Whenever I read some “accepted” text on homosexuality or see the section on homosexuality throughout history, I’ll be astounded by how many historical figures it labels as “gay.” Now, to be sure, with many of them, there is some evidence they took a same-sex lover, described the beauty of members of their own sex or had otherwise manifested such attraction. What was troublesome about the tactic of labeling such individuals as “gay” was the application of an identity established in our era to describe individuals from a period long gone.
The Native American berdache (or two-spirit) lived a far different lifestyle from that of modern gay men and lesbian. A berdache was an individual who lived in the guise of the opposite sex, marrying a member of his (or her) biological sex, but (usually) assuming the social responsibilities of his assumed sex and always wearing its costume. In many cases, this was not by choice.
But, could we say that they were “gay”?
Now, from what we know about Walt Whitman and Oscar Wilde, the evidence is pretty strong that each great writer was exclusively attracted to members of his own gender. And while some gay people want to claim Abraham Lincoln as their own, all available evidence suggests that he was bisexual at best (as it does for Cary Grant).
We today believe that our sexuality is an immutable characteristic, that someone is either born straight or gay, or that it is determined very early in our childhood. But, was our sexuality always so? We can peruse the documents that have survived of the world that existed before our forebears began considering the immutability of this characteristic. While the ancient Greeks allowed men to take a young male lover outside the bonds of matrimony, with strict rules governing their sexual expression. Aristophanes in the Symposium, posited that some people are drawn to members of their own sex, indeed pointing to the host of the gathering, Agathon, a just such an individual. That tragic poet lived together with Pausanias and did not marry a woman.
More than five centuries after Agathon’s death, the Roman Emperor Hadrian maintained the pretense of marriage while taking a Greek (male) lover Antinous. (All evidence suggests that his marriage was a most unhappy one.) But, was he, by contemporary standards, “gay”? Was he only attracted to men?
We will never really know. In the end, the real problem with calling Hadrian “gay” as it is with applying the same descriptor to Achilles and Alexander is the difficulty of applying contemporary standards to ancient individuals. What is important is that each did love a member of his own sex and that stories of homosexual love go back as far as the earliest historical records.
My thank to reader “Man” for inspiring this post with his comment to my piece on “gay” Pashtuns.
FROM THE COMMENTS: ILoveCapitalism builds on my point:
Guessing the orientation of historical figures is a fool’s errand because there is no way to know. We can make inferences based on the little information available to us; also known as “taking a guess”. How do we know what we know about Hadrian? He could have been a raving heterosexual who had some bizarre reason for pushing Antinous before the public, a reason that we don’t know. I’m not saying he did, only that the historical record is far more fragmentary than we usually admit or realize.
I love this kind of conversation. I think the reality is we probably can’t say for sure whether Hadrian or other historical figures were definitely gay.
I think one problem of course is culture. It probably wouldn’t not have been culturally acceptable for Hadrian to have taken a male lover, but not a wife. Probably even more difficult for a homosexual man who wasn’t famous-just average man.
I think it is hard when family obligations to marry and procreate come into the equation. At the time a wealthy man who was interested only in men sexually likely would have still had to get married and procreate, because it was expected of him.
I think another interesting historical figure and one who I think the evidence pretty strongly points to him being fully homosexual is King Richard the Lion Heart.
I think part of the problem is also what really makes a person homosexual-is it who they desire or who they have sex with. A lot of people will have sex with someone they don’t necessarily desire for reasons that are there own-some good and some bad.
Is a male prostitute homosexual because he takes money for performing certain sex acts, even if he desires women?
The experience of men loving men existed long before any of our contemporary definitions. Is it just possible that our contemporary understanding of “gay” is wrong, and doesn’t adequately define the experience? Is it possible that Plato’s symposium, David’s covenant with Jonathan, Michelangelo’s sonnets, Whitman’s poetry, etc. are closer to the truth? My feelings mirror Michelangelo’s, Lincoln’s, Wilde’s, and apparently Hadrian’s. If that’s not gay, then I’m not gay. If my feelings conform to these great men from history and not the Stonewall rallies and parades, well, gee, that’s too bad. I’ll happily give back my toaster.
We have had 2,000 years since the Greeks and Romans were creating ancient history. Perhaps Christianity has had a huge influence during those 2,000 years. The point is that I do not know of societies and cultures during this time frame that have been examined for evidence of societal homosexuality and resulting evidence is found to compare with what is claimed for the ancient period.
Furthermore, one would think that Roman and Greek occupation would have influenced the Britons and Egyptians if homosexuality were the norm in their periods of occupation.
Please, I have no axe to grind about all of this. I just get uneasy when anecdotal evidence begins to morph into big concepts.
Let’s keep it simple.
– Straight/heterosexual == predominately attracted to and physically responsive to the opposite sex.
– Gay/homosexual == predominately attracted to and physically responsive to the same sex.
– Bisexual == about equally attracted to either sex.
Guessing the orientation of historical figures is a fool’s errand because there is no way to know. We can make inferences based on the little information available to us; also known as “taking a guess”. How do we know what we know about Hadrian? He could have been a raving heterosexual who had some bizarre reason for pushing Antinous before the public, a reason that we don’t know. I’m not saying he did, only that the historical record is far more fragmentary than we usually admit or realize.
