When Michelangelo Buonarroti
unveiled his masterpiece in 1504, audiences
were astonished by the artist's work. David loomed large in stature,
bravery, and confidence. But why did the sculptor
choose to depict him as small in, well, everything else? And it wasn't just Michelangelo
giving his male subjects the short end of the stick. Today, we'll be diving
into the weird history of why men in classical
art have tiny junk. But before we get started,
be sure to subscribe to the Weird History channel. Oh, and also leave
us a comment so you can let us know what
other big stories in small packages you'd
like to hear about. Now grab a magnifying
glass and attempt to uncover this small mystery. [MUSIC PLAYING] Today's Western world lives by
the motto, go big or go home. Why buy a 60 inch TV
when you can get a 90 inch for just a few more? Why get an 8 ounce steak
when, if you eat a 72, ounce you get it for free? Bon appetit. In Western society,
bigger is better, and that goes double when it
comes to the male anatomy. In fact, there's a
billion a year industry that preys upon a
man's fear about not being adequate enough. These hucksters, charlatans,
and flim flam men promised to increase the size
through rubs, creams, pills, or pumps. But it wasn't always like this. The ancient Greeks believed that
there were no small parts, only small actors. In fact, the playwright,
Aristophanes, once had one of his
characters proclaim that the perfect man has a
gleaming chest, bright skin, broad shoulders, tiny
tongue, strong buttocks, and a little prick. Sounds like a Hollywood
casting agent. Sorry, you're too tall. I can be shorter. No, can't use you, too short. Oh, I can be taller. [MUSIC PLAYING] While it all may
seem Greek to us, the people of ancient Athens
held a small Jimmy Johnson in the highest regard. According to historian,
Paul Chrystal, author of In Bed With
the Ancient Greeks, sculptors intentionally chiseled
a little extra off the top when it came to men's privates. An artistic circumcision,
if you will. The small penis was
consonant with Greek ideals of male beauty,
Chrystal explains. It was a badge of
the highest culture and a paragon of civilization. So it's time for
the big question. Why? In ancient Greece the ideal
man was driven by logic. Lust was thought to be
antithetical to logic, and since bigger
genitals were believed to give rise to greater
feelings of lust, logically, having a smaller hot dog meant
less lustfulness and therefore, more logic. Of course, there is no
correlation between penis size and lustfulness,
just like there's no correlation between foot size
and the desire for a sweet sock collection. But that's the theory
the ancient Greeks were working with. They sought to praise the
virtuous intellectual. Greeks associated small
and non-erect penises with moderation, which was
one of the key virtues that formed their view of
ideal masculinity, explained Andrew Lear,
a classics professor who has taught at Harvard,
Columbia, and NYU. There's the old joke
that God gave man enough blood for his shwants and
for his brain, but not enough for them to be used
at the same time. The ancient Greeks
seemed to have concurred, and, through their
art, they made it clear which organ they
deemed more important. In ancient Greece,
a well-endowed man could not be trusted
and would certainly make a terrible leader. Historian, Paul Chrystal
notes that the ancient Greeks measured male potency
not by endowment, as it was in other cultures,
but by the intellect needed to power man's responsibility
to father children, prolong the family line,
and sustain the city-state. Perhaps it was
this disassociation of leadership and tube size that
allowed several women to rise up to become powerful leaders. Queen Artemisia I of Caria
began her reign in 484 BC, immediately after
her husband's death. During the Grecko Persian
Wars, queen Artemisia's cunning leadership in the
battle against the Athenians led Xerxes himself
to exclaim, my men have become women
and my women men. Queen Artemisia I ruled
for 24 prosperous years, and would be followed about a
century later by the equally cunning, Queen Artemisia II. The Rhodians revolted
against being led by a woman and sent ships to attack
Artemisia II's capital city of Halicarnassus. They were surprised
when, instead of being stopped and
forced into battle, they were invited to
dock at the Harbor and welcomed into the city. The Rhodians did not
realize that queen Artemisia had ordered the construction
of a second, secret harbor. From there, her soldiers
overtook the Rhodesian vessels that had been left behind,
slaughtering the remaining crew. While those who were invited
into the city were also killed. Artemisia II's soldiers
then sailed the and ships back to Rhodesia, where they
were welcomed into the Harbor as returning victors. Instead, the queen's
soldiers jumped out, slaughtered those who
resisted, and recaptured Rhodesia in the Queen's name. Queen Artemisia did all this
without having beans or franks, so maybe the ancient Greeks
were on to something. Hey, Weird History
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K-E-E-P-S.com/weirdhistory. [MUSIC PLAYING] While Zeus, the King
of the Greek gods, was often depicted as having
