Text | Documentary in Film
Edited by | Documentary in Film
Preface
As the old saying goes, "food and sex are also the nature". It is human nature to like beauty and love between men and women, and there is nothing to avoid.
People in ancient times did not have the concept of contraception. They often worshiped reproduction and believed that a prosperous family was a symbol of blessing. Therefore, they had no restraint in creating humans.
With the further development of social civilization, people found that pregnancy sometimes caused inconvenience and trouble, and always having children was not an option, so they began a lot of research on contraception.
For modern people, condoms can solve most of the contraceptive problems.
However, when there were no condoms in ancient times, what methods did the ancients use to prevent pregnancy?
Ideological Contraception
People in ancient times didn’t even know what pregnancy was like, let alone contraception.
Intimacy between men and women is a biological instinct, but when women’s bellies began to grow bigger day by day, people at that time couldn’t figure out what reproduction was all about.
Because there was a real shortage in the subject of science, most people at that time attributed a woman's pregnancy to some mysterious force in nature. A woman giving birth to a child was a gift from God.
Whether it is Eastern mythology or Western mythology, a woman’s pregnancy always carries a certain element of metaphysics.
In the past, a woman stepped on the footsteps of the God of Thunder, and then gave birth to Nuwa Fuxi. Later, Mrs. Maya saw an image in her dream, and then gave birth to Sakyamuni.
Under the fermentation of this metaphysics, most people believe that children are the product of female ideas.
Therefore, the earliest contraceptive method adopted by humans began with controlling thoughts and applying martial arts.
People in Greenland believe that the moon is the original sin that causes women to become pregnant.
Therefore, they issued a rule that when men and women are intimate at night, women should avoid looking directly at the moon, and after sex, women should smear saliva on their stomachs to prevent the moon from sending children into their stomachs.
In some Western countries where witchcraft is popular, witches will also teach women a set of spells to prevent pregnancy , telling them that as long as they recite the spell silently when doing things, they can prevent pregnancy.
The Maori people believe that as long as they take some blood from the placenta, mix it with a spell and throw it into the fire, they can achieve accurate contraception.
In addition, men and women will also wear some strange things during sex to achieve the effect of contraception.
Such as black cat bones, cow testicles, etc.
As for why people in ancient times chose these things, it is probably related to the various religious beliefs at that time.
If modern people were to imagine the scenes at that time, they would probably laugh out loud because the scenes were so weird and absurd.
Although there are many methods of ideological contraception, these methods naturally end in failure.
At this time, people began to research new contraceptive methods.
2. Female Contraception
With the further development of society, human beings gradually began to get rid of the most primitive ignorance.
In the process of repeated practice, people gradually discovered that children are not born by thoughts, but that pregnancy is often caused by the residual male semen in a woman's body after close contact between men and women.
However, this discovery did not lead people to the path of scientific contraceptive research, but led to a new misunderstanding.
Humans at this time attributed all the responsibility for pregnancy to women and believed that women should be solely responsible for contraception.
Under this understanding, women are forced to embark on a contraceptive path full of sin and humiliation.
As one of the oldest civilizations in the world, the contraceptive method handed down from ancient Egypt can be regarded as the earliest contraceptive practice of mankind.
As early as 1000 BC, the ancient Egyptians soaked wool cotton balls in a solvent mixed with gum arabic, coconut and honey, and then inserted the cotton balls into women's bodies to achieve contraceptive purposes.
Why do they do this?
That's because they believe that the existence of wool cotton balls can effectively prevent male sperm from entering the female body, thus preventing pregnancy on the physical level.
After trying various substances, gum arabic has the best effect.
So they chose to soak cotton balls with gum arabic.
And in the following time, they even discovered a substitute for gum arabic.
From a modern perspective, the substitutes found by the ancient Egyptians at that time were truly bizarre. They were the excrement of elephants and crocodiles.
After repeated experiments, they confirmed that these feces can also effectively prevent pregnancy, and directly stuffed these babies into women's bodies.
Although the contraceptive effect is indeed achieved, the feces undoubtedly has a strong smell.
Under such circumstances, whether there is still a good atmosphere in the same room is a question that modern people cannot know.
Later scientists conducted research on this contraceptive method and found that the reason why gum arabic and elephant dung can effectively prevent pregnancy is that these substances contain acid, and acidic substances can effectively kill sperm.
Although the ancients did not understand the principle, they succeeded in contraception, which can be regarded as a great deal of trouble.
When entering the 4th century BC, human contraceptive methods were updated again.
However, this method of contraception is quite crude, and it is not even as high-tech as the contraceptive methods previously studied by the ancient Egyptians.
The ancient Greeks at this time advocated the "exercise-based contraceptive method".
If a woman wants not to get pregnant, she should directly start squatting on the spot after having intimate contact with a man, and she must make her butt touch her heels to expel sperm in this way.
In some countries, the woman after having sex will start beating violently on the spot, beating 7 times or multiples of 7, before stopping to do other things.
Similar physical contraceptive methods were used not only in the West, but also in ancient China.
In ancient times, after a concubine finished sleeping with her, someone would come to the emperor and ask a question: "To stay or not to stay?"
If the emperor said "stay" at this time, it would mean that the concubine would be pregnant with his child and serve him. The concubines will be sent back to their original palaces intact.
But if the emperor says "no retention", then the concubine will obediently go to the bed in the side room and lie down, and a dedicated person will perform acupuncture or rubbing to drain the semen from the body.
During this period, quite crude abortion surgeries appeared in both the West and the East.
Many women are harmed by these crude methods of contraception and abortion because they are not allowed to have independent reproductive rights, and some even lose their lives.
