In the middle centuries prostitution as a civic institution had its distinction and its privileges. In Venice, all kinds of secondary favors were granted to these practitioners. They were favored with an indulgent and even eulogistic Latin testimonial: nostrae bene merentes meretrices.
In France, there were orgiastic ceremonies in which the participants performed in the nude. These rituals were associated in a contorted sense with primal creation and were known as Fêtes d’Adam.
In one of Boccaccio’s tales there is an instance of a script intended as an erotic provocation:
Quoth Bruno, ‘Will thy heart serve thee to touch her with a script I shall give thee?’
‘Ay, sure,’ replied Calandrino; and the other, ‘Then do thou make shift to bring me a piece of virgin parchment and a live bat, together with three grains of frankincense and a candle that hath been blessed by the priest, and leave me do.’
Accordingly, Calandrino lay in wait all the next night with his engines to catch a bat and having at last taken one, carried it to Bruno, with the other things required; whereupon the latter, withdrawing to a chamber, scribbled divers toys of his fashion upon the parchment, in characters of his own devising, and brought it to him, saying, ‘Know, Calandrino, that, if thou touch her with this script, she will incontinent follow thee and do what thou wilt.’
In Turkey, under the Sultanate, and notably in the sixteenth century, erotic relations in the seraglio were stimulated by a preparation known as pastilles de sérail.