Vestibule, vaginal

The vaginal opening is called the vestibule of the vagina. In medicine, a vestibule is a space or cavity at the entrance to a canal, channel, tube, vessel. In ancient Rome, the “vestibulum” was an entrance or enclosed porch leading into the house.

The vagina is a muscular canal extending from the cervix to the outside of the body. The word “vagina” is a Latin word meaning “a sheath or scabbard”, a scabbard into which one might slide and sheath a sword. The “sword” in the case of the anatomic vagina was the penis. Love and war, it would seem, have been connected in the minds of people for millennia.