History of Condoms

In this talk Dr Kate Stephenson explores the strange and fascinating history of condoms.

First used in Europe in the 16th century in an attempt to prevent the spread of syphilis, historical condoms came in many forms from silk and linen to pig’s gut and fish skin. This lecture will consider their varied and, at times, surprising history from the Dudley Castle finds through Boswell’s diaries and London’s condom wars of the 18th century to the invention of rubber protection in the 1850s.