Humpjones

The Ballad of Rasputin’s Penis

Posted Apr 08, 2007 4 comments

This article has a great deal of personal meaning for me.  Since I was young, I’ve carried the conviction that my penis will outlive me by centuries at least.  I’ve been wrong before, of course—back in high school, I was pretty sure we’d phase out clothing by the year 2000—but I’m still pretty confident about the longevity of my beautiful, beautiful wang. 

Rasputin was pretty damn good with the prophecy gig, too.  He called his impending demise within a few months, and he went further than your average TV psychic: he attached specific conditions.  He warned that if he were killed by Russian nobles, then the Tsar’s family would be dead within two years—and time proved him right.  This is probably an indication that the “prophecy” was bullshit, just like nearly everything else swirling around the legend of Rasputin.

Ain’t Nothing New

Of course, this has been bullshit ever since it started.  We’re all adults here, right?

The epicenter of the Rasputin Bullshit Explosion would have to be his death, and as much as I’d love to retell that story here, I’ll just refer you to the capable hands of the Rotten Library.  (If you’re a sissy, or “at work”, check the wiki.) The only question that matters to me is wether or not Rasputin’s dick got separated from his body at any point during or after his assassination. 

Rasputin, being larger than life, naturally had three autopsies: one in 1916, one in 1993, and most recently, one in 2004.  (September 11th changed the world, so we’ve been double-checking everything since then. Turns out, Rasputin was probably killed by a British Intelligence agent named Oswald Rayner, with a single point-blank gunshot to the forehead. So much for prophecy, huh?)

In terms of this worthless article, the autopsies all agree on one key point: Rasputin’s genitals were still attached to his body.  This, too, is nothing new—there are also unkillable legends surrounding the severed penises of John Dillinger and Napoleon Bonaparte, as well as the foreskin of Jesus Christ —but if there’s no basis in fact, what the hell is going on?

One Tiny Mistake

Fertility, virility, girth.  Repeat those three words until you enter a trance state, and you’ll be in a better position to understand most of human history.  The original Raputin’s Penis was the center of a small but wealthy cult of Russian exiles who lived in Paris and built fertility rituals around it. According to bullshit canon, one of Rasputin’s daughters either stole the wrinkled relic or demanded it back—or perhaps hired Gurdjieff and Blavatsky to reclaim it for her.  (Apparently sales of Isis Unveiled hadn’t taken off yet, and of course, Beelzebub’s Tales to His Grandson hadn’t even been written yet.)

Rasputin’s daughter—tragically, she was not named Rasputina—is a study in living mythology unto herself.  She worked in the circus as an acrobat, hypnotist and tiger trainer.  After liberating her father’s Property from the fertility cult, she went to Buenos Aires where she apparently slept with some British Intelligence agents for the sake of irony, and later retired to California for the sake of art.  And, of course, this was far from the end of the story…

In fact, the penis had resurfaced as a news item in The Daily Telegraph’s Weekend Section on (the date may be significant) 1 April 1995. A photograph shows someone called Victoria Blakey-Porter of Bonham’s holding between her thumb and forefinger an item which, the article says, was alleged to have been Rasputin’s penis. It had been included in a sale of relics and scientific instruments, along with Marie’s manuscript biography of her father, but on close examination in a pathologist’s laboratory, it turned out ‘not to be human’. It was, in fact, a desiccated sea cucumber. It was summarily withdrawn from the sale and, presumably, disposed of.

You Thinking What I’m Thinking?

Granted, the notion that Rasputin was castrated after death and had his Dark Rod preserved for a full century and passed around various collectors of occult memorabilia is hard to believe.  The notion that for nearly 100 years, those same wealthy weirdos were passing around a sea cucumber and never even noticed it—that’s actually even harder to believe.  Or is it?

Are you familiar with UMMO?  It was a South American UFO cult that also made inroads in Canada and Europe, and it was entirely a (very entertaining and intelligent) hoax perpetrated by a UFOlogist who, like Jacques Vallee and John Keel, figured out where the real meat was located.  (You can read about UMMO and how to run a cult at Brainsturbator.)

After all, here in these United States of America, 83% of the population thinks that the Bible is the Word of God—God meaning Jehovah, a creature who created the Universe, from Australia to the Crab Nebula to the furthest visible limits of space, yet somehow can only communicate with the human race through occasional, horribly written books.  To Jehovah’s credit, at least one of those books are among the best-selling titles in the history of publishing, although it also had a head-start (first book published) and other unfair advantages (Gideons). 

Here’s a great joke to tell strangers in a bar sometime: What do God and Rasputin’s Penis have in common? (pause for effect) No matter how many times you disprove their existence, they never fucking go away.

Rasputin’s Other Penis

Rasputin, being larger than life, naturally had two penises, and the other one surfaced in his native Russia in 2004. Igor Knyazkin, a very entertaining maniac, opened the Russian Museum of Erotica, and the centerpiece exhibit was, once again, Rasputin’s penis.  The reader will agree, whatever is in that particular jar, it’s probably not a sea cucumber this time.

“I have always been interested in the most important organ in a human body. I arrived to the conclusion that those are reproductive organs. In the course of my entire working career I have become more convinced that sexual organs in fact are responsible for one’s longevity. As soon as a person (especially men) gives up at the age of 60, 70, 80, nature launches the final countdown. Nature does not need a man who can no longer reproduce.”

--Igor Knyazkin

There’s the usual chorus of skeptics and naysayers, as always.  One group, calling themselves “zoologists”—I haven’t investigated that particular cult but they sure sound weird—are insisting the penis belongs to a horse, which is probably a major consolation for the Less Endowed among us. 

11.8 Inches of Russian Superiority

There are serious questions that need to be addressed—how does one verify the origin and authenticity of a severed penis in a jar? Was this entire article an excuse to show that one photo?

For once, I have clear-cut answers for you.  It’s very difficult to determine the authenticity of severed penises, but based on the available historical evidence, especially the autopsy, it’s fairly certain Rasputin’s dick never once left his body.  As for the article being One Big Excuse to post up that photo, of course not.  Because, you see, there’s two of them:

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