Laws on Male Prostitutes in Politics 19
  8. Group Sex, Exhibitionism/Voyeurism and Male Homosociality 43
  9. Making the Body Speak: The (Homo)Sexual Dimensions of Sneezing in Ancient Greek Literature 71
  10. “Fell in Love with an Anus”: Sexual Fantasies for Young Male Bodies and the Pederastic Gaze in Rhianus’ Epigrams 89
  11. Silencing Female Intimacies: Sexual Practices, Silence and Cultural Assumptions in Lucian, Dial. Meretr. 5 111
  12. Part II: Sex and Medicine
  13. Clitoridectomy in Ancient Greco-Roman Medicine and the Definition of Sexual Intercourse 141
  14. Sex and Epilepsy: Seizures and Fluids in Greek Medical Imagination 173
  15. Part III: The Use and Abuse of Sex Objects
  16. Some Dirty Thoughts about Chairs and Stools: Iconography of Erotic Foreplay 193
  17. Olive Oil, Dildos and Sandals: Greek Sex Toys Reassessed 221
  18. Statues as Sex Objects 245
  19. Having Sex with Statues: Some Cases of Agalmatophilia in Latin Poetry 263
  20. Part IV: Sexual Liminality
  21. Hephaistos Among the Satyrs: Semen, Ejaculation and Autochthony in Greek Culture 285
  22. Human-animal Sex in Ancient Greece 307
  23. The Womb Inside the Male Member: A Lucianic Twist 323
  24. Part V: Sex and Disgust
  25. Sex and Disgust in Martial’s Epigrams 351
  26. Part VI: The Scripts of Sexuality: Drama, Novel, Papyri and Later Texts
  27. To Voice the Physical: Sex and the Soil in Aeschylus 377
  28. Seminal Figures: Aristophanes and the Tradition of Sexual Imagery 425
  29. The Maiden who Knew Nothing about Sex: A Scabrous Theme in Novella and Comedy 445
  30. Sex and Abuse in Unhappy Marriages in Late Antique Oxyrhynchus: The Case of Two Women’s Narratives Preserved on Papyrus 471
  31. “Asexuality” in the Greek Papyrus Letters 487
  32. From Plato’s Symposium to Methodius’ and Late Antique Hagiography: “Female” Readings of Male Sexuality 509
  33. Notes on Editors and Contributors 529
  34. Index Locorum 531
  35. General Index 535
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