Dominance and Submission - History

History

There are many writings from the ancient age through the modern that would clearly indicate a willingness to submit for purely romantic reasons.

Another medieval example is the literary convention of courtly love, an ideal which usually required a knight to serve his courtly lady (in "love service") with the same obedience and loyalty which he owed to his liege lord. This convention was submissive and sometimes fetishistic, with the knight performing acts of cross-dressing and self-flagellation. However, the relationship between the literary conventions and actual practices is unknown.

There are also accounts of prostitutes in most major cities that catered to male submissives, as well as masochists. In a male dominated world, it was all too easy for a submissive woman to find a strict male dominant, but some women still found ways to leave husbands who were "too soft".

One of the most famous works in this area is Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's Venus im Pelz (Venus in Furs, 1869), in which the protagonist Severin persuades a woman, Wanda, to take him on as her slave, serves her and allows her to degrade him. The book has elements of both social and physical submission, and is the genesis of the term masochism coined by the 19th century psychiatrist Krafft-Ebing.

The Velvet Underground's song "Venus In Furs" is clearly based on Sacher-Masoch's novel and discusses sadomasochism, the character Severin, and common bondage practices in a detached, objective and non-judgmental manner.

The Rolling Stones song "Under my Thumb" (M. Jagger, 1966) is supposedly about a D/s relationship. The Green Day song "All By Myself/Dominated Love Slave" (Frank Edwin Wright III or Tre Cool) describes F.E. Wright III's feelings for female dominance.