https://www.boywiki.org/en/api.php?action=feedcontributions&feedformat=atom&user=EdmundBoyWiki - User contributions [en]2026-06-20T13:57:17ZUser contributionsMediaWiki 1.45.3https://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14110Commodus2014-10-19T08:43:35Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div><br />
Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
<br />
==Life==<br />
[[File:Bust of Commodus.JPG|thumb|right|Bust of Commodus]]<br />
He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
<br />
His father raised him with great care, "summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2]</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3]</ref> <br />
<br />
His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXI 36 4]</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
<br />
Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, who commanded the troops, he tried in vain to draw into lewdness, and he thereafter plotted against Julianus.”<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III]</ref><br />
<br />
Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
<br />
The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty."<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4]</ref><br />
<br />
His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
<br />
<br />
==Death==<br />
<br />
On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
<br />
The contemporary historian Herodian summed up Commodus thus:<br />
<blockquote> <br />
“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
</blockquote> <br />
<br />
Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
<br />
==In film==<br />
<br />
Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14109Commodus2014-10-19T06:32:06Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div><br />
Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
<br />
==Life==<br />
[[File:Bust of Commodus.JPG|thumb|right|Bust of Commodus]]<br />
He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
<br />
His father raised him with great care, "summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2]</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3]</ref> <br />
<br />
His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXI 36 4]</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
<br />
Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, the commander of the troops, he tried to lead into debauchery, but in vain, and he thereupon plotted against Julianus.” .<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III]</ref><br />
<br />
Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
<br />
The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty."<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4]</ref><br />
<br />
His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
<br />
<br />
==Death==<br />
<br />
On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
<br />
The contemporary historian Herodian summed up Commodus thus:<br />
<blockquote> <br />
“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
</blockquote> <br />
<br />
Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
<br />
==In film==<br />
<br />
Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Augustus&diff=14058Augustus2014-10-10T04:11:05Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>Imperator Caesar Divi Filius '''Augustus''' (63 BC – AD 14) is reckoned to have been the first [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 27 BC, when the Roman Senate gave him the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus.<br />
<br />
==Public life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Rome on 23 September 63 BC, the only son and initially namesake of Caius Octavius, Governor of Macedonia, of an equestrian family, and his second wife Atia Balba, niece of C. Julius Caesar. His father died when he was four, after which he was brought up first by his maternal grandmother, then by his mother.<br />
<br />
In 46 BC, he was shipwrecked on his way to Spain to join Caesar, by this time childless and Dictator for life. After coming ashore, he continued “over roads beset by the enemy with only a very few companions, … and thereby greatly endeared himself to Caesar, who soon formed a high opinion of his character over and above the energy with which he had made the journey.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> VIII 1]</ref> He then came so much into his favour that, following Caesar’s assassination on 15 March 44 BC, he was found to have been adopted as his heir in his will, and therefore assumed his names, though still often referred to as Octavian(us).<br />
<br />
Mark Antony, once at least he had become Octavian’s principal foe, alleged that his elevation was due to the teenage boy having granted his great-uncle sexual favours, and Antony’s brother Lucius further claimed “that after sacrificing his honour to Caesar he had given himself to Aulus Hirtius in Spain for three hundred thousand sesterces, and that he used to singe his legs with red-hot nutshells, to make the hair grow softer.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXVIII]</ref> However, even Suetonius, whose biographical accounts of the early Roman Emperors are full of salacious gossip, opined that this was too out of character to be more than political slander;<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXXI]</ref> little could be more socially damning than for a freeborn Roman male to give himself passively to a man except than to do so for material incentives.<br />
<br />
After an initial power struggle with Antony for leadership of the Caesarian party, Octavian allied with him and Lepidus to form the second triumvirate or rule of three to rule Rome. The triumvirs proceeded to “proscribe” more than two thousand hostile senators and equestrians, which meant to outlaw them, confiscate their possessions and execute such as they caught. Amongst them was M. Favonius, in the auction of whose goods, his “puer delicatus” or catamite, Sarmentus, was bought by Octavian. <ref>Scholiast to Dec. Junius Juvenalis <i>Satires</i> V 3</ref> <br />
