Latin obscenity is the profane, indecent, or impolite vocabulary of Latin, and its uses. Words deemed obscene were described as (obscene, lewd, unfit for public use), or (improper, in poor taste, undignified). Documented obscenities occurred rarely in classical Latin literature, limited to certain types of writing such as epigrams, but they are commonly used in the graffiti written on the walls of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Among the documents of interest in this area is a letter written by Cicero in 45 BC (ad Fam. 9.22) to a friend called Paetus, in which he alludes to a number of obscene words without actually naming them.
Apart from graffiti, the writers who used obscene words most were Catullus and Martial in their shorter poems. Another source is the anonymous Priapeia (see External links below), a collection of 95 epigrams supposedly written to adorn statues of the fertility god Priapus, whose wooden image was customarily set up to protect orchards against thieves. The earlier poems of Horace also contained some obscenities. However, the satirists Persius and Juvenal, although often describing obscene acts, did so without mentioning the obscene words. Medical, especially veterinary, texts also use certain anatomical words that, outside of their technical context, might have been considered obscene.
Latin taboo words Cicero's letter ad Fam. 9.22 In a letter to one of his friends, written about 45 BC, Cicero discusses a number of obscenities in Latin. 9.22. It appears that the friend, Lucius Papirius Paetus (whose letters to Cicero have not been preserved), had used the word ('penis') in one of his letters. Cicero praises him for his forthrightness, which he says conforms to the teachings of the Stoic philosophers, but says that he himself prefers modesty ().
In the letter Cicero alludes to a number of obscene words, without actually mentioning them. The words which he alludes to but avoids are: ('arsehole'), ('penis'), ('cunt'), ('clitoris'), and ('balls'). He also objects to words which mean 'to fuck', as well as to the Latin word 'two' because for bilingual speakers it sounds like the Greek () ('he fucks or sodomises'Bain (1991).), and also to two words for passing wind, and . He does not object to using the word , and says that , which in his day was obscene, was formerly just a euphemism meaning 'tail'.
Degrees of obscenity There thus appear to have been various degrees of obscenity in Latin, with words for anything to do with sex in the most obscene category. These words are strictly avoided in most types of Latin literature; however, they are common in graffiti, and also in certain genres of poetry, such as the short poems known as epigrams, such as those written by Catullus and Martial.Adams (1982), p. 2. The poet Horace also used obscenities in his early poems, that is the Epodes and the first book of Satires, but later writers of satire such as Juvenal and Persius avoided the coarser words even when discussing obscene topics. There were, however, some occasions in public life, such as in triumphal processions, at weddings, and at certain festivals, where obscenities were traditionally allowed. The purpose of these was presumably twofold, first to ward off the evil eye or potential envy of the gods, and second to promote fertility.Adams (1982), pp. 4–6.
Euphemistic expressions A very common way of avoiding words for sexual acts was simply to omit the word in question. J.N. Adams collects numerous examples of this.Adams (1981a). For example, in Horace (Epodes 12.15):
('You are capable of [having sex with] Inachia three times in a night.')
Another way was to substitute the taboo word with a milder one or a metaphor, for example using ('rump (of an animal)') for or for .
Sometimes the offending word was replaced by a pronoun such as ('that') or an adverb such as ('there'), as in Martial (11.104.16):
('And when the Ithacan was snoring, modest though she was, Penelope always kept her hand there.')
: the penis is the basic Latin word for penis. It is used 48 times in Martial, 26 times in the Priapeia, and 18 times in Pompeian inscriptions.Adams (1982), pp. 10, 12. Its status as a basic obscenity is confirmed by the Priapeia 29, in which and are given as ideal examples of obscene words:Adams (1982), p. 9.
('May I die if it doesn't shame meto use obscene and improper words;but when you, Priapus, as a god, shamelesslyshow me your balls hanging out,it is appropriate for me to speak of cunts and cocks.')
Martial mocks a friend who despised effeminate clothing, explaining why he suspects that he is secretly homosexual:
('He will ask why I suspect him to be a "soft" man.We go to the baths together. He never looks at anything above,but examines the athletes with devouring eyes,and looks at their dicks with constantly moving lips.')
A (the word occurs only in Martial), according to Housman, was a man 'who performs feats of strength in public'.Housman (1930). Rabun Taylor disagrees and sees a more as a kind of rent boy who hung around in the baths in search of patrons.Taylor (1997), pp. 366-70.
also frequently appears in the poetry of Catullus. He uses as a nickname for Mamurra, as if it were an ordinary name, as in his epigram 105:
('That prick tries to climb the Pimpleian mount (of poetry);the Muses drive him out with pitchforks.')
(Pimpleia was a place in Pieria in northern Greece associated with the Muses (the nine goddesses of poetry and music).)
Etymology The etymology of is obscure, although outwardly it would appear to be a diminutive of , gen. , the 'mind' (i.e. 'the little mind'). Cicero's letter 9:22 relates it to , a spearmint stalk. Tucker's Etymological Dictionary of Latin relates it to , 'to project outwards', , 'chin', and , 'a mountain', all of which suggest an Indo-European root *men-. Other hypotheses have also been suggested, though none generally accepted.cf. Messing (1956).
Synonyms and metaphors
is also a basic Latin obscenity for 'penis', in particular for a penis with the foreskin retracted due to erection and glans exposed,Adams (1982), p. 13. as in the illustration of the god Mercury below. As a result, it was "not a neutral technical term, but an emotive and highly offensive word", most commonly used in despective or threatening contexts of violent acts against a fellow male or rival rather than mere sex ( 'fucking'). It is found frequently in graffiti of the type (= ) ('Whoever reads this, you're a dickhead').Adams (1982), p. 124.
It is found less frequently in Classical Latin literature, but it does appear in Catullus 28:
('O Memmius, while I lay on my back for a long timeyou fed me good and slow with that entire beam of yours.But as far as I can see, you guys have met with the same fate:for you have been stuffed with a no less large!')
Catullus is here speaking metaphorically. He complains that when he accompanied Gaius Memmius, the governor of Bithynia (57-56 BC), as part of his entourage, he was not allowed to make money out of the position. From this poem it is clear that Catullus's friends Veranius and Fabullus were kept under an equally close rein when they accompanied Lucius Piso to his province of Macedonia in 57-55 BC.Wheeler, A.L. 1964 . Catullus and the Traditions of Ancient Poetry, pp. 96, 103. Adams (1982), p. 130.
By extension, as a masculine adjective or noun, referred to a man whose was exposed by erection or by circumcision; thus Juvenal (14.100) has
('To guide only the circumcised [i.e. Jews] to the fountain that they seek').
And in poem 47 Catullus writes:
('Did that unsheathed Priapus prefer you guysto my little Veranius and Fabullus?')
In Martial's time, it was a common practice for actors and athletes to be fitted with a (a pin or brooch covering the foreskin) to prevent accidental exposure of the , discouraging sex and thereby preserving their voice or strength.Schultheiss et al. (2003). Martial (7.82) mocks one such actor as follows:
('Such a big brooch clothes Menophilus's penisthat it is enough for all the comic actors in the world.I believed (since we often go to the baths together)that he was anxious to preserve his voice, Flaccus.But one day, while he was wrestling in the middle of the palaestra with everyone watching,the poor man's brooch fell off. He was circumcised!')
or A third word for 'penis' was (or ). This is very rare and found only in one line of Horace and a fragment of the satirist Lucilius. The passage in Horace (Sat. 1.2.68) is as follows, in which he advises a young man who was beaten up as a result of an affair with the dictator Sulla's daughter:
('What if, in the words of his penis, his mind were to say to the man when he sees such troubles: "What exactly do you want? Do I ever demand a cunt descended from a famous consul or veiled in a fancy gown when my passion grows hot?"')
And Lucilius says, referring to the fact that Roman men apparently used to masturbate with their left hand:
('But with his left hand as his girlfriend, he wipes away his 's tears.')cf. Antonio Varone, Erotica Pompeiana: Love Inscriptions on the Walls of Pompeii («L'Erma» di Bretschneider, 2002), p. 95.
The word may be related to the marriage deity Mutunus Tutunus.Adams (1982), p. 62.
Although itself is rare, the derivative ('well-endowed') is found twice in Martial, as at 3.73:
('You sleep with well-endowed boys, Phoebus,and the thing that stands up for them does not stand up for you.')
The derivative , meaning the same as , is found in Lucilius and in two Pompeian graffiti.Adams (1982), p. 63.
The Latin word itself originally meant 'tail'. Cicero's , 9.22, observes that originally was an innocuous word, but that the meaning of male sexual organ had become primary by his day. The euphemism is used occasionally by Catullus, Persius, Juvenal, and Martial, and even once by the historian Sallust,Sallust, Catiline 14. who writes that the supporters of the anti-government rebel Catiline included
('whatever shameless man, adulterer, or glutton had ruined his ancestral property by hand, stomach, or "tail"')
Commenting on this passage, St Augustine notes that Sallust's use of the term in this phrase was not offensive.Adams (1982), p. 36. The word did not survive into Romance, however, and occurs only once in a Pompeian inscription.
Juvenal, showing his knack for describing grossly obscene matters without using taboo words, writes as follows in one of his satires (9.43-4):
('Or do you think it is an easy or straightforward thing to drive a proper-sized "tail"inside someone's guts and there meet with yesterday's dinner?')'proper-sized': Miller (1998). Other commentators translate similarly.
Another euphemism for the penis was ('tail'), which occurs twice in Horace,Lewis and Short, Latin Dictionary. and continues today in the French derivative ('tail' or 'penis'). In one place in his Satires (Serm. 2.7.50) Horace writes:
('Whichever girl receives the blows of my swelling "tail",or when I'm on my back sexily rides my 'horse' with her buttocks,sends me away neither with a bad reputation nor worried thata richer or more handsome guy might piss in the same place.')
For the metaphorical use of ('to piss'), see below.
The words ('nerve' or 'sinew') and In one of Horace's Epodes (12) a woman boasts of one of her lovers, Coan Amyntas,
('on whose indomitable groin a sinew grows, more constant than a new tree clings to the hills.')
or or , which meant a phallic image or amulet in the form of a penis, were also sometimes used as euphemisms for the penis.Lewis and Short, Latin Dictionary.
And one of the characters in Petronius's Satyricon, Ascyltus, is described as follows:Williams (2010), p. 97.
('For he had a weight on his groins so big that you'd think the man himself was just an appendage of his phallus.')
or