# "Making the beast with two backs" - where from? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 12, 2008, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018 "2008-05-12T14:03:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Fir\_na\_tine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Fir\_na\_tine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fir_na_tine)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/1 "2008-05-12T14:03:20Z")
Rereading some old trashy fiction this weekend and one of the characters used the phrase “making the beast with two backs”. Now I’ve known for more than 50 years that the phrase is slang for two people having sex. But I got to wondering, how did the phrase originate? I can’t think of a position that from any angle of observation would appear to be a beast with two backs. What are your thoughts on this weighty matter? ---
**Author:** ![Bravo\_Romeo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e8c25b/32.png) [@Bravo\_Romeo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bravo_Romeo)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/2 "2008-05-12T14:09:21Z")
I’m almost certain it’s mentioned in Othello - pretty sure it’s in the first act as well. Someone (forget his name) tell’s Desdemona’s father (forget his name) that Desdemona and Othello are making the beast with two backs. And also that the “black ram is tupping his white ewe”. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 2:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/3 "2008-05-12T14:11:17Z")
The phrase goes back at least as far as Shakespeare: Iago in Othello says, “I am one sir, that come to tell you, your daughter, and the Moore, are now making the Beast with two backs.” ---
**Author:** ![WarmNPrickly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/d78d45/32.png) [@WarmNPrickly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WarmNPrickly)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/4 "2008-05-12T14:14:21Z")
And here I thought this was going to be a thread about the next installment of Futurama. It is titled The Beast With a Billion Backs if you are curious. I was also aware of the phrases origin. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/5 "2008-05-12T14:14:55Z")
The missionary position is the beast with two backs. Man and woman facing one another, locked in an embrace, so all you see are their backs. Yes, you see their legs as well as the backs of their heads. It’s a metaphor. ---
**Author:** ![Sal\_Ammoniac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8dc957/32.png) [@Sal\_Ammoniac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sal_Ammoniac)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/6 "2008-05-12T14:50:00Z")
It’s actually in Rabelais, which predates Shakespeare by a good bit. _En son eage virile [Grandgousier] espousa Gargamelle, fille du roy des Parpaillos, belle gouge et de bonne troigne, et **faisoient eux deux souvent la beste à deux doz** …_ That’s about 1534, and if the saying predated Rabelais, I wouldn’t be too surprised. ---
**Author:** ![Fir\_na\_tine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/a587f6/32.png) [@Fir\_na\_tine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fir_na_tine)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/7 "2008-05-12T17:56:02Z")
[QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase] The missionary position is the beast with two backs. Man and woman facing one another, locked in an embrace, so all you see are their backs. Yes, you see their legs as well as the backs of their heads. It’s a metaphor. [/QUOTE] Pretty weak metaphor. Kind of like looking at clouds, you see what you want to see. Interesting that it goes that far back in history. For some reason I assumed it was 20th century drivel. Oh well, on to the next mystery of the universe. Judge Crater, oh Judge Crater, come out, come out wherever you are! ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/8 "2008-05-12T18:03:47Z")
When we were studying **Othello** back in high school one guy tongue-in-cheek suggested that “The Beast With Two Backs” referred to a camel. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/9 "2008-05-12T18:20:03Z")
[QUOTE=Fir na tine] Pretty weak metaphor. Kind of like looking at clouds, you see what you want to see. [/QUOTE] Humans don’t have sex like people making porn, trying to show off their body parts to the camera. Man lies on top of woman. There are lots of other positions, of course, but man on top of woman is about as common a position as can possibly be. Their fronts are pressed together. An observer - and in most peasant, poor, urban, tribal and whorehouse situations, there were never any shortage of viewers - sees backs. What could be more obvious than the beast with two backs? It’s a phrase from a variety of cultures and hundreds of years. It’s about as obscure as calling breasts “melons” or a head a “bean”. Or am I being whooshed? ---
**Author:** ![Trunk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/87869e/32.png) [@Trunk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trunk)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 7:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/10 "2008-05-12T19:44:02Z")
[QUOTE=Fir na tine] Pretty weak metaphor. Kind of like looking at clouds, you see what you want to see. [/QUOTE] Would you get it if someone said, “the beast with two backs, the back of two heads, and the backs of 4 legs.” Maybe it’s a Maine thing. Think of it like “making the beast with the back of a man, and the front of a sheep.” ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/11 "2008-05-12T20:10:00Z")
[QUOTE=WarmNPrickly] And here I thought this was going to be a thread about the next installment of Futurama. It is titled The Beast With a Billion Backs if you are curious. I was also aware of the phrases origin. [/QUOTE] _Futurama_ did an earlier joke (in the episode _Spanish Fry_) about a $1.99 Sex Shoppe called “The Beast With Two Bucks”. ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/12 "2008-05-12T20:10:11Z")
[QUOTE=CalMeacham] When we were studying **Othello** back in high school one guy tongue-in-cheek suggested that “The Beast With Two Backs” referred to a camel. [/QUOTE] If I remember my high school Shakespeare correctly, there is another play in which this precise pun is made (i.e. referring to the presence of a camel, inferring that a “beast with two backs” was involved, i.e. a couple having sex). I don’t remember the play, it might have been Much Ado About Nothing. Roddy ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/13 "2008-05-12T20:25:38Z")
[QUOTE=CalMeacham] When we were studying **Othello** back in high school one guy tongue-in-cheek suggested that “The Beast With Two Backs” referred to a camel. [/QUOTE] Well sir, we usually just ride the camel into town. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2008, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/14 "2008-05-12T21:42:33Z")
[QUOTE=DanBlather] Well sir, we usually just ride the camel into town. [/QUOTE] Twenty dollars? ---
**Author:** ![commasense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/commasense/32/3017_2.png) [@commasense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/commasense)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2008, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/15 "2008-05-13T01:47:49Z")
Although the phrase is Shakespeare’s, you might also say the concept goes back to Plato (5th C. BCE), in a sense. In the “Symposium,” the character of Aristophanes offers a humorous explanation for… > [@Aristophanes in Plato's "Symposium"](#): > > …why people in love say they feel ‘whole’ when they have found their love partner. It is, he says, because in primal times people were globular spheres who wheeled around like clowns doing cartwheels (190a). There were three sexes: the all male, the all female, and the ‘androgynous,’ who was half man, half woman. The creatures tried to scale the heights of heaven and planned to set upon the gods (190b-c). Zeus thought about just blasting them to death with thunderbolts, but did not want to deprive himself of their devotions and offerings, so he decided to cripple them by chopping them in half. > > After chopping the people in half, Zeus turned half their faces around and pulled the skin tight and stitched it up to form the belly button. Ever since that time, people run around saying they are looking for their other half because they are really trying to recover their primal nature. (From [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symposium_%28Plato%29).) ---
**Author:** ![Green\_Bean](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/green_bean/32/1760_2.png) [@Green\_Bean](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Green_Bean)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2008, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/16 "2008-05-13T01:52:10Z")
[QUOTE=Trunk] Think of it like “making the beast with the back of a man, and the front of a sheep.” [/QUOTE] I believe that’s called “making the beast with one Briston.” ---
**Author:** ![outlierrn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/outlierrn/32/3005_2.png) [@outlierrn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/outlierrn)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2008, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/17 "2008-05-13T02:21:10Z")
[QUOTE=commasense] Although the phrase is Shakespeare’s, you might also say the concept goes back to Plato (5th C. BCE), in a sense. In the “Symposium,” the character of Aristophanes offers a humorous explanation for… (From [Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symposium_%28Plato%29).) [/QUOTE] and here I thought that was just a glam rock song ---
**Author:** ![DanBlather](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/f4b2a3/32.png) [@DanBlather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DanBlather)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2008, 6:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/18 "2008-05-13T06:59:06Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Twenty dollars? [/QUOTE] Same as in town. Would I? ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2008, 7:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/19 "2008-05-13T07:31:48Z")
[QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase] What could be more obvious than the beast with two backs? It’s a phrase from a variety of cultures and hundreds of years. It’s about as obscure as calling breasts “melons” or a head a “bean”. Or am I being whooshed? [/QUOTE] I wondered the same thing–it seemed pretty obvious what Iago was trying to say when I read the play…and I was a naive young virgin when I read those lines. (Well, okay, once it was pointed out to me that it was a sexual innunendo. The image does just kind of jump into your mind.) ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [May 13, 2008, 2:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018/20 "2008-05-13T14:15:48Z")
[QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase] The missionary position is the beast with two backs. Man and woman facing one another, locked in an embrace, so all you see are their backs. Yes, you see their legs as well as the backs of their heads. It’s a metaphor. [/QUOTE] Which is why a suitable alternative euphemism is “the eight-legged aardvark.” Though I doubt Shakespeare used that one. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/making-the-beast-with-two-backs-where-from/449018.md?page=2)