Oldest profession (phrase)

The oldest profession in the world (or The world's oldest profession) is a phrase that, unless another meaning be specified, refers to prostitution. However, it did not acquire that meaning universally until after the First World War. Formerly, various professions vied for the reputation of being the oldest.

Earlier sense

The claim to be the oldest profession was made on behalf of farmers,^[1] cattle drovers,^[2] horticulturalists,^[3] engineers,^[4] landscape gardeners,^[5] the military,^[6] doctors,^[7] nurses,^[8] teachers,^[9] priests^[10] and even lawyers.^[11]

Perhaps the earliest recorded claim to be the world's oldest profession was made on behalf of tailors. The Song In Praise of the Merchant-Taylors, attested from 1680, which was routinely performed at pageants at the Lord Mayor's Show, London, if the current mayor happened to belong to the tailors' guild,^[12] began:

Of all the professions that ever were nam'd,
The taylor's, though slighted, is much to be fam'd':
For various invention, and antiquity,
No trade with the tayler's comparèd may be:

After pointing out that Adam and Eve made garments for themselves, and were therefore tailors, it continued:

Then judge if a tayler was not the first trade.
The oldest profession, and they are but raylers,^[1]
Who scoff and deride men that be merchant-taylers.

1. ^ Bitter deriders or scoffers.

Acquisition of opprobrious sense

The phrase began to acquire its opprobrious sense in the last decade of the nineteenth century following Rudyard Kipling's short story about an Indian prostitute, On the City Wall (January 1889). Kipling, after citing a biblical reference,^[13] began

Lalun is a member of the most ancient profession in the world. Lilith was her very-great-grandmamma, and that was before the days of Eve as every one knows. In the West, people say rude things about Lalun's profession, and write lectures about it, and distribute the lectures to young persons in order that Morality may be preserved. In the East where the profession is hereditary, descending from mother to daughter, nobody writes lectures or takes any notice; and that is a distinct proof of the inability of the East to manage its own affairs.

In George Bernard Shaw's play Mrs. Warren's Profession (1893) the profession in question was prostitution.

In a scathing article on the morals of the aristocracy in the mass circulation Reynold's Newspaper, 22 July 1894,^[14] the reference was repeated:

In ancient Rome, under the empire, ladies used to go to baths to meet a certain class of men, while men resorted thither to meet a certain class of ladies. The ladies belonged to what has been called “the oldest profession in the world", a profession which is carried on in Piccadilly, Regent street, and other parts of London with great energy every night …

In the same year the Pall Mall Gazette^[15] reported a speech in which “Mrs. Ormiston Chant … implored us to stand shoulder to shoulder and destroy what Kipling has called 'the oldest profession in the world'”.

The phrase was frequently used as a euphemism when delicacy forbade direct reference to prostitution.

Kipling was not the first to employ the phrase "the most ancient profession" in an opprobrious sense. The Irish poet Henry Brooke (1701-1783) wrote:^[16]

Of all trades and arts in repute or possession,
Humbugging is held the most ancient profession.

The phrase had also been applied to murderers. In The Secret Societies of All Ages and Countries (1875),^[17] Charles William Heckethorn, describing the Thugs of India, said:

The hierophant, on initiating the candidate, says to him: "Thou hast chosen, my son, the most ancient profession, the most acceptable to the deity. Thou hast sworn to put to death every human being fate throws into thy hand..."

Residual usage of the phrase in its reputable sense

There is some evidence that unworldly speakers (e.g. of the older generation) or unsophisticated audiences (e.g. in small towns or rural areas) were not at first aware of the phrase's newly acquired meaning. Thus for some time the following could be said in English newspaper reports without apparent embarrassment: “A certain proportion of the cadets were now leaving to enter the oldest profession in the world” (1895);.^[18] “This gentleman's name often figures high in local prize lists, and he is considered an enthusiast in 'the oldest profession in the world'.” (1902)^[19] “Mr Petrie heard the voice of God and observed the working of His hand in ways that are denied to most of us. His speech, and especially his prayers, exhibited a rare consciousness of the beauty of holiness, and were fragrant with phrases of singular charm. As you all know, Mr Petrie followed the oldest profession in the world.” (1915)^[20]

However, those 'innocent' uses of the phrase tended to die out as awareness of the newly acquired meaning increased; as did the appreciation that antiquity, of itself, did not make a profession respectable.

References

1. ”The farmer, therefore, can boast of being a member of the oldest profession” (Annual Report of the Secretary of the State Board of Agriculture, Michigan, 1878).
2. “He reminded his audience that theirs was the very oldest profession in the world” (Bury and Norwich Post, Suffolk, 19 June 1883, p.5.
3. “… certainly we are representatives of the oldest profession of which we have any knowledge” (Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Ohio State Horticultural Society, 1890, p.35.
4. “… we belong to the oldest profession in the world” (The Stevens indicator, vol. 9, 1892, p.167).
5. “I need hardly speak of its antiquity, the oldest profession in the world” (Preston Chronicle, Lancashire, 9 November 1889, p.2.)
6. Speech by Lord Wolseley, Morning Post, 21 December 1895.
7. The Clinic: A Weekly Journal of Practical Medicine, 1875, p.245.
8. Nursing World, vols 21-22, 1898, p.123.
9. The Ohio Educational Monthly, vol 57, 1908, p.294.
10. Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, 1902.
11. ”A lawyer, then, is a member of the oldest profession extant; for as he lives upon the rottenness of human nature, the first human crime made room for a lawyer” (Alfred Butler, Elphinstone, vol 1, 1841, p.189).
12. Percy Society, Early English Poetry, Ballads and Popular Literature of the Middle Ages, vol. XIX (London, 1846), p.74.
13. Joshua ii. 15.
14. Page 4.
15. 12 November 1894, page 6.
16. Samuel Johnson, The Works of English Poets, from Chaucer to Cowper, vol 17, p.428.
17. (London, Richard Bentley and Son), vol 2, p.324.
18. (The profession of arms.) Speech of Lord Wolseley to the Royal Military Academy, Morning Post, 21 December 1895, page 2.
19. (Gardener.) Folkestone, Hythe, Sandgate & Cheriton Herald, 17 May 1902, page 7.
20. (Gardener). Stirling Observer, 12 November 1915, page 8.

External links

Nominations for the second-oldest profession: