Stone Age Carving: Ancient Dildo?

Submitted by coldrum on Wednesday, 11 August 2010 Page Views: 2679

Sex toys have come a long way since the Stone Age – but then again, perhaps not as much as we might think.
Last week, an excavation in Sweden turned up an object that bears the unmistakable look of a penis carved out of antler bone. Though scientists can't be sure exactly what this tool was used for, it's hard not to leap to conclusions.

"Your mind and my mind wanders away to make this interpretation about what it looks like – for you and me, it signals this erected-penis-like shape," said archaeologist Gšran Gruber of the National Heritage Board in Sweden, who worked on the excavation. "But if that's the way the Stone Age people thought about it, I can't say."

"Without doubt anyone alive at the time of its making would have seen the penile similarities just as easily as we do today," wrote Swedish archaeologist Martin Rundkvist on his blog, Aardvarchaeology.

The discovery is so recent, Gruber said, there hasn't been enough time to submit the finding for publication in a scientific journal, though the researchers plan to.

The carved bone was unearthed at a Mesolithic site in Motala, Sweden, that is rich with ancient artifacts from between 4,000 to 6,000 B.C. The area's unique features may have allowed bone artifacts, which usually get destroyed over the millennia, to survive.

"It's an organic object, that's why it's special," Gruber told LiveScience. "Normally when we excavate early Mesolithic sites we never get the organic material. But this site where we're excavating now is along the shoreline. The preservation is very good here – it's been lying in the bottom sediments and clay layers of the river, and it's been well preserved there."

The dildo-like object is about 4 inches (10.5 cm) long and 0.8 inches (2 cm) in diameter.

It's not the first time that such a phallic object has been found from the ancient world. Another item strongly resembling a penis was unearthed in Germany in 2005. That one is even older – dating from 28,000 years ago – and made of stone.

Perhaps instead of, or in addition to, its sexual purpose, the object may have been used as a tool, such as to chip flakes of flint, Gruber suggested. One end is shaped into more of a point, he said.

For more, and a photo, see www.livescience.com.

Note: "It's not immediately clear whether the tool would have been one most likely to be used by men or women or both."

Contributor Bio for coldrum: Based in Milkyway, contributing since 2002. Favourite site: Avebury.

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