Editing Chastity belt (section)

==Historical usage==
[[File:Chastity belt Bellifortis.jpg|225px|thumb|The ''[[Bellifortis]]'' sketch ({{circa|1405}})]]
[[Image:16thc-German-woodcut-Chastity-belt.jpg|thumb|225px|right|Sixteenth-century satirical German woodcut]]
[[Image:Chastity belt Heyser 0.png|thumb|225px|Excerpt from {{US Patent|995600}} by Jonas E. Heyser.]]

[[Gregory the Great]], [[Alcuin of York]], [[Bernard of Clairvaux]], and Nicholas Gorranus all made passing references to "chastity belts" within their exhortatory and public discourses, but meant this in a figurative or metaphorical sense within their historical context.<ref name="Polidoro">Polidoro, 2011: 27-28</ref>

The first detailed actual mention of what could be interpreted as "chastity belts" in the West is in [[Konrad Kyeser von Eichstätt]]'s ''[[Bellifortis]]'' (1405), which describes the military technology of the era. The book includes a drawing that is accompanied by the [[Latin]] text: "Est florentinarum hoc bracile dominarum ferreum et durum ab antea sic reseratum." ("These are hard iron breeches of [[Florence|Florentine]] women which are closed at the front.") The belt in this drawing is described by [[Eric Dingwall|Dingwall]] as "both clumsy and heavy", having "little in common with the later models which served the same use".<ref name="dingwall">{{Cite book|last = Dingwall|first = Eric J|year = 1931|title = The Girdle of Chastity: A Medico-Historical Study|url = http://www.tpe.com/~altarboy/girdle.htm|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20030207200726/http://www.tpe.com/~altarboy/girdle.htm|url-status = dead|archive-date = 2003-02-07|publisher = [[Routledge]]}}</ref> The ''Bellifortis'' account is not supported by any additional concrete evidence or corroborating documents. [[Massimo Polidoro|Polidoro]] argues that Kyeser's references are meant to be humorous or ironic,<ref name=telegraph-20160118/> and that Dingwall's accounts of the use of chastity belts by a few rich men in the 16th and 17th centuries to ensure the faithfulness of their often much younger wives should be treated critically, because of the absence of actual artifacts of this nature from the historical period in question, and his lack of access to more detailed contemporary historical records.<ref name="Polidoro" />

In 1889, a leather-and-iron belt was found by Anton Pachinger—a German collector of antiquities—in [[Linz]], Austria, in a grave on a skeleton of a young woman.  The woman was reportedly buried in the 16th century.  Pachinger, however, could not find any record of the woman's burial in the town archives.  The belt itself, along with most of the rest of Pachinger's collection, were lost during the chaotic [[aftermath of World War I]].<ref name="dingwall" />

Two belts have been exhibited at the [[Musée de Cluny]] in Paris. The first, a simple velvet-covered hoop and plate of iron, was supposedly worn by [[Catherine de' Medici]]. The other—said to have been worn by [[Anne of Austria]]—is a hinged pair of plates held about the waist by metal straps, featuring intricately etched figures of [[Adam and Eve]].<ref name="dingwall" /> There are other such belts at the [[Germanisches Nationalmuseum]] in [[Nuremberg]] and the [[British Museum]] in London.  Most have been removed from public display to avoid any further embarrassment because the authenticity of these belts as [[medieval]] devices has since been called into question. Many contemporary historians accept that these alleged "artifacts" date from the 19th century, and are thus inauthentic.<ref>{{cite news|title = Two historians say chastity belts are purely medieval myths|work = [[Houston Chronicle]]|date = 23 June 1996|url = http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=1996_1349429|page=22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110629063557/http://www.chron.com/CDA/archives/archive.mpl?id=1996_1349429 |archive-date=2011-06-29}}</ref>

From the 18th century until the 1930s, [[masturbation]] was widely regarded as harmful in Western medicine. Numerous mentions can be found in medical journals of the time of the use of chastity belt-like devices to prevent masturbation in female children and adolescents, as well as women.<ref>{{cite book|last1 = Stengers|first1 = Jean|first2 = Anne|last2 = van Neck|year = 2001|title = Masturbation: the history of a great terror|publisher = Palgrave|isbn = 0-312-22443-5|author-link1 = Jean Stengers}}</ref> Many designs for anti-masturbation devices were filed in the US [[Patent|Patent Office]] until the early 1930s, when masturbation was no longer deemed to be the cause of mental health problems.<ref>{{Cite journal|first = Vern|last = Bullough|author-link = Vern Bullough|year = 1987|title = Technology for the Prevention of 'les maladies produites par la masturbation|journal = Technology and Culture|volume=28|publisher = Johns Hopkins University Press|pages = 828–832|doi = 10.2307/3105184|pmid = 11612372|issue = 4|jstor = 3105184| s2cid=44275822 }}</ref>

Furthermore, some 19th-century working women may have used chastity belts for protective reasons, as a "rape shield" to obstruct sexual assault from predatory bosses or male colleagues; the belts were not worn for a long time uninterruptedly, however, since sanitary and hygiene reasons prevented this before the modern invention of stainless-steel belts.<ref name="Polidoro" /> The belt design was the most common but there were also concealed versions worn inside the vagina which were designed to injure the penis.<ref>{{cite book|title=Material Culture in America: Understanding Everyday Life|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jBTHEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA404|editor1-first=Helen|editor1-last=Sheumaker|editor2-first=Shirley|editor2-last=Wajda|publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing USA|isbn=9781576076484|date=2007|page=404}}</ref>