Mental Margins: A Brief History of Pornography

In this bonus episode of Mental Health Rewritten, host Dominic Lawson takes listeners on a captivating journey through the history of pornography, exploring how desire has been depicted, suppressed, and preserved across centuries. From ancient Egyptian satire to the digital age’s pornographic explosion we uncover the cultural, technological, and political forces that shaped the evolution of explicit imagery.

 

Source List

1. Diver, K. (2005, April 4). Archaeologist finds 'oldest porn statue'. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/apr/04/arts.germany
   – News report on the discovery of 7,200-year-old erotic figurines in Germany, considered the oldest known depictions of a sexual scene theguardian.comtheguardian.com.

2. Solly, M. (2022, April 28). Why Was Erotic Art So Popular in Ancient Pompeii? Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved from https://www.smithsonianmag.com
   – Overview of erotic art in Pompeii and its 19th-century censorship, mentioning the secret museum in Naples and recent exhibition of those artifacts smithsonianmag.comsmithsonianmag.com.

3. Jones, J. (2016, Oct 13). Marcantonio Raimondi: the Renaissance printer who brought porn to Europe. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com
   – Art history column detailing the 1524 publication of I Modi, the imprisonment of Raimondi by Pope Clement VII, and the involvement of Aretino, confirming the dates and impact theguardian.comtheguardian.com.

4. Weiss, R. (2020, July 7). The Evolution of Pornography. Psychology Today. Retrieved from https://www.psychologytoday.com
   – Article discussing the history of porn with technology, noting the invention of “published pornography” in 1524 (I Modi) and later developments through digital media psychologytoday.compsychologytoday.com.

5. Encyclopædia Britannica. (n.d.). Fanny Hill. Retrieved 2025, from https://www.britannica.com/topic/Fanny-Hill-novel
   – Encyclopedia entry on Cleland’s Fanny Hill, confirming its 1748–49 publication, immediate suppression as pornography, and its clandestine circulation until the 1960s britannica.combritannica.com.

6. Wikipedia. (2023). Linda Lovelace. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_Lovelace
   – Summary of Linda Lovelace’s biography, including her role in Deep Throat (1972) and later allegations of coercion and her anti-pornography activism en.wikipedia.org. (While a tertiary source, it encapsulates well-documented facts from her memoir and interviews.)

7. Zattoni, F., et al. (2020). Pornography use in the setting of the COVID-19 pandemic. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 49(8), 2733–2735. doi:10.1007/s10508-020-01836-0
   – Academic letter/article noting Pornhub’s traffic statistics – over 42 billion visits in 2019, ~115 million daily pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov – illustrating the contemporary scale of internet pornography consumption.

8. PBS – American Experience. (n.d.). Anthony Comstock’s “Chastity” Laws. Retrieved from https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/pill-anthony-comstocks-chastity-laws/
   – Background on the 19th-century anti-obscenity crusader Anthony Comstock and the Comstock Act of 1873, which banned sending obscene material (and contraceptives) through U.S. mail pbs.org. Provides context for Victorian anti-porn legislation.

9. British Library – Untold Lives Blog. (2017, Feb 14). The Merryland books in the Private Case. Retrieved from https://blogs.bl.uk/untoldlives/
   – Blog post about the British Library’s “Private Case” erotica collection, mentioning 18th-century erotic literature (like the Merryland series) that was kept under lock and key theguardian.com. Helps illustrate how libraries archived banned books.

10. Encyclopædia Britannica. (n.d.). Hugh Hefner. Retrieved 2025, from https://www.britannica.com/biography/Hugh-Hefner
    – Encyclopedia biography of Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, noting the founding of Playboy in 1953 and its influence on the sexual revolution of the 1960s britannica.com. Supports the discussion of pornography’s mainstreaming in the mid-20th century.

11. Mumbai Mirror – Doniger Interview. (2015, Aug 30). “Small Talk: Vatsyayana’s status update”. Retrieved from https://mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com
    – Interview with scholar Wendy Doniger on the Kama Sutra, clarifying that this ancient text is “absolutely not pornographic” in the modern sense but rather a serious treatise on sexuality mumbaimirror.indiatimes.com. Provides cultural context to distinguish erotica vs. pornography.

12. Encyclopædia Britannica. (n.d.). Obscene Publications Act. Retrieved 2025, from https://www.britannica.com/event/Obscene-Publications-Act
    – Brief entry explaining the first Obscene Publications Act (1857) in Great Britain, which for the first time made sexual materials illegal on purely moral grounds. Supports the segment on Victorian censorship. (Britannica summary referenced in analysis)