<br />
The triumvirs’ decisive victory over Caesar’s assassins at the battle of Philippi in 42 BC led to a territorial division of the empire with Italy, Gaul and Spain under Octavian’s control, but this soon led to a power struggle. The weak Lepidus was easily dismissed into obscurity, and attempts to patch over the rivalry between Octavian and Antony through a marriage alliance between the latter and the former’s sister proved a failure when Antony eloped with and scandalously married Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt. The ensuing civil war ended with Octavian’s decisive victory at Actium in 30 BC, soon followed by the suicides of Antony and Cleopatra.<br />
<br />
Thus left in sole control of the Roman Empire, Octavian maintained the formalities of a republic while effectively gaining a monarchical control symbolised by the Senate’s bestowal in 27 BC of the epithet Augustus, by which he and his successors were thereafter known, though he alone is generally now known by this name. As such, he wielded unchallenged power until his death at Nola on 19 August AD 14 aged nearly seventy-six, having done much in the intervening decades to heal the wounds of decades of civil war and inaugurate badly-needed reforms of many kinds. He was much revered: the then sixth month of the year was renamed August in his honour during his lifetime, and he was proclaimed a god soon after his death.<br />
<br />
==Private life==<br />
<br />
Augustus married thrice, all in his youth. He divorced his first wife, Clodia Pulchra, a step-daughter of Antony, before the marriage had been consummated. In his own words, “unable to put up with her shrewish disposition”, he divorced his second wife Scribonia after only a year, the same day, 30 October 39 BC, she gave birth to his only child, Julia. He then “at once took Livia Drusilla from her husband Tiberius Nero, although she was with child at the time; and he loved and esteemed her to the end without a rival.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXII]</ref> They had “no children at all, although he earnestly desired issue. One baby was conceived, but was prematurely born.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXIII]</ref><br />
<br />
Through her marriage to him, Livia exercised unprecedented power and influence for a Roman woman, so much so that she was eventually able to secure the succession of her own son [[Tiberius]] rather than his surviving grandson or other blood relations. “When someone asked her how she had obtained such a commanding influence over Augustus, she answered that it was by being scrupulously chaste herself, doing gladly whatever pleased him, not meddling with any of his affairs, and, in particular, by pretending neither to hear nor to notice the favourites of his passion." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=58.2&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LVIII.2.5]</ref><br />
<br />
Typically of the Roman male of his era, Augustus was as sexually involved with boys as with females. In 30 BC, Antony’s supporter Q. Dellius defected critically to Caesar, as Augustus was then called, giving as his reason that “he had offended Cleopatra at supper by saying that while sour wine was served to them, Sarmentus, at Rome, was drinking Falernian. Sarmentus was one of the little boy playthings of Caesar, such as the Romans call 'deliciae.'" <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, <i>Life of Antony</i> 59]</ref> Sarmentus being so well-remembered as Caesar’s catamite twelve years after he was acquired for that obvious purpose in a public auction illustrates how little need to disguise his involvement with boys was felt by a public figure generally careful of his reputation. It should be noted, however, that all the boys Augustus is known to have been sexually involved with appear to have been slaves, a vital distinction between him and his successors Tiberius and Caligula, who offended Roman sensibilities through sexual activity with freeborn boys.<br />
<br />
Much of the high public reputation of Augustus’s private life rested on his adoption of the traditional Roman virtue of frugality. The way he perhaps compromised this most was in lack of sexual self-restraint. “He could not dispose of the charge of lustfulness and they say that even in his later years he was fond of deflowering maidens, who were brought together for him from all quarters, even by his own wife.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXXI]</ref> “And though he was much at table or drink, to a certain degree, in fact, abstaining from sleep, he nevertheless used to gratify his lust to the extent of the dishonour of his public reputation. For he was accustomed to lie among twelve catamites and an equal number of girls.” <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22]</ref> Taken together, these two judgements illustrate how excessive indulgence in any kind of lust was thought a fault, but whether a man’s sexual partner was a boy or female was a matter of indifference to others as well as, it would sometimes appear, himself.<br />
<br />
Augustus’s sexual life is an exemplary illustration of many Roman mores pertinent to pederasty, mores with broad implications for human sexuality in general: the Roman male’s freedom from censure in enjoying sex with slave-boys as well as females when not carried to excess, his propensity to want both without even a marked preference, and the compatibility of indulging in publicly-known pederasty with an exceptionally successful marriage.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14057Commodus2014-10-10T04:05:16Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div><br />
Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
