K = Kinky bits

The clip from Kinky Boots has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of this post, it's just that I thought I'd start with something upbeat after yesterday's discussion about dead stuff. 

Well, that and I figured some people might be a bit startled if any of the other images I plan to feature popped up first in their feed. 

Japanese sex aids, undated.

These...ummm...thought-provoking objects feature in the Beginning of Life cabinet of the Wellcome Collection. 
I'm assuming that the guiding principle used by the curator to select these objects is the supposition that lots of lives begin as the end product of foreplay and titillation.
Fair enough. 

The carefully partitioned box pictured contains a selection of decidedly unflexible and undoubtedly very cold sex aids. And it strikes me that one would struggle to keep this jumbo-sized wooden chest delicately secreted in one's bedside table. 
Nothing says passion-killer more than, 'Hold on while I winch out some freezing metal balls for your pleasure.'

Cowrie shell snuff container

This next set of objects is far more discreet. 
The first is a handpainted gentleman's snuff box made from a cowrie shell set with silver. But not just any old cowrie shell — a rather seductively shaped Indochinese humpbacked cowrie shell.

Each time said-gentleman fancied an uplifting whiff of snuff, he would also get an uplifting eyeful of a teeny weeny fully-dressed bloke undoing the chastity belt of a teeny weeny fully undressed chick. 
Portrait of husband and wife, do you think?

Erotic scenes in hinged Chinese porcelain fruit.

I like to imagine that these walnut-sized naughties belonged to a very proper Victorian hottie, who kept them on a shelf just out of reach of the children.
Oh what a cheeky surprise for the new chambermaid going about her daily dusting when she flipped open the dear little ornaments, a peach, a pepper and a tiny melon, to find they contain hidden erotica. Itsy-bitsy porcelain cupie dolls engaged in foreplay. 
Such fun!

Graeco-Roman bronze amulet,
100BCE  –  400CE

Naturally, I have saved the best till last. 
See those ...ahem.. dangly bits on this ancient good luck charm? And what about the chain and ring at the top? 
Does that give you a clue about the likely purpose of this penis with legs and a tail? This, running dick, if you will.
Yes, it's a wind chime.
Ancient Roman households had them dangling about the villa to ward off potential nasties. 
This amulet clearly once jingled out the message: stay away or our rampant phallus will hunt you down!
In my alternate fact universe, however, this object would most definitely have been a door bell.

During the month of April, I am participating in the Blogging from A–Z Challenge.

My posts will all feature images of and by the Wellcome Collection, Euston, London: the free destination for the incurably curious.