There are certain things that you don't expect to discover when rummaging around an old house...

The box it was found in, intact.

This week I wanted to get more than a little risque and share with you an interesting (if NSFW) article I found over at TYWKIWDBI about the 'he's-at-home', also known as the Nantucket Dildo.

The 80 year old phallus was made of plaster and discovered by the 80 year old Connie on a flue shelf in the chimney of her house and is thought to be 120 years old, having been secreted away by the fisherman's wife Martha Coffin sometimes between 1898 and 1920. She was one of the 'Cape-Horn wives' so called because often their husbands would be on voyages of up to 8 years around cape-horn. As you can imagine, often husbands would be anxious about the fidelity of their wives and so gifts such as the one that Martha kept secret all these years were common. in Nantucket, these were referred to as 'he's-at-home'. It just goes to show, not much changes.

If you'd like to read the whole article you can do so here.

Phallic items like these turn up quite often in archaeological digs and in historical collections and there is often an interesting level of debate as to whether they are decorative or ritualistic (such as the famous 'flying phalluses' of Ancient Rome, whether they are misinterpreted, or whether they were actually used. Often a culture of prudishness in academia also clouds judgement on these matters, but they always have something interesting to show about the period of history they hail from.

(Ah heck, while we're already here talking about wangs, why don't you check out some other interesting articles on how human penises are thought to have had spines at one point, and how human penises lost the baculum bone during our evolution. You're welcome.)

Sources
-"He's-at-home' was a term for a Nantucket dildo
-There once was a dildo in Nantucket
-LiveScience - Stone Age Carving: Ancient Dildo?
-Ancient Romans Carved Winged Penises to Ward off the Evil Eye
-LiveScience: How men lost thier penis spines
-LiveScience: Technically speaking you don't have a boner, but your dog does.

Being the Head-Honcho Has Never Been Easy, and Make That Doubly So If You Were A Woman In the Past.

Often branded as 'whores', 'poisoners', 'witches' and worse, many societies in the past had a visceral distaste of women in power, and many of the same issues still face women in power today. 

A politically manoeuvring woman is so often called a 'bitch', an opinionated headstrong woman is so often a 'shrew', or 'nag'. In moments of arguments they are often infantalised - told to "calm down dear" (David Cameron to Angela Eagle), called a 'girl' (Silvio Belusconi) or a 'brave little woman' (Austin Mitchell on Margaret Thatcher). If they are dressed plainly they are painted as emasculating, ugly, dowdy and homely as if they have nothing else to contribute ("What does she want, this housewife? My balls on a tray" - Jacques Chirac on Thatcher). If they present as too conventionally 'pretty' they are not taken seriously and dubbed 'beauty queens' (Kumara Welgama to Rosy Senanayake) or criticised (as in the case of the ANC  playing fashion police in criticising South African leader Lindewe Mazibuko's outfit).They may even be subject to wolf-whistles rather than being listened to (as Cecile Deflout, the French housing minister).

Given that women in power still face these challenges today in our relatively liberal western-centric society, in the past their successes were nothing short of remarkable. In 'Women Who Ruled- History's 50 Most Remarkable Women' Claudia Gold's impressive research brings 50 of these such women into the limelight they deserve.

Claudia Gold's book is very easy to read for anyone interested in women's history without any polemics, perfect for dipping in and out of. The 50 women listed are organised chronologically.This becomes especially important when we reach the 16thc and the age of European Queens, when often the political fate of one woman's family influences the rise of another. The book is also commendable in offering a wide variety of female leaders, from the near-mythological figures of Jazebel and the Queen of Sheba, through to Eastern leaders such as Wu Hou and Roxelana, as well as the western favourites of 'Bloody' Mary and Elizabeth 1st and finally into the modern day politicians of Indira Gandhi and Margaret Thatcher. You get a real impression that the book aims not to view history through a western lens, but to celebrate and commiserate the lives and careers of as many interesting ladies as possible.

Roxelana, The Ukranian slave who became
Sultana of the Ottoman Empire

The brilliant thing about Women Who Ruled is that Gold gives us a full picture of the women in power across the many countries of the world without romanticising them.
These women did not have to be saints in order to be respected: just as we have Machiavellian kings we have viscous queens. Just as we have weak-willed and exploited kings we also have foolish and naive queens. Just as we have opportunistic lords we have conniving ladies. For some the bonds of family united them together in mutual honour and bravery, and for others the bonds of family were simply threads in a web to be manipulated and cut off at will. The characters in this work are all multi-faceted and, in the brief few pages that are granted to each, you get a real impression of the often dangerous political landscapes that they resided in, and how fickle fate could be to even the most intelligent political wrangler. Across each story, though, we see how each woman (or her family and 'allies') had to rely on their quick wits to carve out a place for themselves in societies that so often mistrusted them.

