# In olden days, how common was it for people to enter marriage with literally no clue what sex was?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-olden-days-how-common-was-it-for-people-to-enter-marriage-with-literally-no-clue-what-sex-was/980395>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [February 26, 2023, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-olden-days-how-common-was-it-for-people-to-enter-marriage-with-literally-no-clue-what-sex-was/980395 "2023-02-26T13:22:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
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**Author:** ![Moonrise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/moonrise/32/14764_2.png) [@Moonrise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moonrise)\
**Post date:** [March 16, 2023, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-olden-days-how-common-was-it-for-people-to-enter-marriage-with-literally-no-clue-what-sex-was/980395/262 "2023-03-16T09:05:41Z")

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> [@thorny\_locust](#):
>
> … there were a lot of girls (and undoubtedly a lot of people of any gender) who hadn’t done all sorts of other things, either; some for lack of opportunity, some for lack of knowledge that some of those things existed, …

You know, this whole discussion, and this quote in particular, reminds me of a [thread](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/another-time-traveler-question-sex-with-the-locals/970441/52) I posted a few months ago. Some of the answers I got then read as implict criticism of my “smug” premise. What I read here suggest that I may not have been completely off the mark.

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