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Pederasty in Ancient Greece

• Message 1. 

  Posted by SafricanAndy (U7173046) on Monday, 15th December 2008

  Just finished reading Plato's Symposium where there is a hint at this...How prevalent was this and do we have any sources besides ceramics and philosophers...

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• Message 2

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  Posted by Vixkrater (U12742005) on Tuesday, 16th December 2008

  You may find some answers here
  
  
  
  I'm waiting for the paperback

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• Message 3

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  Posted by SafricanAndy (U7173046) on Tuesday, 16th December 2008

  Interesting....I will look out for that....

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  Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Saturday, 20th December 2008

  SafricanAndy, that is yet another area of great distortion of Greek history but really I do not mind it as much as the greatest of all (the one that thinks Greek history started with Ö÷²¥´óÐãr, continued with the random history of a few city-states - thus whoever spoke and felt Greek was not a Greek unless he gathered in lodges to talk philosophy and mathematics (!)... and ended with Roman conquest)....
  
  Yet another time, modern issues run back to find an example in a "more noble, more civilised" society. Well so did Nazis anyway and found "easily" arguments to support their theories, can we accuse the ancient Greeks of being Nazis?
  
  It is naturally to suppose that Greeks societies had as many homosexuals as any other society patriarchical or mitriarchical modern or old, progressive or regressive. And it is natural to imagine that out of the 1000s of Greek writers that left us behind 10,000s of documents we may find references to homosexuality. However on these we have certainly to add the 100,000 of copyists (like christian monks for example) that copied ancient works to be "saved" to us so today we practically have no real original of any of these texts and we know that 1) most copyists of the early-mid christian era actually were actually biased against Greeks 2) homosexual copyists would use ancient texts as a refuge 3) the copyists often translated badly texts confusing meanings like "agapi", "erotas", "filia", "desmos" to the point that for example the very manly bonding (no different to what happens to modern soldiers) of Theban or Spartan soldiers was accused by enemies (and of course later by Asians suffering of symptoms of inferiority as being homosexual. Romans initialy took part in accusing Greeks so but then soon they became themselves the object of ridicule of conquered people. Had Romans gone more gay? No, they simply became the ruling class and naturally the ruled class used the "accusation of homosexuality" in the same way it is used today by so many people showing that back then it was not anymore accepted that in any later times.
  
  What about myths? They really talk about 2-3 cases of clear homosexual relationships without condemning them clearly! Yes! And they also really talk about 2-3 cases of child-killing, even man-eating and raping and these acts were not clearly condemned either! So Greek societies accepted killing, man-eating and raping? Well as much as they accepted homosexuality.
  
  What is interesting to note is that like the vast majority of societies on this planet, the word homosexual did not exist for the simple reason that only "not-so-kind" words like "katapygon" would be used instead for those that accepted the passive role. The ones with the active role were not considered anything, they remained in the category of men - usually their active role was a proof of domination just like what happens in prisons today as well as in so many regressive societies. It is also interesting that you mentioned pottery Andy - do not think that these vases depicting such acts would be found in the living room of any family-house. Pottery was a huge business back then not only for practical purposes like storing olive oil but also for being used for jokes and rude farses... from where it comes the modern Greek expression "to break a plate ("plaka" in later greek)" (and possibly the french "blague").
  
  I do not want to dissapoint people of homosexual orientation whose issues I understand and respect but really I think they have chosen the wrong examples! Had they chosen the most liberal of ancient greek societies and brought to today their customs they would just invite their own hell! They would instantly lose their citizenship, lose their right to speak in courts and sue others (while if sued by others, 90% of chances they would be found guilty since they would be judged in a status perhaps lower of women) and if they were found to had occupied political positions hiding their sexual identity they risked death penalty! Of course the fact that they would become the "fools of the village" was the minimum, at least once in a while they would receive gifts such as a decorated free-vase outside their door!
  
  Again I am sorry if a pull any sensitive string here, I am not any puritan or something and I am in for total sexual freedom among adults but then talking whatever on history is not any helpful either, for any purpose noble or not!

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• Message 5

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  Posted by Xenos5 (U1814603) on Saturday, 20th December 2008

  Nik
  
  Perhaps something is getting lost in translation here. In English 'pederast' is not synonymous with 'homosexual'. The former is an abusive man/boy relationship, activity or assualt. The latter is simply a same-sex relationship.
  
  It is sometimes ignorance which confuses the two words and concepts. But it is sometimes a political position adopted by a writer or speaker to equate homosexuality with an abuse of boys by men.
  
  Xenos

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  Posted by Nik (U1777139) on Sunday, 21st December 2008

  Well if you want to go by the words and their meanings then I have to add that the word paidi = child, thus it could be either a girl or a boy. For the former the sexual intercourse is heretosexual, for the latter homosexual. However as young girls back then were considered at marriage age as early as 12 years old and for engagement even earlier (actually Greek girls were quite late at 16 or 18 for some, given the general standards), the word came to be used singlehandedly for the homosexual intercourse of man-boy and thus when the word was passed in foreign languages it actually meant any homosexual relationship regardles of age of participants while in modern Greek language it remains with its original "correct" meaning along of course the other word "paidophilos" which is used less.
  
  It is nice though that you state that it is often political positions that equate homosexuality - which is of course a wider expression of human sexuality - with paederasty (in its original meaning, i.e. paedophilia). But what I am saying above is that in a similar way it is actually the various political positions that led people to accuse or as-if praise ancient Greek societies of being tolerant to homosexuality. The reality is that they were not. It is not that they would be any paranoid (christian-like) or make any holy war against them - they just did not care much and they certainly would not enter in people's beds to see what they were doing, but then the slightest public knowledge of one's passive homosexual relationship would simply mean his end of political and social life there is no doubt about that. Whoever has other opinion on that sould rather refer to everyday examples like what happened to clown Demosthenis when he tried to sue Aeshunis for treason and what did Aeshunis do to him and how he got his tail between his legs and abandoned the ridiculous charge in fear of being executed or at best ostracised...

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• Message 7

  , in reply to message 4.

  Posted by Sir Gar Hywel dda (U13786187) on Tuesday, 20th January 2009

  They really talk about 2-3 cases of clear homosexual relationships without condemning them clearly! Yes! And they also really talk about 2-3 cases of child-killing, even man-eating and raping and these acts were not clearly condemned either! So Greek societies accepted killing, man-eating and raping? Well as much as they accepted homosexuality. 
  
  A Society which has child monks mingling with adult monks, or the same difference with nuns, is bound to have a problem such as the question raises.
  
  In any monastic, or nunastic, society there are also bound to be strong home-erotic ties between the participants.
  
  It is observable in other animals that when they are deprived of the natural two genders, they form a substitute gender.
  
  Some of the societies/states in the world possess aspects of life which are not considered acceptable by the so called more civilised, even now.
  
  The older I get the more I think that 'civilisation' is merely an alternative method of organisation, with a different jargon and terminology, but not a better sociological one, at all.

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