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Dec 13, 1557
Pope Paul IV Censors Sexually Explicit Books
Pope Paul IV creates the Roman Catholoc Church's first index of banned books. Although most of the 550 books on the list were cenosored for theological reasons, many, such as Giovanni Boccaccio's Decameron were banned for their sexual material. The Catholic Church would continue to publish volumes of prohibited books until 1965, following the reforms of the Second Vatican Council. -
Period: Dec 14, 1557 to
Brief History of Pornography
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"Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure" is Written
John Cleland begins to distribute a sexually explicit novel titled "Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure" (Later retitled "The Life and Adventures of Miss Fanny Hill"). A year after publication, it was confiscated and banned by British authorities. The book was banned in Britain and the United States until the 1960's. It is considered to be the first example of pornography in the form of a novel. -
New York Society for Surpression of Vice Founded
Anthony Comstock founds the New York Society for the Suppression of Vice, and begins his career as America's national censor in earnest. The society fought hard to censor sexual material that thet deemed indecent or obscene until it was dissolved in 1950. -
"L'Ecu d'Or ou la Bonne Auberge" is Distributed
L'Ecu d'Or ou la Bonne Auberge, the earliest surviving hardcore pornographic film, is distributed. Censors (and nervous owners) destroyed most other early examples of the genre, which were typically shown in brothels. -
Denmark Legalizes Pornography
Denmark becomes the first country in the world to legalize pornography, following the general ban on pornography being lifted in 1967. -
Supreme Court Defines Obsecnity
Following the U.S. Supreme Court Case Miller v. California, the high court established a three-part test for defining obscenity that would come to be known as the "Miller Standard". Under this benchmark for defining obscenity, most pornographic material would not be considered obscene, which allowed the pornography industry to continue growing. -
Present Day
Thanks to the internet, pornography has gone from the underground to the mainstream and now has an almost ubiquitous prescence on the web. It is estimated that at any given second, there are over 28,000 people watching Intenet pornography around the world.
