Thisshort article from Tenth Medieval, a wordpress blog, covers the idea of
medieval sex slaves, mostly of the female variety.
They state that is most depictions of slavery, we
often draw the conclusion that women sold into slavery were usually exploited
for sex, and that it was a more than common occurrence. However, the blogger
states that this idea is a bit contrived, considering that the only real record
of it is from penitentials setting penances for it, which would mean that it
was considered a sin. The blogger states that they are not trying to dispute
that it ever happened, but rather they are trying to say that we have limited
knowledge on actual occurrences of it happening, which is further narrowed by
the fact that we assume that any woman under the power of a man is going to be
exploited sexually.
I do not share the sentiment, honestly. Of course male slave owners would
sexually abuse their female slaves, because they were seen as little more than
property. I’m not saying it happened all the time, but it had to at a frequent
enough rate for the stereotype to have been created.
We all know that sex is a massively valuable
commodity, and has been for as long as humans have been able to keep records.
From this it is fair to infer that if one owns the life of another, they are
going to use that to the fullest extent. Even Tomas Jefferson had sex with his
slaves, and his face is on currency that we use today.
I’m not trying to underplay the reality of the
situation, but come one. It happened. It had to. Sadly, that’s just how things
work. Still, some of the same principles are present today in the male over
female power relationship. Women in the military are sometimes raped by their
commanding officers, but we rarely hear about it happening. And maybe the
blogger is right when they say that just because we know it happened doesn’t
mean it happened often, but the fact remains that if it happened, it didn’t
happen just once.
We’ve seen women exploited for their sexual favors
throughout history, and today is no exception, but I’ll stay away from that for
now. As the blogger states, a slave was nothing more than a beast of burden, no
different from working livestock except that they had the same biology as their
owners. It is no secret that sometimes livestock owners would get a little
steamy with their livestock, and, I mean, I don’t quite understand the appeal,
but to each their own I guess. Anyways, if someone who owned slaves and animals
would not hesitate to get romantic with a goat, pig, ox, mule, or what have
you, of course they’re going to get down with a human that they own entirely,
and is pretty much equal to a head of livestock. Now, I’m not sure which is
more deplorable, but at least one makes a tad bit more sense than the other.
Again, not trying to diminish the seriousness of it, I’m just saying that it
makes sense.
So, in short, all we really know is that, yeah,
sometimes male slave owners would have sex (consensual or not) with their
female slaves. Hell, who’s to say that the role was never reversed, or that
slave owners would have sex with slaves of the same gender? That’s up for
speculation, but the former is not. It happened, but we shouldn’t assume that
it happened in all cases, because in all likeliness, it didn’t.
It's interesting to me how common GOT makes the idea of sex slaves. There are many whores portrayed on the show (i.e. Littlefinger's whorehouse) and they are all depicted as lusty, wanton, and willing (i.e. Ros). Additionally, when Dany's handmaiden Doreah tells her she lived in a pleasure house since she was 11, she seems to write this off as a common occurrence. The depiction of prostitutes on the show and in the book makes it seem as though they have fairly good lives. Shae, for example, is lavished with many gifts and jewels. I feel as though GOT does not so much depict female sex slaves as animal property, but rather as willing women happy to please, though many of them were sold into whorehouses at young ages. Therefore, it makes the act seem more common that your article suggests, yet paints a disturbingly cheerful picture of what is was like to be a young girl essentially sold into the sex trade. But GOT does do a good job demonstrating that prostitution is the world's oldest profession.
ReplyDeleteA second thought I had was how in Urban Economics we were taught that prostitution can actually be empowering for women in modern times (interesting class!). Because women can now book "dates" with men (cough cough) online, the concept of the pimp is eliminated, they are free to do background checks on their male friends, they can work around their busy schedules, and they can be selective with clientele. According to The Economist, rich men pay educated women to spend weekends with them in exchange for thousands of dollars, making the idea appeal to more affluent women. It's interesting how the sex sector is both extremely disturbing and violent (think Taken) and oddly growing to become empowering (if you believe that article).