<br />
==Life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
<br />
His father raised him with great care, "summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2]</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3]</ref> <br />
<br />
His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXII 36 4]</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
<br />
Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, the commander of the troops, he tried to lead into debauchery, but in vain, and he thereupon plotted against Julianus.” .<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III]</ref><br />
<br />
Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
<br />
The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty."<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4]</ref><br />
<br />
His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
<br />
<br />
==Death==<br />
<br />
On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
<br />
The contemporary historian Herodian summed up Commodus thus:<br />
<blockquote> <br />
“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
</blockquote> <br />
<br />
Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
<br />
==In film==<br />
<br />
Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14056Commodus2014-10-10T04:04:08Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div><br />
Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
<br />
==Life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
<br />
His father raised him with great care, "summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2]</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3]</ref> <br />
<br />
His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXII 36 4]</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
<br />
Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, the commander of the troops, he tried to lead into debauchery, but in vain, and he thereupon plotted against Julianus.” .<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III]</ref><br />
<br />
Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
<br />
The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty."<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4]</ref><br />
<br />
His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
<br />
<br />
==Death==<br />
<br />
On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
<br />
The contemporary historian Herodian summed up Commodus thus:<br />
<br />
<blockquote> <br />
“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
</blockquote> <br />
<br />
Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
<br />
==In film==<br />
<br />
Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14055Commodus2014-10-10T03:49:59Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div><br />
Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
<br />
==Life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
<br />
His father raised him with great care, "summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2]</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3]</ref> <br />
<br />
His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXII 36 4]</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
<br />
Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, the commander of the troops, he tried to lead into debauchery, but in vain, and he thereupon plotted against Julianus.” .<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III]</ref><br />
<br />
Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
<br />
The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty."<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4]</ref><br />
<br />
His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
<br />
<br />
==Death==<br />
<br />
On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
<br />
“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref> Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
<br />
==In film==<br />
<br />
Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14054Commodus2014-10-10T03:45:54Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div><br />
Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
<br />
==Life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
<br />
His father raised him with great care, "summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2]</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3]</ref> <br />
<br />
His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXII 36 4]</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
<br />
Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, the commander of the troops, he tried to lead into debauchery, but in vain, and he thereupon plotted against Julianus.” .<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III]</ref><br />
<br />
Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving.the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
<br />
The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty.<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4]</ref><br />
<br />
His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
<br />
<br />
==Death==<br />
<br />
On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref><br />
<br />
“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17]</ref> Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
<br />
==In film==<br />
<br />
Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Augustus&diff=14051Augustus2014-10-09T15:59:03Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>Imperator Caesar Divi Filius '''Augustus''' (63 BC – AD 14) is reckoned to have been the first [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 27 BC, when the Roman Senate gave him the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus.<br />
<br />
