Galen (AD 129–216), probably the most influential of the Greek physicians, called the clitoris the ‘nymph’ and thought its function was to help keep the womb warm, like a kind of clitoral bobble hat for your ‘chuff’ (1998).{4} This made perfect sense to the Greeks as everyone knew that women were hot and wet and men were cold and dry. This was a belief shared by Galen’s contemporary, Soranus of Ephesus (yes, really – a gynaecologist called ‘Soranus’), who practised medicine in Alexandria in the first century. In his four-volume treatise on gynaecology, Soranus describes the anatomy of the vulva fairly accurately, and also calls the clitoris a ‘nymph… because it is hidden underneath the labia such as young brides hide under their veil’.{5} Soranus’s work gives us one of the earliest descriptions of ‘oversized’ clitorises, and the ‘treatment’ this required. Brace yourselves.
On the excessively large clitoris, which the Greeks call the ‘masculinized’ nymph [clitoris]. The presenting feature of the deformity is a large masculinized clitoris. Indeed, some assert that its flesh becomes erect just as in men and as if in search of frequent sexual intercourse. You will remedy it in the following way: With the woman in a supine position, spreading the closed legs, it is necessary to hold [the clitoris] with forceps turned to the outside so that the excess can be seen, and to cut off the tip with a scalpel, and finally, with appropriate diligence, to care for the resulting wound.{6}
Evidently, Soranus’s work was highly influential as variations on this procedure start cropping up in various medical texts throughout the Classical world.[6] Sixth-century Byzantine Greek physician Aëtius of Amida builds on Soranus’s work, describing an ‘excessive’ clitoris as being both ‘a deformity and a source of shame’. His sixteen-volume medical encyclopaedia gives the most detailed and vivid account of this awful procedure (wince warning):
Have the girl sit on a chair while a muscled young man standing behind her places his arms below the girl’s thighs. Have him separate and steady her legs and whole body. Standing in front and taking hold of the clitoris with broad-mouthed forceps in his left hand, the surgeon stretches it outward, while with the right hand, he cuts it off at the point next to the pincers of the forceps. It is proper to let a length remain from that cut off, about the size of the membrane that’s between the nostrils, so as to take away the excess material only; as I have said, the part to be removed is at that point just of the forceps. Because the clitoris is a skinlike structure and stretches out excessively, do not cut off too much, as a urinary fistula may result from cutting such large growths too deeply. After the surgery, it is recommended to treat the wound with wine or cold water, and wiping it clean with a sponge to sprinkle frankincense powder on it. Absorbent linen bandages dipped in vinegar should be secured in place, and a sponge in turn dipped in vinegar placed above. After the seventh day, spread the finest calamine on it. With it, either rose petals or a genital powder made from baked clay can be applied. This is especially good: Roast and grind date pits and spread the powder on [the wound]; [this compound] also works against sores on the genitals.{7}
‘Excessively large’ clitorises were thought to be analogous to a mini penis, and therefore responsible for lesbianism and abnormal sexual appetites in women. This belief dominated cultural attitudes to the sweet spot right up until the twentieth century. In modern medical terms, this is known as ‘clitoral hypertrophy’, a ‘macroclitoris’ or ‘clitoromegaly’, and it is an extremely rare condition. But given the frequency with which hypertrophied clitorises turn up in historical medical texts, you’d be forgiven for thinking our matriarchal ancestors were packing endowments that would make a donkey blush. Obviously, this was not the case, so we have to conclude that this obsession with the clitoris and uncontrolled sexuality was cultural, rather than biological. Given the fascination with cutting out offending clitorises, perhaps it’s no wonder the poor thing has tried to keep its head down throughout history. There is not much mention of the ‘jellyroll gumdrop’ (1919) outside medical literature of Ancient Greece and Rome, but we can find it if we put the effort in.[7]
The word ‘clitoris’ didn’t come into use until around the sixteenth century. The Ancient Greeks and Romans would call the ‘little bald man’ (1997) the ‘nymph’, ‘myrtle-berry’, ‘thorn’, ‘tongue-bag’, or just plain ‘bag’.{8} Charming. But the compliments don’t stop there. Orally pleasuring the clitoris was considered obscene. When cunnilingus is spoken about in Classical literature it is generally regarded as something repugnant, indulged in only by lesbians and weak men whose erection had failed them. So much so that many Greek insults involved accusing someone of ‘dining at the Y’ (1963). The Greek playwright Aristophanes (446–386 BC) mentions cunnilingus several times to point to a character’s moral failings. His character Ariphrades appears in several plays as the ‘inventor’ of oral sex: ‘he gloats in vice, is not merely a dissolute man and utterly debauched, but he actually invented a new form of vice; for he pollutes his tongue with abominable pleasures’.{9}
The Romans went one better and actually considered the word clitoris (landīca) an obscenity, in much the same way as ‘cunt’ is obscene today.[8] Cicero referred to it as ‘the forbidden word’.{10} It was regarded as so naughty, it really only appears in street graffiti: ‘Fulviae landicam peto’ (‘Seek the clitoris of Fulvia’), and ‘Eupla laxa landicosa’ (‘Eupla, a loose, large clitoris’).{11} Poet and satirist Martial (AD 41–104) mocks the clitoris as a ‘monstrous blemish’ and a ‘protuberance’.{12} All this big-clit bashing may be disheartening, but, as Melissa Mohr argues, ‘people swear about what they care about’, and it seems that the Greeks and Romans really did care about the clitoris and its stimulating effects.{13} And at least they were talking about the clitoris, because the conversation stalls somewhat when we hit the Middle Ages.
It’s not really fair to say the medieval world forgot about the clitoris – they knew it was there and what it was (sort of), but they didn’t really move the discussion on from the big boys of Greek and Roman gynaecology.[9] Today, we understand scientific research to have a ‘half-life’, meaning that information is being updated at such a rate that by the time medical students leave university, half of what they have learned will be obsolete.{14} However, European medieval doctors believed in vintage medicine and continued to trot out gynaecology’s greatest hits for hundreds of years. One of the pilgrims in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales (1400) is a physician, who we are told is well educated because he has studied the work of…
6
For a full discussion on FGM in the Ancient World, see Mary Knight, ‘Curing Cut or Ritual Mutilation? Some Remarks on the Practice of Female and Male Circumcision in Graeco-Roman Egypt’,
7
Even the
8
For further reading about the clitoris being used as an obscenity in the Ancient World, read Melissa Mohr,
9
For a really excellent overview of the medieval medical understanding of the clitoris, read Karma Lochrie,