Crocodile Feces

There have been many unique items used for contraception throughout history. Many of them are discussed in the texts you can read on this website. The award for uniqueness probably has to go to the recipes found in the Kahun gynecological papyrus, which advocated the use of crocodile feces to prevent conception.[3]

Description: The Kahun Gynaecological Papyrus (1850 - 1825 BCE)

Source: Original image by Francis Llewellyn Griffith. Image accessed from World History Encyclopedia.[4]

In the recipe, users are instructed to take crocodile feces and fermented dough and mix them together. The recipe then instructs the woman to pack the mixture into her vagina, making this contraceptive a vaginal suppository.[2]

Description: Crocodile on a shrine-shaped base statue from the Ptolemaic Period (332 - 30 BCE) in Egypt.

Source: The Metropolitan Museum of Art [5]

Whether this recipe actually worked as a contraceptive or just worked to alter a woman's pH to kill off the sperm is unknown. What is known, though, is that this isn’t the only time animal feces has been used to prevent conception. Elephant feces is a recommended contraceptive in Arabic medicine as well.[1]

Sources:

[1] Phillips, Michelle. "Ancient Contraception: From the World's First Civilization, through

Egyptian Dynasties, to the Native Americans, We've Been Almost as Interested in

Preventing Pregnancy as We Have in Propagation." Medical Post, vol. 37, no. 14, 2001,

pp. 31. ProQuest,

https://www.proquest.com/trade-journals/ancient-contraception-worlds-first-civilization/d

ocview/228752606/se-2.

[2] Riddle, John M. “Chapter Seven - Egyptian Papyrus Sources.” Contraception and Abortion from the Ancient

World to the Renaissance. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press, 1994, pp. 66-73,

hdl.handle.net/2027/heb01463.0001.001. Accessed 15 Apr. 2025.

[3] Riddle, John M., and J. Worth Estes. “Oral Contraceptives in Ancient and Medieval Times.”

 American Scientist, vol. 80, no. 3, 1992, pp. 226–33. JSTOR,

http://www.jstor.org/stable/29774642. Accessed 1 May 2025.

Image Sources:

[4] Griffith, Francis Llewellyn. “Kahun Gynaecological Papyrus.” World History Encyclopedia, 17 Feb. 2017,

www.worldhistory.org/image/6367/kahun-gynaecological-papyrus/.

[5] “Crocodile on a Shrine-Shaped Base | Ptolemaic Period | The Metropolitan Museum of Art.” The Metropolitan

Museum of Art, 2024, www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/551362.