P.S. I’m saying that *IF* you could retrospectively establish that historical figure X was predominately attracted to and physically responsive to the same sex – then yes, it would be fair to call them “gay”. But can you establish that? Really?
It works in both directions: even where all available evidence suggests that historical figure X was straight, we are not correct in calling them so – because we just can’t know. There will be so much about their real life, and/or their inner life, that we do not know. No historical figures should be labelled either gay or straight.
– Straight/heterosexual == predominately attracted to and physically responsive to the opposite sex.
– Gay/homosexual == predominately attracted to and physically responsive to the same sex.
– Bisexual == about equally attracted to either sex.
I am not sure, when it comes to historical examination, these are the only three choices-I am just not sure there is enough information to make the determination on which was the predominant attraction and which was sex due to opportunity, convienience, or for gain.
I do think there is far more historical evidence for some historical figures.
We are all special in our own way and don’t let other people’s opinion of you, make you something you are not. But above all, remember there are people you can talk to, that can listen and not judge and don’t ever give up hope. -0- H. MILK
Rabbi Greenbert struggled with the biblical verses condemning homosexual acts, eventually writing a book about that called “Wrestling with God & Men: Homosexuality in the Jewish Tradition.” A few years ago, he was featured in a documentary film about gay Orthodox Jews, “Trembling Before G-d.”
Ideally, he says, he would like more traditional congregations to say:
“Look, this may or may not be the way God wants people to be. But since I don’t know what it’s like to wake up every morning and want love from someone of the same gender, I’m going to let you work that out with God on your terms.”
should be Rabbi (Steve) Greenberg. OOOPSie
The Rise and Fall of Confidential, “America’s Most Scandalous Scandal Magazine”
It was one of the original guilty pleasures, a magazine probably more skimmed by shoppers in checkout lines than bought and taken home — and the phenomenon on which the movie “L.A. Confidential” was based. Starting in 1952, Confidential came out every other month, a tabloid printed on pulp paper, its cheesy appearance well-suited to its tawdry sources and sensational revelations. Among its favorite targets were alleged Reds and closeted homosexuals, and the magazine came close to outing Rock Hudson. A snoop supposedly had a tape recording of Hudson confessing his indiscretions to his wife, whom he had married precisely to counter rumors that he was gay. “How long after we were married did you have your first homosexual affair?” she asked on the tape. “Oh, I don’t know,” Hudson replied. “The next day.” In the end, Confidential sat on its information, and it wasn’t until Hudson contracted AIDS in the 1980s that his secret became widely known.
The Rock Hudson story is also interesting. Makes one wonder historically just how many homosexuals entered into marriages for appearances sake, although had an understanding with the spouse to do as they will as long as they were discreet.
I also think marriage, or lack of marriage, and same sex relationships historically can’t really be enough to draw conclusions.
I’m not sure exactly why it is such a surprise to many in the gay community that lots of gay men get married. Men get married for a lot of reasons–social expectations, desire to raise a family, having a “company” wife to run parties, etc. In ancient times, a wife was more of a business partner than a sex partner.
Also, being gay does not mean an inability to perform with women or a complete lack of attraction to women. The ability to procreate with a woman does not make you bisexual.
For me, being gay means that my feelings of deepest emotional initimacy whether expressed sexually or not are for other men. I related to what Lincoln wrote about Speed, or what Michelangelo wrote about Tommaso, or what David said about Jonathan, or what Wilde wrote about in De Profundis and Whitman in his Calamus poems or Tennyson in In Memoriam (or the feelings of Holmes for Watson as seen in the new screen version). I’ve always assumed that loving men on that deep of a level is gay. If it turns out that I’m wrong, that’s fine with me. Where do I send the toaster?
On a previous thread I mentioned King Edward II of England and his associations with Piers Gaveston and Hugh le Despenser. Here is an additional thought: Despenser was charged not only with ‘sodomy’, but ALSO, with ‘coming between the King and his wife.” I mention this as a possible way that such as the Pashtun may think of their ‘homosexual’ activities. Just a thought here…
I think the primary thing that gets left out of any discussion here about gays in the past is that pretty much all previous cultures did not believe or uphold the freedom of women as much as western civilization does in the modern era.
The reason this is so important is that until relatively recently gender defined every aspect of ones life, and what one could or could not do with it. If not for that freedom, there would be no space for “gay” to exist other than as seen through the prism of male/female delineated roles.
One point seems to be ignored in these comments. Premodern “homosexual” cultures are better described as pederastic cultures. This means that adolescent boys were considered acceptable sexual surrogates for women and it was assumed that almost any normal male would be attracted by them. Examples are ancient Greece and Rome, Japan before the Meiji Restoration, and parts of the Islamic world including Afghanistan. Everyone knew that some men were more attracted to boys than others and that some were not attracted to boys at all (see Plato’s Symposium), but no one seems to have been much intrested in these differences. There is no reason to doubt that there were men who were complete congenital homosexuals in the modern sense, but in such a culture it would have been easy for them to pass unnoticed. Sexual relations between an adult male and another adult male were unacceptable because of the assumption that one of the two must be effeminized (i.e., penetrated like a woman or a boy), yet we do know of a few relationships like that. As someone pointed out, there are also primitive societies where pederasty is a compulsory ritual forming part of a boy’s initiation into manhood. Possibly that is the root of pederasty, but in the pederastic cultures it is not generally compulsory.