Growing Up Sexually

PREMODERN GREEK

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[Partially reproduced from page on Europe, Historical Matters]

As mentioned by Plato, there was a discourse on sexual abuse of children in classical Athens, and acts of an erotic nature were considered hubris (Cohen, 1993:p8)[1], which was to cover for the apparent absence of a statutory rape provision (p14-5). Specifically, their were a range of laws pertaining to circumstances which could lead to the corruption of boys, and the law of hubris “may have made prosecution at least a theoretical possibility for any consummated act of intercourse with minors” (Cohen, 1991 [1994:p182])[2]. A genuine age of consent, although perhaps a meaningful argument, is not known (p15). A further legal note is found in Macdowell (2000)[3].

Greek Love[4] (with a Specific Reference to Age)

By the Laius Complex, named after Oedipus’s father, Ross (1982,1985/6; Ross and Herzog, 1985)[5] means the  “pederastic and filicidal inclinations that I [Ross] believe to be universal among fathers”[6]. The concept has received little impetus in psychodynamic theory, and the place of the erotic within the parental remains a rather pressing theoretical-ethical impasse. “Philia”, as is argued, was donated by Zeus to mortals to safeguard their humanity (Nicolaiedis and Nicolaiedis, 1993)[7]. Its legitimate use as a suffix the para”philia”, however, appears to be unchallenged.

Booth (1991)[8], sketching the dangers of Greek symposia, where “eating, drinking and sexual indulgence constitute an intimate and unholy trinity”, tried to establish the legal “drinking age” of boys. In Rome “assumption of the toga virilis was on the one hand recognized to bestow freedom to recline and on the other to render desirable some restraint and guidance”. This does not mean children were excluded from parties, but that “in proper imperial practice, before assumption of the toga virilis, princes did not recline but sat, and they did not participate fully in the convivium”.

In ancient Greece, the boy was loved from pubescence, at age 14, to the beard, appearing “at least four years later in life than it does in a modern population” (Moller, 1987)[9], or somewhere around 21.

The only precaution taken was to depilate boys’ anuses, stated Martial and Suetonius. “At least in comedies and satyr plays, admittedly a raunchier environment then everyday Athens, boys were identified as sexual beings from an early age […]. Aristotle […] observes that boys enjoy rubbing their penises before (though only shortly before) they are able to ejaculate […]. Awareness of boys’ interest in the subject leads Xenophon to approve of the Persian reluctance to discuss sex in front of the very young lest their lack of discipline lead to excess […]”. Plato[10] argued for sexual segregation at age 6 and valued heterosexual self-control[11]. There seems to have been a law that referred to the age of 25 as the minimum of sexual responsibility, but there is no record of its use[12]. Whoring was the only method of obtaining sexual intimacy, says Golden (1990)[13], who is rather optimistic about the positive elements of this “institution” (p59). At least, Athenian pederasty brought the meirakion “into the orbit of a wider adult male world than his father’s” (Strauss, 1993:p94-5)[14]. It may also be argued that pederasty functioned to support the family and the continued primacy of masculine values and ethics, where traditional views of warriorhood were degenerating (Ungaretti, 1978)[15].

Contemporary others are not so optimistic about what happened to “children” (e.g., Bloch, 2001)[16]. It may be reasoned that “this [universal] sexual abuse of boys and young men by older men (who had themselves been abused) reflected a desired gender reversal designed to subsume women’s feared powers and increase male control” (Atlas, 2000)[17]. Kahr, who seems to draw conclusions of the absence of erections in the younger party as depicted on surviving vases[18], makes the significant, yet bluntly put, argument that “we have no first-hand accounts from the youths themselves about the ravages of Greek abuse” [sic].

The involvement of prepubescents in ritualised or habitual acts relative to the “sexual” sphere may largely be overshadowed by concepts of warrior pederasty and homosexuality pertaining to ephebes. Johansson (1990:p959-60)[19] argues that “pederasty” is about children aged twelve to seventeen, and not to be polluted with the contemporary stigma of “paedophilia”. DeMause (The Emotional Life of Nations, Ch.7), however, argues that “as soon as boys reached puberty, they were felt to be useless for sexual purposes, and all pederastic poetry[20] mentions the first hairs terminate the boy’s attractiveness”. The alignment of the Greek with contemporary “paraphiliac” categories would be facilitated by their manifest “trichophobia”[21]. DeMause’s ill grasp of “puberty” is indicative enough of this tendency.

