Why do Greek statues have such small penises?
Don’t pretend your eyes don’t hover, at least for a moment, over the delicately sculpted penises on classical nude statues.
qz.com
In ancient Greece, it seems, a small penis was the sought-after look for the alpha male.
“Greeks associated small and non-erect penises with moderation, which was one of the key virtues that formed their view of ideal masculinity,” explains classics professor Andrew Lear, who has taught at Harvard, Columbia and NYU and runs tours focused on gay history. “There is the contrast between the small, non-erect penises of ideal men (heroes, gods, nude athletes etc) and the over-size, erect penises of Satyrs (mythic half-goat-men, who are drunkards and wildly lustful) and various non-ideal men. Decrepit, elderly men, for instance, often have large penises.”
Similar ideas are reflected in ancient Greek literature, says Lear. For example, in Aristophanes’ Clouds a large penis is listed alongside a “pallid complexion,” a “narrow chest,” and “great lewdness” as one of the characteristics of un-athletic and dishonorable Athenian youths.
Only grotesque, foolish men who were ruled by lust and sexual urges had large penises in ancient Greece. Art history blogger Ellen Oredsson notes on her site that statues of the era emphasized balance and idealism.
“The ideal Greek man was rational, intellectual and authoritative,” she wrote. “He may still have had a lot of sex, but this was unrelated to his penis size, and his small penis allowed him to remain coolly logical.”
There are several theories as to why the “ideal” penis size developed from small in ancient Greece to large today. Lear suggests that perhaps the rise of porn, or an ideological push to subject men to the same body shaming that women typically face, are behind the modern emphasis on having a large penis.
If you have a small penis you are an alpha male of culture.
