Hellfire Club (1720s)
Author Jonathan Swift called them “a brace of monsters, blasphemers, and Bacchanalians” (thus proving the Romans set the standard for epic party). These dastardly fiends were members of Dublin’s Hellfire Club, aristocratic men mocking the religious hypocrisy rampant at the time. Twice a year, Hellfire members of the most notorious chapter met at Medmenham Abbey. Erotic art decorated the walls, and the library boasted a collection of p-o-r-n.
Organizers invited the members to bring women with “a cheerful, lively disposition” (meaning physically and sensually free-spirited). To jab at religious standards, parties featured treats like Breast of Venus, Holy Ghost Pie, and Devil’s Loin. While Hellfire is infamous for Satanic rituals, there no evidence to support this ever happened. Hellfire parties were so secretive, nobody knows whether they were actually drunken parties for underground political and religious debate, or the orgiastic frenzy of blasphemy, deviant physical relations, and raging drunkenness that made them infamous.