The dating of the eromenos’ age is hampered by the cultural genres of resources, mostly poetry, legal records and drawings. The Greeks seemed to have had a specific distaste for sprouting beards (horror barbae), as is seen in paiderastia’s Arabic counterpart, but less is known for their alleged pubophobia. Data suggest that contemporary semantic corruptions of the pornographic concepts of “boy” and “young” already existed in pederastic Greece (Dover, 1978:p84-6)[22]. However, most scholars make a more or less sharp phenomenological distinction on the basis of the younger participant’s pubertal status (e.g., Eglinton, 1964:p23-4, 244ff; Brongersma, 1987, [I]:p68-75; cf. Halperin, 1990[23]:p90; Hupperts, 2000[24], I:p23-4; Freese/Licht, 1932 [1976:p72][25]). Licht argues that “ When discussing the Greek love of boys, one thing especially must not be forgotten: that it is never a question of boys (as we mostly use the word), that is, of children of tender age, but always of boys who are sexually matured, that is, who have reached the age of puberty”. However: “[…] We must also bear in mind that in Greece, as in all counties of the so-called Sotadic zone, puberty sets in earlier than in the north […]”. Percy III argues that “[…] as far as prepubescents are concerned, we have no evidence whatsoever in Greek sources to suggest that they were the object of attention of Greek men” (p8). Buffière (1980:p7)[26] argues: “Aimer un enfant avant la puberté serait un grave délit, une sorte d’attentat à l’innocence; l’aimer quand déjà les poils lui hérissent le menton change tout à fait les choses; c’est mettre face à face deux partenaires adultes, pouvant se donner la réplique!”. Pubescent children, however, may have their loves (p287-8, 609).

Insofar as pederastic aesthetics were based on somatic appearance, it might not have been what we call pubescence. As referred to supra, DeMause (1992/1994)[27] ventures: “The common notion that [buggery of boys in Greece / Rome] occurred only at “adolescence” is quite mistaken. It began around age seven, continued for several years and ended by puberty, when the boy’s facial and pubic hairs began to appear- actually at about age 21, very late, since most children suffered from “psychological retardation” from being so severely abused”[28]. Of course, the coincidence of male pubarche (pubes) and barbarche (beard) is contested by all elementary sources, and is to be considered erroneous. Secondly, with the scarcity of factual hints in this direction, the critical issue of “trauma” remains more or less open to debate.

In Sparta, boys associated with their mentors from age 12 (Bethe, 1907:p444/1983:p13). Cantarella (1988 [1992:p36-44])[29] concludes that there were three socially distinct age groups. Until 12, the boy should not be interfered with in “any kind” of relationship, though no punishment is known to have been institutional. Until 14/15, relationships were permissible but only in the context of a lasting emotional link. Until 18, then, a freeborn boy was considered to be able to choose his lovers freely. In his Historia Animalium, Aristotle mentions the age of 14 at which sexual control needs to take its place: “Girls who abandon themselves to pleasures when they are still very young become ever more lascivious, and the same is true for boys […] This happens because on the one hand the passages are dilated, facilitating bodily secretions along these paths, and on the other hand because the memory of pleasure experienced brings forth the desire to renew the connection which accompanied this pleasure”[30].

Female Paiderastia?

Calame[31] believes that in Sparta homosexual relationships existed between girls and older women. His best piece of evidence is a passage in Plutarch’s Life of Lycurgus 18.9, where Plutarch reports that the Spartans were so impressed by the beneficial effects of the male pederastic relationships that they encouraged “noble women” (kalas kai agathas gunaikas) to have erotic relations with girls (parthenon eran). The question is, however, how reliable this report is. In the French original Calame adduced as evidence another passage by the fourth century B.C.E. philosopher Hagnon, who maintains that it was the custom in Sparta to have intercourse with girls before their marriage as with paidika, but Calame now admits that this passage most likely refers to intercourse by men with young women (p254n169). It is not impossible that Plutarch, or his source, misread such statements by Hagnon or others in the same way, and inferred that the Spartans had instituted pederastic relationships between older women and girls similar to those of the men. Plato, in his Symposium, recognised female bisexuality, as did Plutarch when he remarked that “at Sparta love was held in such honor that even the most respectable women became infatuated with girls”.

