Erotic art in Pompeii and Herculaneum
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Erotic art in Pompeii and Herculaneum was discovered in the ancient cities around the bay of Naples (particularly of Pompeii and Herculaneum) after extensive excavations began in the 18th century. The city was found to be full of erotic art and frescoes, symbols, and inscriptions regarded by its excavators as pornographic. Even many recovered household items had a sexual theme. The ubiquity of such imagery and items indicates that the sexual mores of the ancient Roman culture of the time were much more liberal than most present-day cultures, although much of what might seem to us to be erotic imagery (eg oversized phalluses) was in fact fertility-imagery. This clash of cultures led to an unknown number of discoveries being hidden away again. For example, a wall fresco which depicted Priapus, the ancient god of sex and fertility, with his extremely enlarged penis, was covered with plaster (and, as Schefold explains (p. 134), even the older reproduction below was locked away "out of prudishness" and only opened on request) and only rediscovered in 1998 due to rainfall [1].
In 1819, when King Francis I of Naples visited the Pompeii exhibition at the National Museum with his wife and daughter, he was so embarrassed by the erotic artwork that he decided to have it locked away in a secret cabinet, accessible only to "people of mature age and respected morals". Re-opened, closed, re-opened again and then closed again for nearly 100 years, it was briefly made accessible again at the end of the 1960s (the time of the sexual revolution) and was finally re-opened for viewing in 2000. Minors are still only allowed entry to the once secret cabinet in the presence of a guardian or with written permission.
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[edit] Famous examples
[edit] Phalluses
 Wall mural of Mercury/Priapus |
Bronze wind chimes of "phallus-animals" were common household items. Note the child on one of the wind chimes -- the large phallus (whether on Pan, Priapus or a similar deity, or on its own) was not seen as threatening or erotic, but as a fertility symbol.
[edit] Priapus
 Wall Painting of Priapus, House of the Vetti |
 An older reproduction of the same painting |
 Another fresco of Priapus, this time from the entryway of the largest Pompeii brothel |
The second image, from Schefold, Karl: Vergessenes Pompeji: Unveröffentlichte Bilder römischer Wanddekorationen in geschichtlicher Folge. München 1962., with its much more brilliant colors, has been used to retouch the younger, higher resolution image here.
[edit] Brothels
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 Fresco from the largest Pompeii brothel |
 An erotic wall painting from Pompeii |
It is unclear whether the images on the walls were advertisements for the services offered or merely intended to heighten the pleasure of the visitors. As previously mentioned, some of the paintings and frescoes became immediately famous because they represented erotic, sometimes explicit, sexual scenes. One of the most curious buildings recovered was in fact a Lupanare (brothel), which had many erotic paintings and graffiti inside. The erotic paintings seem to present an idealised vision of sex at odds with the reality of the function of the lupanare. The Lupanare had 10 rooms (cubicula, 5 per floor), a balcony, and a latrina. It was one of the larger houses, perhaps the largest, but not the only brothel. The town seems to have been oriented to a warm consideration of sensual matters: on a wall of the Basilica (sort of a civil tribunal, thus frequented by many Roman tourists and travelers), an immortal inscription tells the foreigner, If anyone is looking for some tender love in this town, keep in mind that here all the girls are very friendly (loose translation). Other inscriptions reveal some pricing information for various services: Athenais 2 As, Sabina 2 As (CIL IV, 4150), The house slave Logas, 8 As (CIL IV, 5203) or Maritimus licks your vulva for 4 As. He is ready to serve virgins as well. (CIL IV, 8940). The amounts vary from one to two As up to several Sesterces. In the lower price range the service was not more expensive than a loaf of bread. Prostitution was relatively inexpensive for the Roman male but it is important to note that even a low priced prostitute earned more than three times the wages of an unskilled urban laborer. However, it was unlikely a freed woman would enter the profession in hopes for wealth because most women declined in their economic status and standard of living due to demands on their appearance as well as their health. Prostitution was overwhelmingly an urban creation. Within the brothel it is said prostitutes worked in a small room usually with an entrance marked by a patchwork curtain. Sometimes the woman's name and price would be placed above her door. Sex was generally the cheapest in Pompeii, compared to other parts of the Empire. Although an estimation of price is difficult to guess, one should suspect the prostitute's age, appearance, and skill level would play a part in the price. All services were paid for with cash.
[edit] Suburban Baths
These frescoes are in the Thermae suburbanae (near Porta Marina - [1]).
These pictures were found in a changing room at one side of the newly excavated Suburban Baths in the early 1990s. The function of these pictures is not yet clear: some authors say that they indicate that the services of prostitutes were available on the upper floor of the bathhouse and could perhaps be a sort of advertising, while others prefer the hypothesis that their only purpose was to decorate the walls with joyful scenes (as these were in Roman culture). The most widely accepted theory, that of the original archaeologist, Luciana Jacobelli, is that they served as reminders of where one had left one's clothes. The Thermae were, however, used in common by males and females, although baths in other areas (even within Pompeii) were often segregated by sex.
Collected below are high quality images of erotic frescoes, mosaics, statues and other objects from Pompeii and Herculaneum.
 Fresco from the Suburban baths of a 2 male and 1 female threesome. |
 Fresco from the Suburban baths. [2] |
 Fresco from the Suburban baths in cowgirl position |
[edit] Venus in a Half Shell
The mural of Venus from Pompeii was never seen by Botticelli, the painter of The Birth of Venus, but may have been a Roman copy of the then famous painting by Apelles which Lucian mentioned. In classical antiquity, the sea shell was a metaphor for a woman's vulva.
[edit] Finds
[edit] Images
 Tile Mosaic, Satyr & Nymph, House of the Faun |
 Wall Painting, House of the Epigrams, Reign of Nero |
 Marble Bas-Relief |
 Fresco from a Pompeii sleeping room |
 Erotic fresco |
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 From Casa del Centenario. Note that the woman is wearing a primitive brassiere. |
[edit] See also
[edit] Notes
- ^ As reported by the epd press agency in March, 1998.
- ^ As this image shows cunnilingus, this image has elicited much interest, because it may contradict the popular male customer / female prostitute notion.
[edit] External links
[edit] References and further reading
- Michael Grant and Antonia Mulas, Eros in Pompeii: The Erotic Art Collection of the Museum of Naples. New York: Stewart, Tabori and Chang, 1997.
- Thomas A.J. McGinn, The Economy of Prostitution in the Roman World. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 2004.
- Antonio Varone, Eroticism in Pompeii. Getty Trust Publications: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2001.
