Can I interest you in a linen condom? Pt 1.
A pig gut has never sounded so delightful....
I knew from the moment I heard this podcast episode that I wanted to share this information with someone. Thanks for being that someone.
The podcast is Betwixt the Sheets and it’s my current podcast obsession. It’s hosted by Kate Lister, (who I hope to become best friends with some day) a delightful historian with loads of personality and a delightful British accent. You can’t lose.
The episode itself is called Tudor Origins of the Condom (it’s linked below) and oh man was this one a delight. Kate is joined by Dr. Kate Stephenson who is also a historian but her specialty is ancient condoms. If I had known you could get a career studying things like ancient condoms, I would have been on a very different trajectory in my younger years.
But alas let’s talk about the (incomplete) history of the condom. What I love most about learning about the history of products we still use and behaviors we still participate in is how drastically different circumstances and attitudes are now…and what painfully has not changed at all. Turns out we’ve always had problems with the Kevins and Kyles of the world not wanting to wear condoms.
The origins of the condom
Long story short…we don’t really know. Back in the day, and I mean like cave paintings back in the day, there was a painting with a bison and a dude wearing a penis sheath. To the contemporary eye, this sheath may look like a condom, and mayhaps it is one, but there just isn’t enough proof to back that up.
In fact, there have been claims and assumptions that maybe the Egyptians, the Romans, or even pre-historic peoples were the ones to invent the condom. All I can think about is this scene from Billy Madison and maybe somehow now the buffalo makes more sense…
Linen Condoms
Anyway, the earliest recorded account of a condom was from the early 16th century from an Italian anatomist, Gabriele Falloppio, who was getting real sick and tired of all this dang syphilis going around. Apparently in 1495 there was a massive syphilis outbreak that was spreading across Europe and people were UPSET about it. Enter Gabriele Falloppio, who not only gave us an early condom was also so generous to lend his name to the fallopian tube.
Mr. Fallopian Tube himself invented what could only be described as the worst condom in the history of ever.
It was made out of linen and was big enough to cover just the tip… That’s right folks, a piece of dry fabric. Ok, I lied. There were instructions to use a bit of saliva to help with the uh…friction we’ll say.
Apparently our dude Gabriele was a legit scientist because he allegedly tested this linen condom among 1,000 soldiers to see how effective it was at preventing syphilis. His instructions were to wash the penis (yay!) but were not clear on whether or not to use the condom during intercourse or after (what?).
We’ll never get to know the results of that incredibly scientific study (that we definitely could not predict results from at this point in time), because we don’t have the whole of his research to reference anymore. I have so many questions. While there are other references to linen condoms in the books, there are currently no surviving linen condoms that we have managed to dig out of the earth. A tragedy for us all.
See you next week for Part 2!