THREAD: So I study medieval sex, and what *fascinates* me are sex acts that don't get discussed in medieval texts. Take analingus/rimming: almost NEVER mentioned, but it appears *all the time* in illustrations.

[CW: butts and rimming, duh. also genitals]

#MedievalTwitter

Handbooks for confessors list oral sex but it usually seems to be blowjobs. Note also "interfemoral intercourse", which is very well attested in church literature, *possibly* suggesting it was a big issue at the time, at least among monks.

This 20th-century translator is too shy to translate the Latin here, but it means that someone who "sends semen into the mouth" does penances for seven years. This is called the "worst of all evils." (Note that *getting* a blowjob is the sin, not giving one)

But there's no references I've come across to oral sex other than blow jobs. There's lots about anal sex, doggy-style, etc, but not mouth-to-ass.

But medieval MANUSCRIPTS *love* this trope.

(Morgan Lib, MS G. 24, f. 079r)

Asses being kissed, licked, and generally mouthed are all over medieval manuscripts, including many religious manuscripts. Why this disconnect between art and text?

I think there is a simple explanation--that they thought ass-licking is funny, not sexual--that has more complicated implications.

(Morgan Library, MS m754, f. 036r)

Medieval illustrators generally seem to have thought that Butts Are Funny.

Things being done to butts are thus also funny.

However, there is a larger theological issue with butts.

(BL, MS Royal 14 E III, f. 89)

Medieval Christians saw the body as representative of the natural, moral order of the universe. Up is good, down is bad. The upper body is better, the lower body is sinful. So medieval devils had inverted bodies, with faces on their asses. https://twitter.com/erik_kaars/status/1154682696985141249

Putting the face to the ass represented, in this world view, a distorted sense of priorities. You were supposed to turn your face up towards God, not down towards the Worst Area of the Body. Doing so meant you'd inverted the moral order.

(Morgan Library, MS m754, f. 049v)

This is why devil's bargains were so often represented as being sealed by kissing the devil's anus or the anus of a representative, like a cat. It meant you'd turned from God. https://twitter.com/erik_kaars/status/1154687502650941441

So why is there so much funny ass-kissing in manuscript margins? It's hard to say. It may represent chaos or the inversion of the natural order.

(Morgan Library, MS g24, f. 072v)

There's also likely a reason that animals and grotesque hybrid creatures are often the ones doing this in the margins: inverting the natural order of the body means violating what makes you human, in the church's eyes.

(Morgan Library, MS M729, f. 268r)

It's also associated with religious heresy. When the Knights Templar were disbanded for heresy, the accusations included anal kissing, all linked to devil worship. Eating ass was a sign of Evil!

(This is probably a representation of a Templar)

(Morgan, MS g24, f. 070r)

I'm still thinking this through, and there may be medieval texts about eating ass that I just don't know about (TELL ME IF YOU KNOW OF ANY), but it's an interesting example of cultural differences in what's perceived as an erogenous zone.

(BL, MS Royal 12 F XIII, f. 39v)

Anyway, that's all from me for now! Go forth, cursed with this knowledge!