His phallus is said to be as thick as a beam and curved like a rainbow. The glans is huge as if wearing a woven hat. Its length is eight sun [approx. 24cm], and the width is about four fingers worth. The veins look like a crawling spider. It is as strong as a tree stump, and as hard as an iron hammer. It wakes up in the night and relaxes at dawn. Therefore, there were no women who dared to marry him.
This is an excerpt from an 11th-century performance written by a Japanese court scholar and describes a lowly official with a terrible character and a huge penis. This is not a solitary mention of a phallus in medieval Japanese literature; in fact, phalluses are celebrated, and ridiculed, in Japanese folklore and Buddhist writing, without a taboo.
One of the most entertaining medieval pieces is the kachi-e, a handscroll depicting two themes: a phallic contest, and farting battles. While the latter is ridiculous, and you should check it out, today we’ll focus on the first.
The scroll starts with a scene of a growing crowd, gathering to witness the competition; and being shushed away by the guards.
One of the following scenes depicts the contest; an elderly judge is measuring the participants’ penises
Men outside the competition area are resting
It is uncertain who the author is, nor when the handscroll was first created. Some claim that the piece was painted by Abbot of Toba, an eccentric known for cheeky portrayals of the Buddhist deity Fudō Myō-ō; such as showing Fudō Myō-ō wiping his bottom with his sword. If this were true, it would mean that the scroll came to life in the 12th century. One interesting thing to note is that these representations never include women, nor intercourse.
The original and its copies entertained those positioned the highest in the Japanese courts throughout the Middle Ages. An anecdote has it that the humor of these stories, in particular, the farting battle, heals with laughter. However, many scripts about phalluses were not humorous; rather, they related to the Buddhist admonition against lust; they tied the phallus to jealousy, supernatural powers, and violence.
The origins of phallic representations in Japan date back to between 12500 to 300 B.C. Archaeologist found ancient stone phallic-shaped objects, believed to have had religious, weaponry or practical function in everyday life. Medical scripts from the 10th century teach how to prepare medication for the penis enlargement.