I don’t buy a lot of BDSM gear. I typically play with pro-dommes who have more equipment and furniture than you can shake a whip at. However, I do enjoy window shopping from time to time. Partly because it’s a good way to get ideas for future sessions and partly because I harbor the fantasy of creating my own custom playspace at some point. It seem like it’d be a very fun thing to put together. Unfortunately, given I’m currently single and living in a condo in downtown Seattle, it’s not really a practical proposition right now.
In the meantime I stick to browsing sites like the Stockroom, where I found these two fun looking toys. The one on the left is called ‘The Nut Crusher‘ and the one on the right the ‘Ultimate Asslock‘. Both those names should tell you all you need to know about their function. They’re appealing to me for their very industrial solid construction, almost resembling surgical equipment. As fun as pervertibles can be, there’s something sexy about a device deliberately designed and constructed to hurt someone. Particularly when using it involves screws, bolts and locks. No lightweight straps or buckles involved here.
P-
I believe what you wrote, but note the picture on the right, when you pass a cursor over it, reads “pear of anguish.” That was originally used to stuff, then open the mouth and break the jaw of females who talked too much.
That’s what I thought it was when I saw it, before I read your commentary. I shudder to think of the damage even playful use of it would cause to the anal canal.
-s
Actually the ‘pear of anguish’ labeling is my bad. The stockroom just says it was ‘modeled on’ that and for some reason I translated that across rather than the correct title. I should update the image labels.
I think the anal risk really depends on how large it is and how far the petals open. I’ve played with inflatable butt plugs in the past, which have much the same idea, and haven’t had issues. Just an interesting feeling of fullness. I’ve also seen some fairly insanely large strap-ons used on people, which tells me the anal canal can take a lot. The thing that would scare me about this would be the idea of moving around with it in. The idea of tripping and falling onto it makes me shudder.
Interestingly the wikipedia page on the pear of anguish suggests that it’s not clear if the device was ever actually used, as there are no first hand accounts of it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Choke_pear_%28torture%29
There are reports of robbers in Holland using a pear gag to silence victims, but nothing in the medieval literature.
Thanks for comment – it led me to a nice wander through wikipedia articles on medieval torture 🙂
No, it was used.
I wrote a post or two on the H channel program that specializes in recreating ancient tortures. They did the pear of anguish.
First, they subject a replica skeleton, animal part or gelatin blocks to the punishment. In the case of the pear, used modestly, it dislocated the jaw and tore up the soft connective tissue of the mouth rather severely.
Because, unlike an inflatable plug, which simply presses the surrounding flesh with equal pressure, the pear is essentially a levered device, it will affect the anal canal differently. Hemorraging there can, of course, be lethal.
-s
Well wikipedia isn’t exactly a definitive source. But at the same time I don’t really trust anything on the history channel either. This is the same channel that has a show called ‘ancient aliens’ exploring the theory that aliens helped ancient civilizations! Anytime they cover something I have deep knowledge of they seem to a pretty hit and miss job. Which doesn’t stop me watching it, but does make me skeptical at times.
You’re right that the pear will have a more uneven pressure than a plug. But at the same time it doesn’t that different to me to the medical devices used to hold open orifices. They’re basically a metal petal design. There’s leverage as it opens, but not once it’s fixed in place. The one thought that does scare me (other than the falling and sitting on it at speed) is the idea of it trapping flesh as it gets closed. Seems like pulling or abrading the interior skin wouldn’t be fun. I still like it from a visual perspective, but probably not a particularly wise purchase.
Ironically, I had just that discussion about the wacked out ‘ancient aliens’ programming on History channel last week with a friend.
That said, I don’t, in that case, therefore cease to trust “anything” on said channel. We may differ there.
The series to which I’m referring, which I may have named in the posts I wrote, is fairly convincing. Especially the effort they take to first simulate the effects of tortures on objects replicating the human body. They included a guy being pressed by stones, the “shame flute”, some suspension devices, and of course the pear.
I view the H channel as something which presents a lot of programming, some of which I don’t trust. Wiki, even more so. Especially on this sort of thing.
Recall, too, when we discuss torture, we’re including not just, in America, Puritan times, but European Inquisitions. The really heavyweight stuff.
Per your comment about the leverage, my point is that the opening endpoints begin to push internal organs and tissue not evenly and in parallel, but, rather, shoving them with levered force into positions apart from nearby tissue not subjected to similar pressure.
I’m seeing, as I write this, the way the pear completely tore a test jaw apart with its force, in that series.
-s
Yes, saying I don’t trust ‘anything’ was definitely over stating the case. Should have been more careful about wording that. Lets just say if I have contradictory sources of information I now revert to a position of undecided, rather than automatically going with the history channel source. Wiki sources really depend on how well researched and referenced the page is. In this case it seems pretty reasonable, although far from conclusive.
The problem with searching for this stuff online is that everyone just seems to have copy/pasted the same few sentences. There’s no actual original information entering the system. Even pages that claim it as a myth are just copy pasting the wiki page (e.g. http://www.cracked.com/article_18487_6-ridiculous-history-myths-you-probably-think-are-true_p2.html).
I have no doubt believing it could be incredibly destructive on the human body. The amount of leverage you can get with a worm gear is very high, so mechanically it’d have no problem pulling tissue and tendons apart. The historical question is more about is it a made-up concept from more recent years (like a lot of medieval torture implements) or was it really used as suggested. There’s a very long discussion about the wikipedia page here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Choke_pear_%28torture%29 which basically consists of a bunch of people saying “It must be true, it’s in a museum” and another bunch of people saying “Show me the actual historical references”. Entertaining but far from decisive. I personally tend to assume fake, simply given its a relatively complex mechanical device and I’m not sure why they’d both creating such a thing in the medieval period. There are far simpler and equally painful ways to torture people without messing around with something as fiddly as this. But that’s just me guessing.
As far as the sexual device goes, I’m not sure the degree of leverage really matters, assuming the petals only open to a limited extent (I believe it’s fully open in that photograph). Obviously if they open very wide then extreme leverage is bad, as it makes it very hard to judge the force being applied. But if they stop well within the stretch limits then really the main issue is the other one you identify – uneven pressure. In the static case I can’t see why that would matter too much, but moving around or twisting might be more of a problem. Scraping or trapping flesh would suck.
Again, all I can tell you is seeing a demonstration on a very good replica of a human mouth was astonishing.
The range of the open petals doesn’t seem so great until you see it in action.
As to why the instrument with the screw device? Probably more nuanced control of application. Same as the rack. why such a complex device when you could just leash someone to two horses going in opposite directions?
-s
I certainly don’t doubt if the petals were allowed to fully extend it could do a lot of damage. But according to the stockroom this is constrained to 2.5″ maximum diameter. That’s not too scary. They have a number of butt plugs wider than that (which have to pass the sphincter muscle), plus inflatable plugs that go to greater than 3″.
This certainly give very fine control. However a worm thread and petal design is a lot more complex to manufacture than a rack. You could build one of those out of wood – an axle, a table and some rope would do it. An upturned wagon could even be converted.