The other day I came across an interesting tweet. Supposedly Cleopatra, the ancient queen of Egypt, is credited with inventing the vibrator.
Here’s how the story goes: Cleopatra took a hallowed out fruit and filled it with live bees. With a little shake this “vibrator” activated. The angry buzzing bees could be safely placed against her royal you-know-what while she fantasized about, well, pharaohs? Anything to take her mind off her brother-husband, I guess.
I Google’d this story and found it often repeated, with differing variations. In some cases the fruit (a gourd) is replaced with a box. What I didn’t find in any of these retellings was a historical source. And that, I’m afraid, is because there doesn’t seem to be any.
The oldest telling of the story I could find was sexologist writer Brenda Love’s 1992 book “The Encyclopedia of Unusual Sex Practices”. In one chapter the book states the following:
Cleopatra is said to have had a small box that could be filled with bees and placed against her genitals for a stimulation similar to that of vibrators.
Brenda Love. (1992). The Encyclopedia of Unusual Sex Practices.
Even there we have a source-less claim. With that, we’re at a dead end. The most likely conclusion, sadly, is that Cleopatra was out of luck being born before the battery.
Vibe Nerd 