ULM, Germany—Homo sapiens are distinguished from other mammals not least because of their ability to make and use tools to improve their lives, but it may come as a shock to some people—like the Family Research Council and Morality in Media—to learn that around 30,000 years ago man fashioned a tool whose main purpose was as a sexual aid—i.e., a sex toy. The Stone Age phallus was discovered in a cave in Ulm, Germany, and is currently being studied by researchers at the University of Tubingen.
But the story has an added twist. It turns out the prehistoric novelty was also used to create fire. A spokesperson for the university told the Independent Online that when it wasn’t being used sexually, it was used to ignite fires, which reminds us that cavemen were not as dumb as the commercials imply.
The 20cm stone artifact had to be pieced together from more than a dozen pieces discovered in a “cave complex associated with the activities of modern humans and not their pre-historic ‘cousins,’ the Neanderthals,” reported the site.
Being a phallic device, the stone dildo was obviously used by females, or at least we imagine it was. (There’s been no discovery of a prehistoric Fleshlight … yet.) Though hardly surprising that women have reserved the right to pleasure themselves since before man was fully erect (hehe), one hopes that this discovery helps remind all modern people (yes, including the Family Research Council and Morality in Media) that sex has always been an activity that served as more than a means to procreate.
Of course, the phallus dates to a time before the advent of religion, its concomitant embrace of shame, and our current confusion as to whether using a sex toy counts as an act of infidelity.
