What Makes a Dungeon?
I rarely think of dungeons in any practical manner. Mostly it’s fantasy world kind I loot when I’m pretending to be a Tiefling Rogue. But, when I do consider what constitutes a dungeon, fluids are more common than loot. What makes a dungeon, I wonder. Is it the setting, the greater context, or perhaps the goal of the owner?
A dungeon should be dingy, ideally, but I’m not sure it’s required. As a child of the 90’s (the late 80’s) “sex dungeons” were a common reference point – this could be just as true for children of the 80’s (late 70’s) or the 00’s (late 90’s), but I can’t speak for them. All I know is that Donny Darko came out in 2001 (late 90’s) and there was a sex dungeon in it.
So, is a sex dungeon a dungeon? The evidence it pretty weak. Sure, there are whips and chains, but give me one example of a dungeon with a swing. And to cut you off, no, a gallows or hanging shackles don’t count. Further, there’s just too much leather. Even the more brutal sex dungeons are designed with a bit of comfort in mind. Not to mention the consent. And the wear and tear! Consider how long you could reliably restrain an unwilling occupant with leather cuffs compared to a medieval castle’s chains, supposing the shackles were expertly connected to the dungeon walls, of course.
Most of the time sex dungeons aren’t even underground!
Dungeons and Dragons used to have a lot more dungeons in it as well, so far as I understand. Even then, though, they didn’t constitute what I imagine a dungeon should be. A dungeon simply needn’t be narratively interesting.
Dungeons, by and large, are likely boring places. Most of the people inside are just dying, and there’s nothing particularly special about that. We’re all doing it in a more or less notable way – screaming doesn’t make anyone special. Sure, some are being tortured, but in a DND campaign you’re usually fighting monsters or looting skeletons, so the torture is mostly done. And even if it’s an active dungeon, that just means a bunch of the people inside are at their job and it doesn’t get more boring than that.
This is where I made the terrible mistake of reading Wikipedia which has informed me that the number of dungeons in castles has been highly exaggerated in order to appease tourists. It turns out that many of these so-called dungeons are actually cisterns or latrines. A latrine would definitely constitute torture, but only if they actually kept someone inside. Perhaps even more disappointing is that in practice dungeons were actually quite pedestrian.
Most of the time it was a single room occupied for a short time while its denizen awaiting trial or some other political resolution. If a prisoner was to be kept for a time, they would more often be kept in a bit of comfort in a guest room of the castle.
The more I read about this the more I think that we might be crueler than our forebears in imagination (and perhaps in practice, but that’s for another essay).
For example, do you know what an oubliette is? I certainly didn’t. It’s a prison cell with an opening up top like you sometimes see in movies. Anthropologists are always arguing over whether a given pit was an oubliette, ice storage, cistern, or otherwise.
A particularly horrible example of archeological imagination is within Ceasar’s Tower at Warwick Castle. The famous oubliette is so small as to keep the prisoner from bending their knees or even turning about. With the only access being a metal grate at the top, this would be a nightmare beyond comprehension.
Except…
“However, the tiny chamber that is described as the oubliette, is in reality a short shaft which opens up into a larger chamber with a latrine shaft entering it from above.”
Much less sexy. Yet, if you look up this oubliette online or go on the tour, it’s obvious which version of the story you’re more likely to get.
This is all pretty disappointing. Dungeons weren’t underground after all, they were basically the county jail, and weirdly, it turns out that sex dungeons are closer to what true prisoners would have been treated like – comfortable accommodations inside the home.
I guess that means I’ve been looting latrines all this time. That really takes the romantic shine off my fantasy game.
From the Rift,
Thanks for Reading!
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