A Culture Without Taboos or Rules
The worldview and sexuality of the conquering Hungarians were marked by remarkable openness. For them, not only the sight of the naked body but also sexual activity itself was entirely natural.
We know much about the conquering Hungarians’ warfare, clothing, and migrations – but what about their private lives? How did they choose partners? What roles did men and women play in relationships? And what did the morals of the time allow in the bedroom? Sexuality is rarely discussed when speaking of the Hungarians of the 9th and 10th centuries, yet it was very much a part of their lives – and even of their social order.
According to Dr. László Józsa’s book Sex in Medieval Hungary, intimacy in this era was characterized by naturalness and a degree of openness that might seem surprisingly frank today. His research reveals fascinating details about the customs and sexual habits of the conquering Magyars.
Life and Intimacy Without Walls
Between the 7th and 10th centuries, the Hungarians’ ancestors lived in yurts and semi-subterranean dwellings. The exact size of their felt tents is unknown, but ethnographic studies suggest that a family yurt measured roughly six meters in diameter, covering about 28 square meters. Regardless of size, all family life unfolded in a shared space.
The family’s sleeping area was around two to two and a half meters long and wide. Shared by the man, woman, and their young children, who slept with their parents until the age of six to eight. At night, a curtain separated this space from the rest of the yurt, where adolescents, guests, and servants slept.
Because of this arrangement, everything could be heard — intimate encounters included. Children thus grew up accustomed to hearing, and perhaps occasionally seeing, their parents and relatives making love. This was regarded as entirely natural, and this openness functioned as a kind of early sexual education.
Nudity itself was not taboo either. Bathing was a communal and visible activity, so seeing one another naked was ordinary. Children became familiar with human anatomy early on. Contemporary sources even suggest that the sexual desires and practices of the Hungarians were more uninhibited than those of many neighboring peoples. However, they did not adopt customs such as genital shaving, circumcision, or ritual washing after intercourse from surrounding cultures.
The Naturalness of the Naked Body
Women’s clothing also reveals much about attitudes toward sexuality. Beneath their shirts, women bound their breasts with linen cloths and wore linen trousers. This meant that during lovemaking, they had to remove their undergarments, and it’s likely they undressed completely.
Historical records indicate that sleeping and making love naked remained common until the 16th or 17th century. Written accounts also show that swimming without clothes was routine and that people did not feel ashamed to expose their bodies, even before strangers.
Jewelry often carried erotic symbolism as well. In a 10th-century grave uncovered in Szeged, archaeologists found a silver ornament from a shirt collar decorated with stylized hair and a form representing the clitoris.
Sexual Freedom – Virginity, Marriage, and Lovers
Boys were considered adults by around age 11, and girls by 11 or 12, after which they were free to marry. Puberty typically began around 13 or 14, and it seems likely that sexual activity did not start before then.
Premarital sex, however, was entirely accepted and commonplace. Most people married between the ages of 16 and 18, and before that, everyone was free to choose partners as they wished. Female virginity was not demanded or valued as a prerequisite for marriage, and a woman’s lack of it carried no stigma.
In marriage, the husband was nominally the head of the household. But this did not translate to female subservience — men and women were largely regarded as equals. The practice of bride kidnapping existed early on, but over time it became more symbolic. The girl herself often planned it, and sometimes her parents even approved.
Marriage itself was neither a legal nor a religious act. The community simply recognized the couple’s intent to live together, and from that point on, they were considered married. If the relationship failed, there was no formal divorce — partners simply separated and moved apart.
The only true prohibition on marriage was close kinship.
Men were permitted to have both free and enslaved concubines, who were more economically and socially dependent on them. Even so, adultery was not common among the Hungarians — largely because a man’s occasional or ongoing sexual relationships outside marriage were not considered infidelity.
It was also accepted that, during times of war, a wife might not remain faithful either.
Even after the adoption of Christianity and the founding of the Hungarian state, marital customs changed only slowly. Casual sexual relationships persisted, and young couples often lived together for years before marrying. Adultery only became defined as a sin in legal codes in the 11th century.