Sex Machines Museum

The Sex Machines Museum in Prague is the only sex museum in the world devoted solely to sex machines, mechanical erotic appliances built to give pleasure and make unusual positions possible. Its three floors hold around 200 devices, many shown with flexible dummies that demonstrate their use, and some date back to the 16th century.

The collection ranges from body harnesses and copulation tables for unconventional, even weightless, positions to coercive chairs, iron corsets and chastity belts with clawed teeth from the 1580s. Other pieces include an Asian palanquin called the Magic Box, with sliding peepholes, and a 1920s French anti-masturbation device that alerted parents to a boy's erection. Shoes worn by ancient Greek prostitutes have soles engraved to print "follow my steps" on the ground. There is also erotic clothing, a gallery of images on human sexuality and a small cinema showing early Spanish pornographic films from the 1920s.

Opened in 2002 near Old Town Square, the museum drew criticism from city officials, which only increased its popularity with tourists. It now receives more than 400,000 visitors a year.