Gay greek sex

Greek Homosexuality

Homosexuality: sexual attraction to persons of the same sex. In ancient Greece, this was a normal practice.

Introduction

Violent debate, enthusiastic writings, shamefaced silence, flights of fantasy: few aspects of ancient population are so hotly contested as Greek pederasty, or - as we shall see below - homosexuality. Since the British classicist K.J. Dover published his influential book Greek Homosexuality in 1978, an avalanche of new studies has appeared. We can discern two approaches:

The historical approach: scholars are looking for the (hypothetical) roots of pederasty in very ancient initiation rites and endeavor to reconstruct a development. Usually, a lot of fantasy is required, because our sources complete not often mention to these ancient rites.
The synchronistic approach: scholars concentrate upon homosexuality in fifth and fourth-century Athens, where it was integral part of social life.

In the present article, we will use the second approach, although we won't neglect the first one. There are many sources of evidence: lyrical poetry, vases, statues, myths, philosophical treatises, speeches, inscriptions, medical texts, tragedies, comedi

In our sexual histories series, authors explore changing sexual mores from antiquity to today.

In recent years, we have seen significant advances won for LGBT rights through hard-fought legal cases and well-targeted political campaigns. Yet it is worth remembering that for decades, recourse to such methods was not available to LGBT people. The law-court and the parliament were deaf to their pleas. For many, it was only in their dreams that they could escape oppression.

One should not underplay the importance of such fantasies. They provided succour and hope in a grim nature. It was comforting to visualize a time before Christianity told you that the acts of love that you committed were a sin or the rule pronounced that your public displays of affection were acts of “gross indecency”. The persistent desire of a “gay utopia” is one of the constants in gay and lesbian historical imaginings over the last 200 years.

One place in particular attracted the longings of gays and lesbians. This was the world of ancient Greece, a supposed same-sex attracted paradise in which same-sex cherish flourished without discrimination. It was a powerful, captivating dream, one which scholars of ancient Greece have sta

Friday essay: the myth of the ancient Greek ‘gay utopia’

In our sexual histories series, authors travel changing sexual mores from antiquity to today.

One should not underplay the importance of such fantasies. They provided succour and hope in a grim planet. It was comforting to imagine a time before Christianity told you that the acts of love that you committed were a sin or the law pronounced that your public displays of affection were acts of “gross indecency”. The unyielding dream of a “gay utopia” is one of the constants in homosexual and lesbian historical imaginings over the last 200 years.

One place in particular attracted the longings of gays and lesbians. This was the world of ancient Greece, a supposed gay paradise in which gay love flourished without discrim

Lover's Legends: The Gay Greek Myths

And the Greeks had a word for it...

Παιδεραστεια (‘pederasty’, ‘fancying youths’) was a central highlight of Greek civilisation, earning it a reputation from which it has still not fully recovered. ‘The unspeakable vice of the Greeks’ (as E M Forster made a pretend professor describe it in Maurice) has been the object of ridicule, opprobrium, censorship and innuendo since we first hear of it in Classical Greece. While many contemporary homosexual men think of Ancient Greece as an idyllic time for unbridled queer behaviour, the truth (as ever) is much more complex and - dare I say it? - interesting.

The study of male homosexuality in Ancient Greece only began in the 1970s, particularly following the publication of Kenneth Dover’s Greek Homosexuality in 1978. This book helped to strip away many of the misconceptions about lgbtq+ love in the Classical world that had grown up during the nineteenth century and