And of course, no similar barometer existed for men. Virginity was a concept that held serious significance when it came to women only. There was a slighter consideration of it regards men, but it was with women that the importance of her virginity was paramount. (This attitude is somewhat reflected today, where the word can apply to men and women both, but it is still considered to "matter" more when it comes to women.)

This can seem strange to us, but it's important to keep in mind why the state of a woman's hymen was considered to be so vital -- it was the means by which one could prove that she had had sex with a man. A woman who had torn or stretched her hymen was "less valuable goods" (yippee for us, eh?) because her untouched state could not be determined with absolute certainty. A woman with a tiny or nonexistent hymen was similar. Thus a virgin was a woman who, it could be positively proven by physical evidence, had not had a penis inserted into her vagina.

(Inserted -- what an annoying way of putting it!)

And again, a similar physical barometer did not exist for men. So defining virginity isn't the clear-cut thing that we think it can be, and the definition has changed from the past to the present.