A similar note from Pomeroy (2002:p29, orig. footnotes)[32]:

“Plutarch (Lyc. 18.4) reports that erotic ties between older and younger women were common. In Alcman, Parthenion 1.73, the girls mention visiting Aenesimbrota, who is probably a purveyor of love magic. She would provide drugs, spells, and magical devices to attract the object of desire[33]. Hagnon of Tarsus, an Academic philosopher of the second century B.C.E., states that before marriage it was customary for Spartans to associate with virgin girls as with paidika (young boyfriends)[34]”.

Argues Klinck (2005)[35],

“Although many modern scholars believe Sappho's relationships were egalitarian and same-age, the collective evidence of her own poetry together with the ancient testimonia and commentaries does not support that inference”.

Further refs.:

§  Reames-Zimmerman, J. (1999) An Atypical Affair? Alexander the Great, Hephaistion Amyntoros and the Nature of their Relationship, Ancient Hist Bull 13,3:81-96

See also Europe, Historical Matters page

Selected additional refs.:

For an excellent bibliography consider “Bibliotheca Erotica Graeca et Latina: Erotismo y Sexualidad en la Antigüedad Clásica: Ensayo de un Repertorio Bibliográfico” [http://webpersonal.uma.es/de/JFMARTOS/BEGLintro.htm et seq.]. Also consider the exhaustive Thomas K. Hubbard’s HOMOSEXUALITY IN GREECE AND ROME: a sourcebook of basic documents in translation, University of California Press, 2003 [http://www.utexas.edu/courses/cc348hubbard/]. See also bibliography 3 in Volume 3.

§  Arkins, B. (1994) Sexuality in fifth-century Athens, Classics Ireland 1:18-34 [http://www.ucd.ie/~classics/94/Arkins94.html]

§  Bethe, E. (1907) Die dorische Knabenliebe. Ihre Ethik und ihre Idee, Rheinisches Mus f Philol [Frankfurt am Main] 62:438-76. Reprinted in Dynes, W. R. & Donaldson, S. (Eds.) Homosexuality in the Ancient World, New York / London: Garland, p10-48; and in Siems, A. K. (Ed.) Sexualität und Erotik in der Antike. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, p17-57

§  Beyer, R. (1910) Fabulae Graecae quatenus quave aetate puerorum amore commutatae sint. Dissertation, Leipzig [Latin]

§  Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg, G. (1987) New research into the Greek institution of pederasty, in One-off Publication of the International Scientific Conference on Gay and Lesbian Studies «Homosexuality: Which Homosexuality?» December 15-18 1987, Amsterdam, 1987 (= History, vol. 2), p50-8

§  Bremmer, J. M. (1988) Greek pederasty and modern homosexuality, in Bremmer, J. (Ed.) Van Sappho tot De Sade: Momenten in de Geschiedenis van de Seksualiteit. Amsterdam: Wereldbibliotheek, p1-14

§  Bremmer, J. M. (1990) Adolescents, Symposion, and Pederasty, in Murray, O. (Ed.) Sympotica: A Symposium on the Symposion, Oxford, p135-48

§  Brioso Sanchez, M. (1999) La pederastia en la novela griega antigua, Excerpta Philologica [Servicio de publicaciones de la Universidad, Cádiz] 9:7-50

§  Cartledge, P. (1981) The politics of Spartan pederasty, PCPhS 207 (N. S. 27:17-36. Reprinted with Addendum in Siems, A. K. (Ed.) Sexualität und Erotik in der Antike. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, p385-415

§  Cohen David (Nov., 1991) Law, Society and Homosexuality in Classical Athens: Reply, Past & Present 133:184-94

