Exactly 20 years ago, a young Marc Orriols surprised attendees at the III Ibero-American Congress of Egyptology held in La Laguna, Tenerife, in Spain’s Canary Islands, with a paper on the sexual habits of Ancient Egyptians, specifically the practice of copulation from behind, based on iconography in graffiti and ostraca (pieces of pottery or stone with drawings).

Now, at the VIII congress at the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB), Orriols, 51, who now holds a PhD in Egyptology, has once again made an impression with an exhaustive lecture on the famous Turin Erotic Papyrus, a scroll painting created during the Ramesside period that depicts in detail several sexual acts. According to Orriols, the 3,150-year-old painting is a “mockery of hegemonic masculinity” and may be the first depiction in history of female ejaculation.

Question. What new insights have emerged about sex in Ancient Egypt?

Answer. Basically, it confirms our view that, despite the popular reputation of the Ancient Egyptians as uninhibited or indecent — an image shaped by biased Greek and Roman accounts and by the movies (Hollywood has done great damage to our perception of sex in Ancient Egypt) — they were, in fact, a rather modest society. Although religion shows a certain sexual fluidity, with gods who copulate or masturbate, that belongs to the celestial sphere; there are almost no depictions of it in everyday life.

Q. So they were prudish.

A. Human sex does not appear in official art, only in those, let’s say, non‑normative representations, of which there are very few — around 30 across as many years of history. One even depicts sex with a donkey. It is true that traditional Egyptologists probably hid or destroyed things they found offensive. If [English Egyptologist Flinders] Petrie came across a scene of fellatio…

Q. That’s quite a contrast with the conventional image of those women in sheer dresses and men in loincloth.

A. The Egyptians didn’t dress like that. Those are iconographic conventions: there was no silk until the Ptolemaic period, and the linen used does not produce that kind of transparency — just try leaving so much of your body exposed under the Egyptian sun. We confuse religious and symbolic images, largely funerary, with reality. Figures that seem erotic to us refer to fertility.

Q. Did the concept of non-binary identity exist?

A. There were deities that we might consider as fitting that category, such as Atum, Hapi, Sekhmet and Neith… and in society you can sense a kind of third gender, but they more closely resemble castrated figures; children were considered without gender, which happens in many cultures. In any case, identity issues did not exist culturally, and homosexuality — male or female — is not documented. The Ancient Egyptians were, formally, binary and heteronormative, as is common in a patriarchal society.

Q. Can we identify any preferred sexual positions?

A. In the scant record, the position from behind and the woman with her legs over the man’s shoulders appear. Both allow deep penetration and were possibly associated with female pleasure. But we are still talking about marginal representations. The Turin Papyrus, with its exceptional detail, shows the woman on top, but my interpretation is that it was a humiliating practice for the man and that the entire document echoes a tale about the degradation of a powerful individual and an inversion of the norm — a world turned upside down. An extraordinary mockery of hegemonic masculinity.

Q. What about the existence of prostitution? The character Nefernefernefer in Sinuhe the Egyptian was paid for her relationships.

A. It is not documented. We have yet to find evidence of sex for economic exchange in Ancient Egypt. Today one cannot assert that prostitution existed; in this case it is not the oldest profession in the world.

Q. What about oral sex?

A. Again, it is practically only for the gods. There is little evidence of fellatio. A deceased person in the Book of the Dead says he has not tried it, as if that made him more virtuous. And there is an ostracon that appears to show a woman being ejaculated into the mouth, externally.

Q. So much for Cleopatra’s kiss.

A. The cliché of Cleopatra as the great, lustful Eastern fellatrix weighs heavily. The Romans foisted it on her to denigrate — and brutally sexualize — a powerful woman who instilled fear in them. The name Cleopatra is still common in porn movies.

Q. At the very least, did Ancient Egyptians recognize orgasms?

A. There is the word nedjemet, which means something pleasant or sweet, but it seems to refer only to male pleasure…

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