Modern times don’t have a historical monopoly on sexual deviancy. People have been gettin’ down and gettin’ freaky for the whole (heh-heh, that sounds like “hole”) of recorded history. Some people on a particularly filthy (and educational!) Ask Reddit thread shared the hottest, steamiest, most depraved historical facts they’ve picked up along the way. (Oh, and thanks to a very hot-and-heavy afternoon of Googling, we can tell you that they all check out.)
1. She was pretty much your average goth teen.
Frankenstein author Mary Shelley lost her virginity on her mother’s grave.
2. And then the French economy collapsed.
Victor Hugo slept with so many prostitutes that on the day he died, all the brothels in Paris were closed, because so many of the prostitutes took the day off the mourn him.
3. This is like “the most interesting man in the world,” but a woman, and way more interesting.
Julie D’Aubigny was a famous 17th century French opera singer who once took the holy vows to enter a convent just so she could have sex with a nun.
She also had a habit of seducing women at parties, which would lead their husbands to challenge her to a duel. She was an expert duelist and killed 10 men like this.
4. He did not have it on lock.
King Louis XVI had trouble impregnating Marie Antoinette because he had phimosis (the inability to pull back the penis foreskin). At the time, he was fascinated with locks, so his opponents made jokes about “the locksmith having trouble finding the keyhole”.
5. Start your day with torture.
John Harvey Kellog (yes that Kellogg on your sugary cereals) hated masturbation and thought it would rot your child’s brain. He thought spicy foods made you sexually excited and so people were convinced that giving your child bland foods would keep the hormones at bay. This made Kellogg put into production all these bland tasting cereals and graham crackers (which had little to no sugar back then) to keep your children from popping boners. As an added extent, he would advise parents to sew your young boy’s foreskin closed without anesthesia and pour carbolic acid on your young girl’s clitoris. He would brag about not having sex with his wife of 20 years
6. It was the “Blurred Lines” video of its day.
The Roman Emperor Elagabalus as a show of power upon entering Rome to become crowned emperor he had hundreds of naked women drag his chariot down the streets of Rome