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The origins of striptease as a performance art are disputed and various dates and occasions have been given from ancient Babylonia to 20th century America. The term "striptease" was first recorded in 1932,[8] though "stripping", in the sense of women removing clothing to sexually excite men, seems to go back to at least the late 19th century.[citation needed]
There is a stripping aspect in the ancient Sumerian myth of the descent of the goddess Inanna into the Underworld (or Kur). At each of the seven gates, she removed an article of clothing or a piece of jewelry. As long as she remained in hell, the earth was barren. When she returned, fecundity abounded. Some believe this myth was embodied in the dance of the seven veils of Salome, who danced for King Herod, as mentioned in the New Testament in Matthew 14:6 and Mark 6:21-22. However, although the Bible records Salome's dance, the first mention of her removing seven veils occurs in Oscar Wilde's play of 'Salome', in 1893.
In ancient Greece, the lawgiver Solon established several classes of prostitutes in the late 6th century BC. Among these classes of prostitutes were the auletrides: female dancers, acrobats, and musicians, noted for dancing naked in an alluring fashion in front of audiences of men.[9][10][11] In ancient Rome, dance featuring stripping was part of the entertainments (ludi) at the Floralia, an April festival in honor of the goddess Flora.[12] Empress Theodora, wife of 6th-century Byzantine emperor Justinian is reported by several ancient sources to have started in life as a courtesan and actress who performed in acts inspired from mythological themes and in which she disrobed "as far as the laws of the day allowed". She was famous for her striptease performance of "Leda and the Swan".[13] From these accounts, it appears that the practice was hardly exceptional nor new. It was, however, actively opposed by the Christian Church, which succeeded in obtaining statutes banning it in the following century. The musica stripteas degree to which these statutes were subsequently enforced is, of course, opened to question. What is certain is that no practice of the sort is reported in texts of the European Middle Ages.
An early version of strip-tease became popular in England at the time of the Restoration. A strip tease was incorporated into the Restoration comedy The Rover, written by Aphra Behn in 1677. The stripper is a man; an English country gentleman who sensually undresses and goes to bed in a love scene. (However, the scene is played for laughs; the prostitute he thinks is going to bed with him robs him, and he ends up having to crawl out of the sewer.) The concept of strip-tease was also widely known, as can be seen in the reference to it in Thomas Otway's comedy The Soldier's Fortune (1681), where a character says: "Be sure they be lewd, drunken, stripping whores"