a less than Olympic sized phallus, Priapus,
the God of fertility, was shown as having a
schlong as long as the Iliad. Priapus was cursed by
Hera, the wife of Zeus, to be forever impotent,
foul-minded, and ugly. That's an O'Henry
story, right there. Priapus was cast out
by the other gods and forced to live with
the insatiable satyrs. Priapus was thought to be a
despicable creature driven by lust, and the
exact antithesis of the ideal Greek man. You know how those
Viagra ads say call a doctor if your erection
lasts for over four hours? Seek immediate medical
help for an erection lasting more than four hours. Well that medical
condition is known as Priapism, named
after Priapus, the well-endowed god, with whom
no self-respecting Greek wanted to be associated. The satyrs that Priapus is so
closely identified with we're half human, half animal
creatures with massive cranks. Greek mythology held
up satyrs as examples of creatures driven by their
bodies, who lacked restraint. Historian, Paul Chrystal,
notes that oversized genitals were vulgar and outside
the cultural norm. Something sported by the
barbarians of the world, and they were not
only associated with a lack of civilization,
but with a lack of humanity as well. That explains Ron Jeremy. [MUSIC PLAYING] In the mind of the ancient
Greeks, having a large pipe made one stupid,
animal-like and barbarous. That's why their favorite
and most humiliating insult was to
depict their enemies as having giant wankers. Take that, ancient Egyptians. But the ancient Greeks
weren't the only ones to demonize others
based on a perceived out-sized lustfulness. The idea that Black
men had larger baby arms, and therefore,
greater sexual appetites, was one of the justifications
used for slavery. This fostered fear for
the sanctity of women, believing that African
men, with enlarged genitals and enlarged sexual urges, would
take women if they were not kept locked in chains. Not only is there
a zero correlation between little
dickie size and lust, but there is also
no known correlation between size and skin color. [MUSIC PLAYING] Trigger Warning, we're
now going to talk about how classical
Greek men are known for cultivating close
relationships with younger men, or even boys. This idealization
of the teenage boy may have influenced
Greek beauty standards. While many Greek statues
show the rippling muscles of an adult man, in
one area, Greek artists may have prioritized youth. The prepubescent male was
considered beautiful, innocent, and full of potential, because
he had not yet burst forth. And if prepubescent
was considered the epitome of male
beauty, it would make sense that a small gherkin,
or one that had not yet finished growing, would
be the one most coveted. In a study titled,
"Penile Representations in Ancient Greek Art",
scholars concluded that the Greeks
represented character through their endowments. Men associated with fertility
or a lack of humanity might sport large cranks. But the Greek gods
and mortal men were shown with average
or less than average size. Another explanation for
the teeny weeny depictions may have something to do
with the men's activities. It is noteworthy that
many of these images belong to athletes
during or immediately after hard exercise. The study notes, when one
goes about exercising, the body sends blood to
the muscles and joints. It also pulls blood
away from the areas that aren't being used for exercise. So part of the reason we see
classical art depicting men with small hoses may be that the
artists were being anatomically correct by showing their
subjects with shrinkage, cue George Costanza. [SCREAMS] Oh my God. I was at the pool! Another possible explanation,
is that perhaps our views of what is average are skewed. According to a study of
over 15,000 men published in the British Journal
of Urology International, the average length of an erect
party missile is 5.16 inches. Compare that with the average
length of an erect male porn star, which adult film
director, Adam Glasser, estimates at about 8 inches. Art historian, Ellen Oredsson,
points out an important fact, most men in these artworks
are depicted at rest. The same BJUI study found
that the average length of a flaccid soldier
is only 3.61 inches. If you compare their size
to most flaccid males, they are actually not
significantly smaller than real life penises tend
to be, Oredsson argues. The Romans didn't just
copy the Greek gods, they also copied
their sculptures. Thus, the Greek preference
for small packages carried on for centuries,
as Renaissance artists, like Michelangelo, follow
the Greek and Roman style of portraying anatomical
accuracy while making no embellishments when it came
to depicting male genitalia. Whether the reason for
depicting small kielbasas was to dissociate from
lustfulness, stupidity, and barbarity, to emulate the
stature of a prepubescent boy, or just a simple
case of shrinkage, classical art will forever
be associated with average to sub average ding-alings. So what do you think? Do you like the classical style,
or are you a modern art lover? Let us know in the comments
below, and while you're at it, check out some of these other
videos from our Weird History.
