Historical cases of male submissive sexual fantasies: Sexual rejection
Reports of submissive kinks in men from the early literature on human sexuality. In this entry, a case of a man with the rejection kink reported by a certain Dr. Pascal.
This is part of a series of essays on historical cases of male submissive kinks. Find the Table of contents here.
Ever since the serious study of sex began at the end of the 19th century, the pioneers who undertook that research became intrigued by atypical sexual interests—or paraphilias, as they came to be known. Men like Richard von Krafft-Ebing, Iwan Bloch, Magnus Hirschfeld, and many more, carefully collected and reported numerous case histories of men and women presenting with the “sexual perversions”.
These pioneer researchers of human sexuality reported these cases in their published works. These books and volumes were popular in the day but they are largely obscure and forgotten today, having been relegated to obscurity because the scientific notions and explanations advanced in them have, for the most part, been superseded by modern scientific understanding.
Nevertheless, the case histories reported in these old books remain timeless. They offer a window into the sexual fantasies of people at the time, and those case histories that specifically deal with submissive fantasies in men are of great interest to the understanding of this phenomenon.
I have perused numerous of the works of the pioneers in search for these historical cases. For this endeavor, I hunted down hard-to-find articles published in the journals of the time and obtained access to rare books, some of which have never been translated from their original European languages into English.
From the historical cases I found, I have carefully made a selection which I present in this series of essays, along with my commentary and analysis. In all these cases, I have observed the same kinks motivating the men of centuries past that drive the men of today in their submissive sexual fantasies.
In this first entry, we consider the case of a gentleman from the 19th century who seems to have had a kink for being rejected by a woman he sexually desired.1 The gentleman in question paid a woman—a prostitute, most likely—to enact a scene that catered to his peculiar kink, regularly resorting to her services for his sexual satisfaction.
The woman had to pretend to be a marquise and he, a count. He would visit her in her house and assume an arrogant attitude in greeting her before inevitably proceeding to confess his attraction toward her, taking advantage of the fact they were alone. The woman had to be offended at the man’s audacity but he was not to be deterred in his boldness.
Finally, the man would make a sexual advance toward the lady, asking to kiss her on the shoulder. At this, she had to act out an angry scene where she called on a servant who readily appeared before them in the salon, an actor briefed beforehand on the role he was to play in the staged act.
In the woman’s affected outrage, she ordered the servant to handle the insolent guest. He duly obliged by kicking the pseudo-count out of the house, all to the gentleman’s full satisfaction. Both actors were reportedly well remunerated for their participation in the scene’s enactment.
A gentleman in Paris was accustomed to call on certain evenings at a house where a woman, the owner, acceded to his peculiar desire. He entered the salon in full dress, and she, likewise in evening toilette, had to receive him with a very haughty manner. He addressed her as “Marquise,” and she had to call him “dear Count.” Then he spoke of his good fortune in finding her alone, of his love for her, and of a lover's interview. At this the lady had to feel insulted. The pseudo-count grew bolder and bolder, and asked the pseudo-marquise for a kiss on her shoulder. “There is an angry scene; the bell is rung; a servant, prepared for the occasion, appears, and throws the count out of the house. He departs well satisfied, and pays the actors in the farce handsomely.”2
I have no reason to doubt that the same drive that animated this gentleman from the 19th century in satisfying his peculiar sexual desire impels the men of today in the fulfillment of theirs. He sought to enact a scene of his sexual rejection by an attractive woman, whom he cast in the role of marquise. Today, men watch pornographic videos of female actresses acting out point-of-view scenes in which they reject men and tell them they have no chance of ever having sex with beautiful women.
Granted, it is less likely for men today to fantasize about women as marquises; they are more likely to cast women in whichever archetype is deemed sexy by the culture of their time and place. If that gentleman in Paris in the 19th century had instead lived today, perhaps he would have fantasized not about a marquise, but about a bratty young woman clad in athletic clothes rejecting him for being a loser who does not deserve her.
Even though the particular content of submissive sexual fantasies is undoubtedly shaped by the culture of the age and regional customs, the immutable elements at the heart of the fantasies—what I call the kinks—have persisted across time and place ever since they were first studied and reported in the human sexuality literature in the 19th century. This pattern will be observed in all the historical cases presented in this series of essays.
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The line art in this essay’s card is by Georgian artist Dorian Chelios.
Reported by Krafft-Ebing in his Psychopathia Sexualis (case number 65 in the twelfth edition). It was related by many others as well, mostly citing Krafft-Ebing. He attributes the original report to a certain Dr. Pascal, citing an Italian book titled Igiene dell'amore (Hygiene of Love). Despite my best efforts, I was not able to identify this Pascal.
Krafft-Ebing, Richard von. (1965). Psychopathia Sexualis. Translated by Franklin S. Klaf from the twelfth German edition. Stein and Day. (Originally published in 1886.) p. 106.