Petronius

Gaius Petronius Arbiter (c. 27 – 66 AD) was a Roman courtier during the reign of Nero. He is generally believed to be the author of the Satyricon, a satirical novel, although there is some dispute about this.

Petronius in "The Maltese Elephant"
In chapter 132 of the Satyricon, Petronius wrote a passage where the character Encolpius puts the curled and preserved ear of a Maltese elephant to an imaginative use. This passage was so scandalous that early 20th-century Americans would not recite it in polite company, not even in the original Latin.