Perpetually missing from this whole thing is that a lot of people have tiny penises when they're not hard. It's nothing to be embarrassed about, but everybody seems to REALLY YELL about how small the statue penises are.
I would trade an inch off my penis for a couple inches of height easily, but it looks a lot like a statue penis if I'm just hanging out and walking around the house.
Yeah, unfortunately I don’t think this bit of trivia will do anything to stem the body shaming of guys with smaller packages. It’s fun but not effective. Most people lack empathy for that particular physical attribute.
I think this is nice but not really helpful to men who are insecure. I wish the discussion around sexual compatibility wasn't so focused on genital sizes but I also wish we would stop trying to lie and say it doesn't matter at all.
There's a lot of nuance to the discussion but I feel like it always devolves into "big penises are awful and painful" or "genital size doesn't matter at all and all genitals fit together perfectly". I don't think either of those statements are true. I don't think those sayings actually help struggling men. And then there's always the classic, "women don't even like penetrative sex so as long as you're good with your mouth your penis is irrelevant". That might be true for some women but a lot of women enjoy PIV.
I don't know, I'm somewhat off topic but every penis size thread on Reddit devolves into people making broad generalizations. Men who share they've experienced rejection because some women do in fact care about size are told they're just not good at sex.
I wish we just said your size might be too big or too small for some women/men and thats okay. It says nothing about your value as a person or partner. It just means you're not sexually compatible.
I don’t think men should have to feel bad or insecure about anything they were born with and have no recourse for enhancing. The blatantly sexist view that there is an acceptable penis size that men should have is repulsive. That’s like stating loose gaping vaginas aren’t acceptable and how they should only be a certain diameter for men’s pleasure. Men need to stop and women need to stop.
Small penises represented intelligence. Meaning that they weren’t a slave of their sexual desires, thus showing that they were smart, brave and stuff like that.
So it was basically a non verbal way to communicate "this person has better things to do than think about ravishing maidens 24/7"
but wait?. all the gods did that didn't they? 🧐
It was art not porn. They didnt fluff to impress?
What baseline measurement are you using to determine that the penises in these statues are unusually small? This is a bit of a weird topic for this sub where I think we typically try to dispell these notions of normalcy.
The video above dives into the history behind Greek statues of Gods and heroes and why so many of them feature small penises. It turns out that for Ancient Greek society, having a larger penis was looked down upon as it was an indication that you were a barbarian and less rational as a result. Often times when men with smaller than average penises talk about their situation they’re met with platitudes and reassurances about the variety of women’s taste, much the same way a women who doesn’t fall into common beauty standards is reassured about the variety of men’s standards. I like the video above in particular as it demonstrates how modern attitudes about men’s sexuality that are taken for granted are not universal nor were they should we look at history. I like to imagine that since the video above is really popular, it may help to bring a new cultural trend where men with smaller than average size penises can show off what they have and say “I AM BUILT LIKE A GREEK GOD” knowing that the historical facts are backing them up.