Rijksmuseum acquires rare 200-year-old condom
- maxwell museums
- Jun 3
- 2 min read
The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has acquired a 200-year-old condom for its collection.
The condom — probably made from a sheep’s gut — features an eye-opening erotic etching depicting a nun and three clergymen.
The contraceptive has now gone on display in the Dutch museum’s Print Room as part of a small display called Safe Sex? which shows prints and drawings on the themes of 19th-century sex work and sexual health.
“We suspect it was more of a luxury brothel souvenir than an actual condom for use” the Rijksmuseum curator Joyce Zelen said. “In the 1830s, when this condom was made, the use of condoms was still frowned upon, especially by the church.”
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The Rijksmuseum bought the condom at auction in November 2024. Costing €1,000 (£840), it was acquired with the support of the F.G. Waller Fund, a long-standing fund set up in 1938 to help the museum acquire prints in honour of the art historian and print expert François Gérard Waller.
This is the first example in the Rijksmuseum collection of a print on a condom, and it’s only the second-known surviving example of an object of its kind. It now joins the 750,000 prints, drawings and photographs in the museum’s print collections.
In the amazingly detailed etching, a nun — seated with her legs apart in front of three clergymen — points her finger at one of them. The men are standing and they hold their robes up to display their state of sexual arousal. The inscription ‘Voilà mon choix’, meaning ‘This is my choice’, makes the print a parody of both celibacy and the Judgement of Paris from Greek mythology.
In a statement, the museum said the condom “embodies both the lighter and darker sides of sexual health, in an era when the quest for sensual pleasure was fraught with fears of unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases – especially syphilis.”
It can be seen on display at the museum in the Netherlands capital until November 2025.
More from the Netherlands:
The exhibitions in the Hague you should see this year
Director of Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum cuts visitor numbers after 'too much growth'
Exploring the Netherlands for the Sainsbury Centre’s North Sea exhibition
