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January 18, 2025

Finally have gotten around to finishing this blog, which my loyal fans (two friends) have been patiently for. Possibly one of the most obvious items for us to research of, ladies and gentlemen; I present the history of the vibrator.

Though not as related as pop culture would have us believe, the history of the vibrator is directly linked with the history of the female orgasm. Let's get this out of the way. Cleopatra did not use a gourd filled with bees as a vibrator. There is no archaeological or written evidence of this at all, and the first time anyone ever brought it up was in 1992, in Brenda Love’s Encyclopedia of Unusual Sex Practices. Why Brenda thought it would be fun to include this, citing literally zero sources is an absolute mystery to me. Cleo had enough rumours about her sex life floating around during her lifetime because Rome couldn’t handle her as the bad ass - multilingual political girlboss that she was, so people started the idea that she was an outrageously beautiful seductress to play down her success as a leader. There was no gourd, or angry swarm of bees. (Just thinking of the logistics of how one would even fill a gourd with live bees boggles my mind) 

The next most prevalent theory is that the vibrator was made during the industrial revolution by doctors to treat ‘female hysteria’. This one at least is a bit more credible than the gourd, but not nearly as common as popular culture would suggest. Female hysteria is a ‘disease’ male doctors have been blaming womens behaviour on since at least the 4th or 5th century BCE. Ancient Greek doctors and philosophers thought the uterus was more or less its own creature inside the female body, and that it would go wandering through the rest of the body causing mayhem whenever it was not fulfilling its duty of bearing children. The word Hysteria is literally derived from the ancient Greek word for uterus for this exact reason. 

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The actual specifics of hysteria changed a lot, and so did the treatments. As best as I can put it together women were thought to hold onto nasty fluids which built up in the uterus which had to be taken out through vigorous intercourse, so poor women who weren’t married: such as nuns, widows or spinsters, were in a bit of a pickle. They would frequently suffer from melancholy, hysteria and general ickiness due to lack of D. (unfortunately: mood)

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Physician Abraham Zacuto writes in his Praxis Medica Admiranda from 1637:**

'Because of retention of the sexual fluid, the heart and surrounding areas are enveloped in a morbid and moist exudation: this is especially true of the more lascivious females, inclined to venery, passionate women who are most eager to experience physical pleasure; if she is of this type she cannot ever be relieved by any aid except that of her parents who are advised to find her a husband. Having done so the man's strong and vigorous intercourse alleviated the frenzy.'

So centuries of the most educated Western minds came together, after much deliberation, to determine that women are happier when they’re sexually satisfied. Good job guys. But moving onto artificial tools that achieve this satisfaction (arguably better than the average old timey husband). Joseph Mortimer Granville is credited as the inventor of the vibrator, having patented the first electronic vibrator in  the late 1880’s. Popular culture likes to claim that these were intended to induce a “hysterical paroxysm” (orgasm)  in women with hysteria. A whole movie was dedicated to this idea. Hysteria (2011) stars Hugh Dancy and Maggie Gyllenhaal (I've written a whole review on that movie, check that out here)

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A screenshot of the movie, of Hugh Dancy testing the new device on a lovely volunteer (that should be me fr)

 

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Granville's Hammer, circa 1880

Like many, I was happy to accept this version of historical events, it's interesting and just a bit scandalous, an absolute hoot to bring up at parties. However Granville was not routinely out here making women bust a nut for the sake of their health (at least not professionally, I have no idea what he got up to in his private life.) Granville’s device, colloquially known as Granville’s Hammer was designed for men and their muscle aches. It was remarkably similar to the modern day sports massage gun. Over the next few decades a number of personal massage devices began popping up in catalogues; for every function and for every member of the family. You could get a vibrating face massager which claimed to keep you young and beautiful. You could get a finger shaped gum massager which claimed to be the next big thing in dentistry, or a shared family vibrating multi-purpose massager.

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Vibra-finger. circa 1950

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American Vibrator Co., 1906

Now heres where it gets a bit tricky. You can still buy vibrating ‘face’ massagers from places like Kmart, and I know a lot of people who have gotten biblical with an electric toothbrush. People these days are less shy about talking about pleasure than they were, and people will admit to using these items not exactly according to manufacturers instructions. So its not a huge stretch to imagine people back in the day were also doing this with their variety of buzzy devices and just not talking about it or writing it down. This leaves us in a bit of a pickle when trying to think about history though, since we have little to no real evidence that people were using these for self pleasure. Just because I woulddoesn’t mean Ethel the Housewife would when her husband was at work. 

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Oster Massage Instrument, LIFE, 20 November 1950. Be so for real, there is no SFW purpose for this

We finally see vibrators being used loudly and proudly for female pleasure in New York in the 1970s. As part of the Women’s Liberation Movement, certified ICON Betty Dodson, began running “BodySex” workshops, which taught women how to embrace their own sexuality and how to make themselves orgasm. Betty provided workshop participants with Hitachi Magic Wand body massagers (which at the time were marketed towards men and their muscle aches - where have we heard that before?) and showed them exactly where to put them and what to do to reach the finish line, which was seriously life changing for these women, since up until this point the female orgasm was not something that many thought possible, let alone experienced. 

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Betty Dodson, left, at a sexuality conference in 1973 with a variety of sex toys SCHLESINGER LIBRARY/RADCLIFFE INSTITUTE/HARVARD UNIVERSITY

Hitachi Massage Wand sales on a totally unrelated note began skyrocketing after word got out of Ms Dodson and her more creative way of using them. This scandalised the brand somewhat, which led to them promptly taking the product off the shelves. A few years later they would re-release the wands without the company name Hitachi attached. The Original Magic Wands are still staples of adult toy collections and are way more versatile than they were back in the 70s, with mini and cordless versions available. I will also say they do function really well as a back and neck massager, I use our demo model on my back when I’ve been sitting at the computer researching these blogs too much. We love a tool with multiple uses. 

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Vibratile Facial Massage, McClure’s, April 1899.

Overall the history of vibrators used specifically for sexual gratification is difficult to define. The shame and mystery surrounding women's pleasure has robbed modern scholars of useful sources, proving once again that this stigma is nonsense because damn it I want to know how our grandmothers and great grandmothers were getting off! 

Funtasia Sexpert and Proud “Vibrating Facial Massager” Owner

Verin Sampson

Sources

** this is a translation found in Rachel Maines, (1999). The technology of Orgasm: 'Hysteria', the Vibrator, and Women's Sexual Satisfaction. The original text is all in Latin

https://magicwandoriginal.com/about/ 

James, E.L. (2023) Kinky History: The stories of our intimate lives, past and present. North Sydney, NSW: Pantera Press.

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