review of Harlots, Whores & Hackabouts by Kate Lister

This is a large book full of illustrations. It is a history of sex for sale. The first chapter is Sex in the Ancient World. There is much about ancient Babylon. I learned much from chapter four, The Honest Courtesans - Selling Sex in Renaissance Europe.

Both St Augustine of Hippo and St Thomas Aquinas taught that although prostitution is immoral, it is the lesser of two evils. Without it much worse things would happen - adultery and sodomy. It doesn't seem that they thought masturbation was much of a problem.

In Renaissance Italy sex workers were called 'meretrice' or 'cortigiane'.

"Cities, like Venice, forbade men from managing the brothels, instead installing older women known as matrons to do the job. A good matron not only looked after her girls, but knew how to keep the customers happy as well. In fact, the iconic Italian dish tiramisu is said to have been invented in the brothels to revive flagging energy levels. Whereas puttanesca, a flavourful sauce served with pasta, literally translates to 'cooked in the whorish fashion' and is said to have been eaten in the brothels when women were between clients. For all the moralizing around sex work, it did allow women to earn their own money, run their own business, and in a few cases, become internationally celebrated celebrities."

Kate goes on to write about Imperia Cognati, known as Queen of Courtesans. I was aware that the puttanesca pasta sauce is associated with Italian brothels, but I didn't know that the dessert tiramisu is too. Kate isn't saying that they were invented during the Renaissance though: they are of much more recent origin. I can imagine Italian sex workers having a hearty appetite, I can only speculate on which pasta shape they prefer. Perhaps farfalle, which means butterfly but is also a slang name in some parts of Italy for vulva: the labia minora resemble the wings of a butterfly.

The attitude of Christians is revealed in this chapter. The real problem came with the Protestants.

"Attitudes to sex work began to change dramatically across Europe following the rise of Protestantism. Protestants utterly rejected Augustinian notions that prostitution could curtail far worse sexual sins. Martin Luther called sex workers 'murderers' and suggested they be 'broken on the wheel'. Protestant preachers utterly condemned any toleration and called for state-run brothels to be closed and for prostitution to be abolished. Catholic attitudes to prostitution were soon viewed as evidence of wider moral corruption. The Vatican responded by ushering in a new era of sexual repression."

Pope Pius ordered them out of Rome and the Papal States, but the citizens of Rome petitioned him, and he repealed his edict.

So it seems that it is the Protestants and especially the Puritans, who came later, who despised sex work. Catholicism in Ireland seems to be heavily influenced by English (and Scottish) Puritanism. Southern European Catholics aren't quite so uptight about sexual matters.

In chapter 11 there are photographs named 'Interior of a brothel in Naples, c.1945'. One American surgeon reported that 'prostitutes from Naples descended upon our encampment by the hundreds, outflanking guards'. Let's hope they brought some tiramisu with them.