Bayle (Dictionary, Art, Bathyllus) quotes various authorities concerning the Italian auxiliaries in the south of France in the sixteenth century and their custom of bringing and using goats for this purpose. Warton in the eighteenth century was informed that in Sicily priests in confession habitually inquired of herdsmen if they had anything to do with their sows. In Normandy priests are advised to ask similar questions.
It is worth noting that in Greek the work χοιρος means both a sow and a woman's pudenda; in the Acharnians Aristophanes plays on this association at some length. The Romans also (as may be gathered from Varro's De Re Rustica) called the feminine pudenda porcus.
Schurig, Gynæcologia, pp. 280-387; Bloch, op. cit., 270-277. The Arabs, according to Kocher, chiefly practice bestiality with goats, sheep and mares. The Annamites, according to Mondière, commonly employ sows and (more especially the young women) dogs. Among the Tamils of Ceylon bestiality with goats and cows is said to be very prevalent.