However, due to their low social status, many women do not have the ability to resist.
In ancient my country, in addition to physical contraception, there were also many secret recipes for medical contraception.
During the Western Han Dynasty, in order to monopolize all the favors of Emperor Cheng of the Han Dynasty, Zhao Feiyan and Zhao Hede would try their best to prevent themselves from getting pregnant, so as not to give other women the opportunity to rise to power.
Ancient books record that musk is a valuable medicinal material. At the same time, taking large amounts of musk for a long time can also make it difficult for women to become pregnant.
In order to achieve the contraceptive effect, sisters Feiyan Hede used some "belly patches" made of musk and stuck them on their belly buttons.
According to many documents, in ancient my country, in order to prevent concubines from getting pregnant, saffron and other drugs were used to make medicated baths, and the women's lower bodies were soaked in them to achieve the contraceptive effect.
In fact, the above-mentioned medicinal contraceptive methods are not the most vicious.
In our country's "The Girl with a Thousand Gold Fang", there is a record of such a contraceptive drug, which is called "Five Poison Decoctions" among the people.
The main ingredients of Wudu Decoction are mercury, arsenic and strychnine. Modern medicine has confirmed that these substances are toxic and the human body cannot overdose on these substances.
However, in ancient times, in order to prevent the pregnant women from receiving customers, the madams in the brothels coaxed the pregnant women to drink the "Five Poison Soup", which poisoned the fetus in the abdomen and died.
No woman at that time would have thought that this Wudu Decoction was not only harmful to the fetus, but also harmful to her own body.
If a woman takes Wudu Decoction for a long time, she will become infertile at worst, and lose her life at worst.
Therefore, the ancient medical contraceptive method was also quite unreliable.
Male contraception
For a long time, humans have put the responsibility of contraception on women.
Little do we know that pregnancy is the result of both men and women, so men are also responsible and assume their own contraceptive responsibilities.
What makes people feel sad is that the awakening of male contraceptive awareness is not due to the improvement of women's status, but the emergence of a virus.
During the Renaissance, syphilis began to spread in Italy, and then spread to every country and city in Europe in the early 16th century. Countless men and women lost their lives because of the plague.
At this time, Westerners were so perverted about sex that they were all afraid that they would die because of the affair between men and women.
But physiological desires have prompted humans to start researching new contraceptive methods.
At this time, a man asked why not protect the lower body, so as to greatly reduce the risk of danger.
With this idea, many people began to search for protective covers and materials.
It is easy to sew materials, but the process of finding suitable materials is very tortuous.
At first, some people chose to use rough linen to make protective covers.
The protective cover has been made, but the effect of wearing it on the body is imaginable. The roughness of the linen makes men feel deeply uncomfortable, and they have given up on this material.
Later, the Japanese also tried to use hard steel materials to make protective covers for the lower body.
The protection effect is very good, but it completely loses the feeling when being intimate. This really goes against the original intention of the matter itself.
Therefore, this experiment quickly ended in failure.
After many experiments, a foreigner finally successfully developed a condom.
This foreigner is called Condem, and he is the doctor of King Charles II of England.
Because King Charles II of England was keen on beauty and liked to look for women everywhere, Condom, as his personal doctor, also devoted himself to the development of condoms in order to prevent him from contracting related diseases.
One day, he accidentally saw the expanded fish bladder and felt that the shape was very similar to the male genitals. Inspired by this, he made a condom with the fish bladder and then presented it to the king.
King Charles II gave this product a five-star rating after using it. He also highly praised Condem, who made the product, and immediately named the condom after him.
This is the origin of the English word "condom".
King Charles II of England
In fact, in our country’s historical records, we can also see that ancient Chinese people used fish fat and oily silk paper to make condoms.
However, because the smell of fish fat is very strong, condoms must be dried and cleaned after one use. The whole process is very complicated, so ancient Chinese people gradually gave up the use of this type of condoms.
In addition to fish fat, the ancients also searched for condom materials.
During this period, slaughterhouse workers and female glove-makers plundered the intestines, gallbladders and other organs of all animals and made early condoms of various materials.
Because the cost of these condoms is lower than that of fish bladders, they are also popular among ordinary people.
Eventually, humans also discovered that the lamb’s cecum is quite thin and is the best material for condoms.
For a time, condoms made from lamb ceca became extremely popular and became a must-have item for Western families.
After entering the 1820s, mankind finally understood the true principle of pregnancy with the development of science and technology, and completely walked away from the original ignorance.
At this time, Western countries also had latex processing technology, and more mature and safer condoms also emerged.
As condoms continue to become more popular, modern scientific research teams are also exploring more contraceptive methods.
Doctors have not only developed short-term contraceptive pills, but now also have long-term contraceptive pills.
As the status of modern women further improves, the relationship between the sexes gradually becomes equal and rational, and crude contraceptive methods will gradually decrease.
It is replaced by a safer and more reliable method of contraception.
Epilogue
reviews the history of the development of contraceptive methods, but in fact it is also reviewing the history of the development of human civilization.
Although this road has been full of twists and turns and hardships, and the development process is also full of ignorance and absurdity, I have to say that this is an extremely meaningful road.
From early ideological contraception to modern scientific contraception, people have really put in their own unique wisdom and efforts.
From a certain perspective, this road has witnessed mankind's transformation from ignorance to science, the gradual improvement of women's status and the continuous progress of human society.
It is precisely because of the efforts and research of the ancients that we have the convenience and security of our modern life today.
Here, we still want to express our heartfelt admiration for human wisdom that shines like stars.
At the same time, I also hope that everyone can use scientific contraception, especially women, and they must learn to love themselves.
