Sex, lies, and vaginas featured prominently in medieval music, as well as medieval literature. Prior to the twelfth century, however music and songs rarely dealt with love and women were minor characters, if mentioned at all. But with the rise of the troubadours — travelling singers of folk-type ballads originating in southern France — women, love, and sexual pleasure infiltrated musical compositions. When the troubadours sang of love and sex, it was often romantic, non-matrimonial sexual encounters that were the theme. In contrast to the church view on sex, the troubadours’ message was that copulation was good and healthy and that women should be placed on a pedestal, to be worshipped, treasured, and admired, and in return, their love will enable knights and knaves to reach their fullest potential.
Yep, this was quite a change of pace from the clerical dribble folk had been accustomed to hearing. Many songs, in fact, romanticized wifely infidelity. Married ladies were often courted and bedded by swooning lovers and the audience listening to the music was rather accepting of this notion, despite what they learned at church. An unwritten rule in troubadour ballads, however, made it tolerable for a woman to have one lover, in addition to her husband, but multiple lovers? Now that was crossing the moral line.
A collection of songs from the 13th century were discovered in Germany in the mid-1800s which contain such memorable lines as “My virginity makes me frisky”. These songs have come to be known as the Carmina Burana. It is believed that these songs, with their primary focus on drinking, sex, and tempting fate, were written by the Goliards, a group of monks who rebelled against the oppressive authority of the church.
The Goliards lived by the “you-only-live-once” philosophy long before the YOLO acronym gained its current popularity. In fact, the Goliards were defrocked in 1300 because they were more interested in eating, drinking, and making merry than they were in reading scripture and praying. Sounds like the medieval version of frat boys!
To sum up, in medieval times, the bards and lyricists and musicians (oh my) didn’t only create clean verses for all ears to listen. Some songs and stories of medieval times were quite raunchy, and we’re confident that the performers and audiences enjoyed bawdy ballads and vulgar verses.
Giant Stone Vaginas… in Church!?
“More recently the images have come to be regarded in a positive light… they are a symbol of active female power.”
As crazy as it sounds, there are medieval churches in Ireland and England, indeed throughout much of Europe, with rather vulgar and explicit decorations. They are far from PG-13… in fact, they are X-rated. The Sheela-Na-Gigs are stone carvings of women, sitting or squatting with knees in the air, holding open their large, caricature-ishly oversized vaginas with their hands. And, yes, these female exhibitionists adorn churches! Hardly the spot one would expect to see cartoon porn. So there must be a reason, but sadly there is no textual evidence that remains from the Middle Ages that explains the intended meaning of the Sheela-Na-Gigs. In its place, we have the speculations of scholars and historians to go on, and they have developed some interesting theories as to the lost meaning of the Sheela-Na-Gigs.
Sheela-Na-Gigs could be a fertility symbol, after all the focus is on the vagina where seeds enter and babies exit. In some of the churches where Sheela-Na-Gigs are found, visitors have rubbed the exaggerated stone vulva so much, assumedly to transfer some of the magical fertility powers to the fondler, that this area of the statue is smoothly finished. At other churches, patrons have shaved off stone crumbs from the Sheela-Na-Gig’s va-jay-jay, perhaps, again, in search of fertility magic. I don’t know if the Sheela-Na-Gig scrapers ate the stone powders, or snorted it, or inserted it in their vagina, or simply made tea with it. Without a written record we are left to wonder.
It could be that the Sheela-Na-Gigs were not medieval fertility deities, but instead were meant to ward off evil spirits. Indeed, there are numerous folklore stories the apotropaic powers of the vagina. According to these tales, the power of the evil eye, witches’ spells, and even the devil himself, could be thwarted by a female exhibitionist, flaunting her naked vagina in the face of malevolent evil. So it is possible that medieval church builders incorporated the evil banishing powers of the vagina in form of the stone Sheela-Na-Gigs.
But then again, the Sheela-Na-Gigs could very have been placed in medieval churches to serve as a cautionary reminder about the dangers of lust and carnal sexual pleasure. Certainly this was the church’s ideology of the time; sex in any form was bad. It could be that the churchgoers, many of whom were probably illiterate, needed a visual image to reinforce the teachings of the church. The vulgar depiction of the Sheela-Na-Gigs could be a way to illustrate to the congregations that it was women and their wicked vaginas that caused the fall of man, who are the root of all evil. Talk about a slanderous campaign against women!
A final theory, however, is not so misogynistic. It contends that the Sheela-Na-Gigs are actual a representation of the power of women, harkening back to pagan days when reverence was given to the life-giving aspect of the vagina and women were celebrated as mother beings. This sentiment has enjoyed a renaissance in recent years, and the image of the Sheela-Na-Gigs is often adopted by feminist groups and women’s organizations. Irish artist Fiona Marron captures this believe when she writes that the essence of the Sheela-Na-Gigs is “a celebration of womanhood and fertility in life, death, and rebirth wrapped in the web of our ancient past.”
It may be that the Sheela-Na-Gigs were used in some female-degrading way during medieval times, but we like that it seems as though women are, to some extent, rewriting their own history in an empowering way.
VAGINAL ODDITIES
Chapter Overview
Our research into the medieval attitudes about the vagina uncovered many interesting stories that, like the vagina itself, defy pigeon-holing. The sections in this chapter are devoted to vaginal stories, myths, questions, and oddities that refused to be lumped in to other chapters.
Mad About Merkins
“This put a strange Whim in his Head; which was to get the hairy circle of [a] prostitute’s Merkin… this he dry’d well, and comb’d out, and then return’d to the Cardinal, telling him he had brought St. Peter’s Beard.”
That crazy vagina wig that we now see advertised in the back of certain racy magazines or on the racks of those deliciously naughty adult novelty stores is, in actuality, a medieval invention. Merkins, or pubic hair wigs, date back as far as 1450, according to the Oxford Companion to the Body. Now before you start thinking that couples in the Middle Ages were a playful and kinky bunch, we should peer into the history of the magical va-jay-jay carpet to learn that the creation of this furry vaginal covering is more sinister than erotic.