There are several explanations for this.
- The beauty ideal of antiquity. In Ancient Greece, a large penis was considered a sign of stupidity, lust and animalism. The ideal Greek man was intelligent, rational and authoritarian. Statues from Ancient Greece therefore usually show men with small genitals. The Romans adopted this detail. Since the Renaissance refers to antiquity, David’s penis also turned out to be correspondingly small.
- David’s tension. The statue shows David shortly before his fight against the giant Goliath. On his shoulder, the slingshot is already prepared. Despite his relaxed posture, the signs of tension are clearly visible in the details. In such a situation of fear and danger, even the genital shrinks.
Michelangelo was a master sculptor and had outstanding anatomical knowledge. This also becomes clear when you take a closer look at the details of the statue of David.
The right hand rests loosely on the hip, but the fingers tense slightly, the muscles in the forearm are tense, and the veins stand out clearly. The distant gaze and the wrinkles on the forehead and between the eyebrows depict anxiety, as do the tightened lips. The tension is also visible in the taut neck tendons.
The low expression of David’s sexual organ could therefore have biological reasons as well as aesthetic ones. David is naked, he’s afraid, he’s under stress: all factors that can cause the penis to shrink. Michelangelo was certainly aware of this.
EDIT
Since many of you have pointed out that Davids penis is of average size, I could no longer ignore this. Instead of defending my point in every single comment, I made a post where I did the math.
Turns out I was right. Davids penis is way below average. Also did penis based math for the first time, so that’s a win, I guess.