§  Davidson, J. (forthc.) The Greeks and Greek Love. Weidenfeld & Nicolson

§  Devereux, G. (1967) Greek Pseudo-Homosexuality and the “Greek Miracle”, Symbolae Osloenses 42:69-92. French reprint: La pseudo homosexualité grecque et le “miracle grec”, Ethnopsychiatrica 2(1979),2:211-41

§  DeVries, Keith (1997) The 'Frigid Eromenoi' and Their Wooers Revisited: A Closer Look at Greek Homosexuality in Vase Painting, in Duberman, Martin (Ed.) Queer Representations: Reading Lives, Reading Cultures. New York: New York University Press, p14-24

§  Döbler, H. (1971) Kultur- und Sittengeschichte der Welt. Eros Sexus Sitte. Verlagsgruppe Bertelsmann

§  Ellis, H. (1927) Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume II: Sexual Inversion. 3^rd ed.  [http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/3/6/1/13611/13611-8.txt]

§  Foucault, Michel & Hurley, Robert (Summer, 1985) Erotics, October 33:3-30

§  Halperin, D. M. (1989) Sex before sexuality: Pederasty, politics and power in classical Athens, in M. Duberman, M. Vicinus, G. Chauncey (Eds.) Hidden from History: Reclaiming the Gay and Lesbian Past, p37-53

§  Halperin, David M. (1997) Questions of Evidence: Commentary on Koehl, DeVries, and Williams, in Duberman, Martin (Ed.) Queer Representations: Reading Lives, Reading Cultures. New York: New York University Press, p39-54

§  Haworth, M. (2005) The Grooming of Athletes: Seeing in the Greek Symposium. “Building knowledge of the past and present through acts of seeing”, A conference hosted by the Archaeology Center at Stanford University, February 4–6, 2005 [http://traumwerk.stanford.edu:3455/SeeingThePast/admin/download.html?attachid=100906]

§  Hindley, C. (Nov., 1991) Law, Society and Homosexuality in Classical Athens, Past & Present 133:167-83

§  Hubbard, Thomas (2005) Pindar’s Tenth Olympian and Athlete-Trainer Pederasty, Journal of Homosexuality, Vol. 49, Nos. 3/4. Published simultaneously as Same-Sex Desire and Love in Greco-Roman Antiquity and in the Classical Tradition of the West. Edited by Beert C. Verstraete. Haworth Press

§  Hupperts, Ch. A. M.  (1988) Greek Love: Homosexuality or Paederasty? Greek Love in Black Figure Vase-Painting, in Christiansen, J. & Melander, T. (Eds.) Proceedings of the 3rd Symposium on Ancient Greek and Related Pottery. Copenhague, p255-68

§  Klabunde, M. (1998) Symmetry Braking: The Discussion of the Advantages and Disadvantages of Boys vs. Women as Sex Partners in the Second Century. Thesis, University of Cincinnati

§  Koehl, Robert B. (1997) "Ephoros and Ritualized Homosexuality in Bronze Age Crete, in Duberman, Martin (Ed.) Queer Representations: Reading Lives, Reading Cultures. New York: New York University Press, p7-13

§  Konstan, D. (2000a) The Pre-pubescent Lover in Greek Literature <http://www.stoa.org/diotima/essays/konstan2.pdf> [forthcoming as “El amante adolescente”, in López, J. A. F. (Ed.) El Amor en la Literatura Griega. Madrid, 2001?] [p3 missing]

§  Konstan, D. (2000b) Enacting Eros <http://www.stoa.org/diotima/essays/konstan3.pdf> [forthcoming in Nussbaum, M. & Sihvola, J. (Eds.) The Nights of Reason: Erotic Experience and Sexual Ethics in Ancient Greece and Rome. Chicago, 2001?]

§  Konstan, D. (2002) The prehistory of sexuality: Foucault's route to classical antiquity, Intertexts 6,1:8 et seq.