==Public life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Rome on 23 September 63 BC, the only son and initially namesake of Caius Octavius, Governor of Macedonia, of an equestrian family, and his second wife Atia Balba, niece of C. Julius Caesar. His father died when he was four, after which he was brought up first by his maternal grandmother, then by his mother.<br />
<br />
In 46 BC, he was shipwrecked on his way to Spain to join Caesar, by this time childless and Dictator for life. After coming ashore, he continued “over roads beset by the enemy with only a very few companions, … and thereby greatly endeared himself to Caesar, who soon formed a high opinion of his character over and above the energy with which he had made the journey.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html] C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> VIII 1</ref> He then came so much into his favour that, following Caesar’s assassination on 15 March 44 BC, he was found to have been adopted as his heir in his will, and therefore assumed his names, though still often referred to as Octavian(us).<br />
<br />
Mark Antony, once at least he had become Octavian’s principal foe, alleged that his elevation was due to the teenage boy having granted his great-uncle sexual favours, and Antony’s brother Lucius further claimed “that after sacrificing his honour to Caesar he had given himself to Aulus Hirtius in Spain for three hundred thousand sesterces, and that he used to singe his legs with red-hot nutshells, to make the hair grow softer.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html] C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXVIII</ref> However, even Suetonius, whose biographical accounts of the early Roman Emperors are full of salacious gossip, opined that this was too out of character to be more than political slander;<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html] C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXXI</ref> little could be more socially damning than for a freeborn Roman male to give himself passively to a man except than to do so for material incentives.<br />
<br />
After an initial power struggle with Antony for leadership of the Caesarian party, Octavian allied with him and Lepidus to form the second triumvirate or rule of three to rule Rome. The triumvirs proceeded to “proscribe” more than two thousand hostile senators and equestrians, which meant to outlaw them, confiscate their possessions and execute such as they caught. Amongst them was M. Favonius, in the auction of whose goods, his “puer delicatus” or catamite, Sarmentus, was bought by Octavian. <ref>Scholiast to Dec. Junius Juvenalis <i>Satires</i> V 3</ref> <br />
<br />
The triumvirs’ decisive victory over Caesar’s assassins at the battle of Philippi in 42 BC led to a territorial division of the empire with Italy, Gaul and Spain under Octavian’s control, but this soon led to a power struggle. The weak Lepidus was easily dismissed into obscurity, and attempts to patch over the rivalry between Octavian and Antony through a marriage alliance between the latter and the former’s sister proved a failure when Antony eloped with and scandalously married Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt. The ensuing civil war ended with Octavian’s decisive victory at Actium in 30 BC, soon followed by the suicides of Antony and Cleopatra.<br />
<br />
Thus left in sole control of the Roman Empire, Octavian maintained the formalities of a republic while effectively gaining a monarchical control symbolised by the Senate’s bestowal in 27 BC of the epithet Augustus, by which he and his successors were thereafter known, though he alone is generally now known by this name. As such, he wielded unchallenged power until his death at Nola on 19 August AD 14 aged nearly seventy-six, having done much in the intervening decades to heal the wounds of decades of civil war and inaugurate badly-needed reforms of many kinds. He was much revered: the then sixth month of the year was renamed August in his honour during his lifetime, and he was proclaimed a god soon after his death.<br />
<br />
==Private life==<br />
<br />
Augustus married thrice, all in his youth. He divorced his first wife, Clodia Pulchra, a step-daughter of Antony, before the marriage had been consummated. In his own words, “unable to put up with her shrewish disposition”, he divorced his second wife Scribonia after only a year, the same day, 30 October 39 BC, she gave birth to his only child, Julia. He then “at once took Livia Drusilla from her husband Tiberius Nero, although she was with child at the time; and he loved and esteemed her to the end without a rival.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html] C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXII</ref> They had “no children at all, although he earnestly desired issue. One baby was conceived, but was prematurely born.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html] C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXIII</ref><br />
<br />
Through her marriage to him, Livia exercised unprecedented power and influence for a Roman woman, so much so that she was eventually able to secure the succession of her own son [[Tiberius]] rather than his surviving grandson or other blood relations. “When someone asked her how she had obtained such a commanding influence over Augustus, she answered that it was by being scrupulously chaste herself, doing gladly whatever pleased him, not meddling with any of his affairs, and, in particular, by pretending neither to hear nor to notice the favourites of his passion." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=58.2&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593] Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LVIII.2.5</ref><br />
<br />
