Martinets in France - info needed please... (40)

As long as I can make it clear I wouldn't dream of using it on a dog...

Thanks for this louise.

International man of mystery

Ah, but using it on a pussy ... quite a different thing.

Most French homes had one up to the 1970's, at least I suspect that, and many of these were likely purchased from Supermarkets and Drogueries (hardware shops) – in Supermarkets they were most often found in the Pet section where they were described as Dog Whips! Everyone knew what these were really used for and I suspect that many French bedrooms are still equipped with a Martinet to this day. I last saw them in a Supermarket in 2003, down near Bordeaux, but the quality had dropped dramatically with the tails being plastic faux leather rather than the real thing – most likely cheap Chinese imports. The last French company making Martinets disappeared from the Internet about five years ago – they were Morven Martinets and their product was top quality judging from their website.

The Martinet is the term used for this whip in France and Belgium but the same, or similar, whips can be found in other European countries too and I've seen examples from Germany, Poland and Austria. I'm sure there are other models I've missed.

I started making my own Martinets after buying one in France while on holiday in the late 1970's. I bought my first one in a Droguerie in the Ardeche after spying thirty or more of them hanging by their handles from a ceiling hook. I took a fancy to owning one as I'd heard about their effectiveness in magazines such as Janus and Roue. I nervously bought one, using my schoolboy French. It had a handle about 10" long with a leather hanging cord at the end - the lashes were around 12" long and were strips of brown leather a bit broader than they were long. It was quite effective as a whip but was too light unless applied with great force in which case it had a potential to cut due to the sharpness of the relatively new tails.

That Martinet was greatly improved when I oiled the lashes and took the edge off the tails. This made them more effective and allowed harder strokes to be delivered without fear of cuts. When these tails wore out I replaced them with ones I'd made myself using strong leather bootlaces and other leather off-cuts. Remarkably the new Martinet was much more effective than the original, perhaps because of the quality of the lashes. Using these in various play situations exposed my BDSM friends to the delights of the Martinet and before long I was making new ones to the original French design for their own use.

I later experimented with various tail lengths and ended up with three sizes that seemed to work well – short, medium and long - I had no way of researching the Martinet as there was no Internet at the time so I was surprised, on a visit to Paris in 1992, to find Martinets in the sex shops of Pigalle that were very close in lash length to my own whips. The longest one I make is quite severe and would be equivalent to a British Cat o' Nine Tails but with no knots along the lashes there is much less danger of cutting or serious damage to the recipient's buttocks or back.

Over the years I have also tried different handle materials and have found that the smaller Martinet is very nice if made with a strong flexible rattan handle with a leather grip. For most occasions though, and for long-term reliability, a strong wooden handle is much more useful.

One devotee of the Lochgelly Tawse that I play with once said, on viewing the apparent flimsiness of my Senior Martinet, that he thought French children had it easy compared to Scottish kids who got the Tawse. Twenty hard strokes on the bare backside soon changed his mind!

The Martinet is in my opinion one of the best disciplinary instruments you can use. Applied lightly it is quite sensuous in its effect but applied with force it can produce a very red and well-marked bottom. It can also be used gently on the genital area and is good for breast whipping too. From a subs point of view they feel very much like a cross between a birch and a tawse with a nice mix of sting and thud. The ratio is different depending on the tail length. Short tails give a greater sting than thud while the long tailed examples are about equal in terms of thud and sting. For judicial whippings the longer martinet is probably to be preferred. In my sessions I always use these whips on the bare buttocks but they are effective through thin knickers, underpants or trousers. Applied to a bare back the Senior Martinet can be an effective whip to recreate historic floggings – without fear of lasting damage.

I've been asked recently to consider manufacturing my Martinets for sale to other BDSMers and I am considering this at the moment. I expect to have some prototypes available by the end of August or early September and I may offer these for sale if I get enough feedback that there is a demand among the wider BDSM community. At the moment I'm supplying BDSM friends who have tried my Martinets and want one of their own. I haven't priced these up yet but I'm sure that they will be cheaper than most of the examples that can be found on the Internet. I suspect they may end up costing somewhere in the region of £25 to £30, plus postage and packing. Anyone potentially interested in purchasing a Martinet should contact me on Jim_Knickers@hotmail.com

Jim Nixon

wuff

clyde

You're right; first CP magazine I ever read, aged 16.

Free film about The London Corporal Punishment School can be seen at http://www.the-firm.org/Cinema.htm

You can only perceive real beauty in a person as they get older. Anouk Aimee

last time we were in France we went to a hardware store and bought two. They keep them supposedly for disciplining dogs.

clyde

Thank you for this wonderful, detailed response. I was, not unexpectedly, unable to buy a martinet in France, although I scoured antique shops as well as ironmongers in smaller, provincial towns.

I think the time has passed for their availablility as domestic tools for a lady's everyday essential home management (!) I am sure, however, that one can be fashioned by the recipient for the time being, and perhaps at some stage, a finer, more professionally made one can be purchased for the household.