History is Fun!!!

Editor’s Warning:  This post contains rather graphic descriptions of sexual acts.  Younger historians should consult with an adult before clicking to see the entry after the jump.  Tomorrow we shall continue posting (mostly) family friend content. 

Welcome again historians.  Today’s entry should really put a buzz into your bones, literally!  Most of us grow up thinking of the Victorian era as a sexually repressed period with author’s like Jane Austin putting an emphasis on love over lust.  History begs to differ.  If anything, Victorians had sex on the brain (and elsewhere!).  An excerpt of a Harper’s Bazaare issue from March of 1873 chronicles a strange sexual practice:

…a table spoon of honey is dabbed on the vagina with a silk handkerchief.  The  jar containing the bees is then placed under the honeyed canal attracting the insects.  I observed this “ritual” in the back room of a playhouse in Kensington.  A young woman, who shall remain nameless as to conceal her good name, prepares to receive the four insects.  Sharp stings yield cries of pain and eventually tears.  The practice of “hiving” has been  advertised as originating in the Orient as a way to receive pleasure whilest maintaining chastity.  Advertisements in newspapers trumpet sayings like “intense ecstasy” and ”superior than verile males.”  The Archbishop of Canterbury has condemned the craze calling it,”ungodly.”   The Queen has made no official comment, but rumors circulate in taverns that midnight shipments of bee hives have entered Buckingham Palace…

Eventually hiving would be exposed as a fad that left many women (and some men) sore and a bit angry.  Once again history illustrates how little we as a people change, for bees are not the only buzzing thing known to give women pleasure.

Vaginal Bees

Painful?  Apparently.  Bizarre?  Oh Yes.  History?  You betcha!