“Let them be seen from behind whose backs are sightly” (v. 774).
But besides necessity, it is a fact that women are worked in this way out of mere caprice, variety offering the greatest pleasure. It is simply for this reason that Tullia suffers Fabrizio to do her that way, in Aloysia Sigaea:
“As Aloysio got up” (Tullia speaks) “Fabrizio makes ready for another attack. His member is swollen up, red and threatening. “I beg of you “Madam”, he says, “turn over on your face.” I did as he wished. When he saw my buttocks, whiter than ivory and snow, “How beautiful you are!” he cried. “But raise yourself on your knees and bend your head down.” I bow my head and bosom, and lift my buttocks. He thrust his swift-moving and fiery dart to the bottom of my vulva, and took one of my nipples in either hand. Then he began to work in and out, and soon sent a sweet rivulet into the cavity of Venus. I also felt unspeakable delight, and had nearly fainted with lust. A surprising quantity of seed secreted by Fabrizio’s loins filled and delighted me; a similar flow of my own exhausted my forces. In that single assault I lost more vigour than in the three preceding ones” (Dialogue VI.)[[19]].
This copulation from the back is practicable in another very pleasant fashion, an excellent reproduction of which can be seen in the Monument du culte secret des dames romaines, plate XXVIII. A woman is represented with her hands placed on the ground, while the lower part of the body is lifted up and suspended by cords; she is turning her back to the man who stands. This seems to be much the same position as was taken up by the wife of the artisan Apuleius speaks of in his Metamorphoses (book IX), whom “bending over her, the lover planed with his adze, while she leant forward over a cask.” An engraving showing this ingenious attitude is appended to the story of The Tub in the Contes et Nouvelles en vers of Jean de La Fontaine, vol. II., p. 215.
FOOTNOTES - OF COPULATION
[13]. This method was not unknown at the time of Aristophanes, as we see from the following passage of the Peace:
“So that you may straightway, lifting up the girl’s legs, accomplish high in air the mysteries” (v. 889, 890).
And in the Birds he says:
“For this girl, your first messenger, why! I will lift up her legs and will in between her thighs” (v. 1254, 55).