Whatever your stance on feminism as a whole, this is a very engaging and interesting book for anyone who is a fan of history. I very much recommend it.



Sources

• Top 10 sexist Moments in politics
• 10 Sexist Quotes about Margaret Thatcher
• 'Women Who Ruled- History's 50 Most Remarkable Women' By Claudia Gold

History has a long culture of hoaxes, and perhaps one of the most bizarre is the monstrous births of Mary Toft.

Mary Toft with one of her 'children'

In 1726, in Goldiming near Surrey Mary Toft went into labour. She was 25 and illiterate, working as a servant and married to a clothier and has suffered a miscarriage a month earlier. nevertheless she still seemed to be pregnant and, as she struggled through the labour, she apparently gave birth to something resembling a liverless cat.Apparently confused, her family asked the local obstetrician John Howard to attend Mary and it became clear that she had given birth to yet more animal parts. Things came to a remarkable head when, in one day, she claimed to have given birth to nine baby rabbits.

Howard was stunned and sent out word to England's greatest doctors and scientists and even to the King to ask for assistance in investigating the seemingly miraculous case. Intrigued, the king sent out some of his best men and the infamous hoax of Mary Toft's rabbits began in earnest.


Why on Earth did people believe it?

Monstrous births and miracles had been a culture in of itself since time immemorial. Monstrous births could be items of horror or entertainment which could produce a profit but also act as portents from God. Science - proper empirical science - was still in its infancy and, in Mary's case, the idea that rabbits (and dead animal parts) could be generated in the womb was not one that was entirely fanciful. It was believed, for example, that the emotions and imaginings of the mother could be transferred to the foetus and this had in the past been used to explain monstrous births or in cases where a child developed a unexpected genetic trait, such as babies with darker skin when infidelity was ruled out of the equation. As in the case of the 'mooncalf', it was even thought that the moon itself could affect the development of the foetus. 

Mary's story for the births, which took place after a miscarriage a month earlier, was that she had been working in the fields and was startled by a rabbit. When she and a friend tried and fail to catch it and another rabbit she returned home and, when she went to bed, dreamt that she was sat with those two illusive rabbits in her lap. When she woke she fell ill and, for some months, had a very strong desire to eat rabbits, which she could not afford. For the science of the time, it was entirely possible that such a strong maternal impression could influence the development of the foetus, and Mary made sure to physically 'give birth' to more dead rabbits in the presence of scientists to secure her story. So it was, on the whole, taken seriously.

When Mary handed over the dead rabbits as evidence it was here that science started to

make some in-roads to exposing the hoax. King George himself sent the German surgeon Cyriacus Ahlers and Mr.Brand to investigate, and on investigation of the rabbits, Ahlers found that dung pellets still inside the rabbits contained corn, hay and straw. Clearly these had not been created inside the womb. The eminent Midwife Sir Richard Manningham and Sir James Douglas were also called to attend her 'births' and observe them in controlled settings, and also had serious doubts. The reputations of all of the doctors involved were on the line for even entertaining the idea of this being true, but opinions were divided.

The whole situation came to a head when finally Toft's accomplice was caught trying to sneak a rabbit into her room. The doctors waited to see if Mary would incriminate herself and sure enough she went into a dramatic labour that produced nothing. Mary was finally taken into custody and, being threatened with painful medical experimentation, finally admitted to the hoax, explaining that she had inserted dead rabbits into her own birth canal and allowed them to be removed as if she was giving birth. The hoax was exposed, Mary's fame only increased and, despite spending a small amount of time in custody Mary was largely pardoned and was released to avoid further attention and embarrassment. For a long time afterwards the medical profession as a whole was mocked for its gullibility.




Sources
-The curious case of Mary Toft (University of Glasgow Special Collections)
-Mary Toft and her extraordinary delivery of rabbits (The Public Domain Review)
-Notes of Karen Harvey's presentation of 'Rabbits, Whigs and Hunters: Rethinking Mary's toft's Monstrous Births 1726' (10 Dec 2014)
-Mary Toft Image