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Sexual attitudes, preferences and infections in Ancient Egypt

Sexual attitudes, preferences and infections in Ancient Egypt

Morton, Robert S.

Genitourinary medicine, Vol.71 (1995)

Abstract: This socio-sexual review of Ancient Egyptian society aims to increase awareness that the prevalence of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) is largely determined by the way a society is structured and how that structure functions. The prevalence of STDs in Ancient Egypt has been found to be low. This state of affairs was maintained for centuries. Although the structure of their society was rigidly hierarchical, Egyptian people made it function in an acceptable way. What might be learned is concerned more with prevention than cure. Whether this has any relevance today is discussed.



Introduction: An earlier study showed that the Ancient Greeks structured their society on democratic principles. They adopted some ideas long employed in Ancient Egypt. Over the last 2,000 years the methods of Ancient Greece have been widely adopted and adapted in the Western World with variable success in terms of healthy social order. This study attempts to learn whether Ancient Egypt’s history reveals anything worthy of reconsideration and application today.

The Upper and Lower Kingdoms of Ancient Egypt were united in 3118 BC. Their peoples were descendants of early hunters who had once lived in a green Sahara. They had settled, with others from both the east and the south, along the banks of the river Nile. There they developed one of the world’s earliest civilisations. This was a civilisation which at its peak of attainment and development was to produce temple and tomb wall paintings and sculpture of a high order, such architectural wonders as the Giza pyramids and such great works of art as the death mask of the young King Tutankhamen.

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