Synopsis

Vulva is Latin word for the outer part of the female genitalia, the part we see. And although the title of this book is The Vulva, that does not imply that the inner part – the vagina – has been overlooked. It is just that, in most languages, the everyday word for the female genitalia is considered offensive.

In English, that word is “cunt”, which probably derives from Kunthus, a Greek goddess of fertility. Then again the Sanskrit word is kunti, which is the name of an Indian goddess. And among the ancient Romans, a woman of easy virtue, a haetera or a public prostitute, was called a “cunnus”.

It would not be impossible to call a book The Cunt. Indeed, a book called Cunt was published by Inga Muscio in 1998. However, this was a feminist track not intended for a general readership. In the revered British Library in London, any book with the word “cunt” in the title is destined for the infamous “closed cupboard”. Books kept there can be read only by acknowledged scholars sitting at designated desks.

But why is there such the strange flight from the female sex organs? After all, all of us began life there. It is the very seat of pleasure, comfort and succour for both men and women. Only male homosexuals lose out – and they, too, were born from one.

There can be not disputing that the vulva is an important thing, the most important thing in human life. So it is curious that there is not a single depiction of it in mainstream western art from the time of the early Greeks until the late nineteenth century. For almost the entire sweep of European civilisation, the vulva has been, if not deliberately hidden, at least overlooked.

In the pre-classical world, the vulva was seen rightly as the fount of life. This tradition has continued in the East. Its importance has also persisted in folklore. At one time, when a female camel or a mare died, the vulva was cut out and nailed to the stable doors to ward off evil. Later the horse-shoe was substituted. For similar reasons, symbols of the vulva were attached to houses and built-in to the walls of churches.

Maybe the vulva has been hidden, because we are afraid of it. After all, when a man penetrates the vulva of his lover, his most prized possession is lost from view. Women too are a little bit frightened. After their menses start, they are taught that the vulva is unclean. And both sexes are afraid of the sexual power of the female sexual organ. As an Arab philosopher once said: “Three things are insatiable: the desert, the grave and a woman’s vulva.”

But it is time to get over our fear. Women’s sex organs are a beautiful thing. They are everything we desire and crave for. They are the very source of life itself.

The vulva should be loved, cherished, worshipped and elevated, not dismissed as something sordid, smutty and cheap. In his book The Perfect One, the great Arabic grammarian Mubarrad (826-98) lamented that the woman’s cleft was not set in forehead of a lion “so that only the worthy and valiant might possess it”.

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