Amazing Moments in Birth Control
The pope disapproves of it. Teenagers are confused by it. And it may be one of the world's most politically charged health issues. Though most people associate birth control with the advent of the Pill in the '60s, contraception is an age-old concern.
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Condoms come first
"There is no society that's been found that didn't practice birth control. It's a universal and eternal practice," says Linda Gordon, PhD, a professor of history at New York University and the author of The Moral Property of Women.
Though archaeologists debate the exact origin of the condom, the earliest known illustration of a man apparently using one for intercourse was engraved on a cave wall in France about 12,000 years ago. But guys weren't having all the fun. Thousands of years later, ancient Egyptian women began experimenting with contraception of their own: crocodile dung as spermicide. Talk about a mood killer!
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