§  Krenkel, W. A. (1979) Paederastie, Der Kleine Pauly [Stuttgart] 4:1583-4

§  Krenkel, W. A. (1979) Pueri meritorii, WZ Rostock 28:179-89

§  Kroll, W. (1922) Knabenliebe, Pauly’s Realencycl Classisch Altertumswiss 11,1:897-906

§  Kroll, W. (1927) Freundschaft und Knabenliebe. Munich. Tusculum-Schriften; 4

§  Lambert, M. (2004) Cruel boys and ageing men. The paederastic poems in the Theocritean corpus, AClass 47:75-85

§  Marrou, H. (1965) Histoire de l’Éducation dans l’Antiquité. Paris: Points-Seuil [p61-73]

§  Patzer, H. (1982) Die Griechische Knabenliebe. Wiesbaden: Steiner

§  Percy III, William Armstrong (2005) Reconsiderations About Greek Homosexuality, Journal of Homosexuality, Vol. 49, Nos. 3/4. Published simultaneously as Same-Sex Desire and Love in Greco-Roman Antiquity and in the Classical Tradition of the West. Edited by Beert C. Verstraete. Haworth Press

§  Provencal, Vernon (2005) Glukus Himeros: Pederastic Influence on the Myth of Ganymede, Journal of Homosexuality, Vol. 49, Nos. 3/4. Published simultaneously as Same-Sex Desire and Love in Greco-Roman Antiquity and in the Classical Tradition of the West. Edited by Beert C. Verstraete. Haworth Press

§  Rettig, G. F. (1882) Knabenliebe und Frauenliebe in Platons Symposion, Philologus 41:414-44

§  Reynen, H. (1967) Philosophie und Knabenliebe, Hermes [Stuttgart] 95:308-16

§  Rind, Bruce (2005) Pederasty: An Integration of Cross-Cultural, Cross-Species, and Empirical Data, Journal of Homosexuality, Vol. 49, Nos. 3/4. Published simultaneously as Same-Sex Desire and Love in Greco-Roman Antiquity and in the Classical Tradition of the West. Edited by Beert C. Verstraete. Haworth Press

§  Scanlon, Thomas (2005) The Dispersion of Pederasty and the Athletic Revolution in Sixth-Century BC Greece, Journal of Homosexuality, Vol. 49, Nos. 3/4. Published simultaneously as Same-Sex Desire and Love in Greco-Roman Antiquity and in the Classical Tradition of the West. Edited by Beert C. Verstraete. Haworth Press

§  Schertel, E. [ca. 1920] Knabenliebe und Erziehung. Berlin: Pergamon

§  Semenov, A. (1911) Zur dorischen Knabenliebe, Philologus 70:146-50

§  Skinner, M. (2005) Sexuality in Greek and Roman Culture. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.

§  Stroh, W. (1992) Musa puerilis: Die Knabenliebe in der klassischen Dichtung der Römer, in Stemmler (1992:p69-87). Reprinted in Leonhardt, J. & Ott, G. (Eds., 2000) Apocrypha: Entlegene Schriften. Stuttgart: Steiner, p28-42

§  Symonds, J. A. (1873-1897) A Problem in Greek Ethics. Privately published, expanded and included as an Appendix in Ellis, H. & Symonds, J. A. (1897) Sexual Inversion. London: Wilson & MacMillan

§  Vanggaard, T. (1972) Phallos: A Symbol and its History in the Male World. London: J. Cape

§  Verstraete, Beert C. (Ed.) (2005) Same-Sex Desire and Love in Greco-Roman Antiquity and in the Classical Tradition of the West. Haworth Press

§  Vrettos, J. (1985) Lehrer-Schüler-Interaktion bei Platon: Die pädagogische Bedeutung von Eros und Dialog. Series Europäische Hochschulschriften: Pädagogik. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang Verlag

§  Williams, Craig A. (1997) Pudicitia and Pueri: Roman Concepts of Male Sexual Experience, in Duberman, Martin (Ed.) Queer Representations: Reading Lives, Reading Cultures. New York: New York University Press, p25-38

§  Yates, Velvet Lenore (2005) Anterastai : Competition in Eros and Politics in Classical Athens, Arethusa 38,1:33-47

Janssen, D. F., Growing Up Sexually. Volume I. World Reference Atlas. 0.2 ed. 2004. Berlin: Magnus Hirschfeld Archive for Sexology

Last revised: Jul 2005