Typically of the Roman male of his era, Augustus was as sexually involved with boys as with females. In 30 BC, Antony’s supporter Q. Dellius defected critically to Caesar, as Augustus was then called, giving as his reason that “he had offended Cleopatra at supper by saying that while sour wine was served to them, Sarmentus, at Rome, was drinking Falernian. Sarmentus was one of the little boy playthings of Caesar, such as the Romans call "deliciae." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077] Plutarch, <i>Life of Antony</i> 59</ref> Sarmentus being so well-remembered as Caesar’s catamite twelve years after he was acquired for that obvious purpose in a public auction illustrates how little need to disguise his involvement with boys was felt by a public figure generally careful of his reputation. It should be noted, however, that all the boys Augustus is known to have been sexually involved with appear to have been slaves, a vital distinction between him and his successors Tiberius and Caligula, who offended Roman sensibilities through sexual activity with freeborn boys.<br />
<br />
Much of the high public reputation of Augustus’s private life rested on his adoption of the traditional Roman virtue of frugality. The way he perhaps compromised this most was in lack of sexual self-restraint. “He could not dispose of the charge of lustfulness and they say that even in his later years he was fond of deflowering maidens, who were brought together for him from all quarters, even by his own wife.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html] C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXXI</ref> “And though he was much at table or drink, to a certain degree, in fact, abstaining from sleep, he nevertheless used to gratify his lust to the extent of the dishonour of his public reputation. For he was accustomed to lie among twelve catamites and an equal number of girls.” <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html] Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref> Taken together, these two judgements illustrate how excessive indulgence in any kind of lust was thought a fault, but whether a man’s sexual partner was a boy or female was a matter of indifference to others as well, it would sometimes appear, of himself.<br />
<br />
Augustus’s sexual life is an exemplary illustration of many Roman mores pertinent to pederasty, mores with broad implications for human sexuality in general: the Roman male’s freedom from censure in enjoying sex with slave-boys as well as females when not carried to excess, his propensity to want both without even a marked preference, and the compatibility of indulging in publicly-known pederasty with an exceptionally successful marriage.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14050Commodus2014-10-09T15:54:47Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div><br />
Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
<br />
==Life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
<br />
“Commodus, his father reared with great care, summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2] Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3] Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3</ref> <br />
<br />
His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593] Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXII 36 4</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
<br />
Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, the commander of the troops, he tried to lead into debauchery, but in vain, and he thereupon plotted against Julianus.” .<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html] Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III</ref><br />
<br />
Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving.the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
<br />
The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty.<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html] Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4</ref><br />
<br />
His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
<br />
<br />
==Death==<br />
<br />
On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17] Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17</ref><br />
<br />
“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17] Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17</ref> Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
<br />
==In film==<br />
<br />
Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14049Commodus2014-10-09T15:52:53Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div><br />
Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
<br />
==Life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
<br />
“Commodus, his father reared with great care, summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2] Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3</ref> <br />
<br />
His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXII 36 4</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
<br />
Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, the commander of the troops, he tried to lead into debauchery, but in vain, and he thereupon plotted against Julianus.” .<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III</ref><br />
<br />
Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving.the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
<br />
The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty.<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4</ref><br />
<br />
His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
<br />
<br />
==Death==<br />
<br />
On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17</ref><br />
<br />
“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17</ref> Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
<br />
==In film==<br />
<br />
Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Augustus&diff=14047Augustus2014-10-09T13:31:21Z<p>Edmund: </p>
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<div>Imperator Caesar Divi Filius '''Augustus''' (63 BC – AD 14) is reckoned to have been the first [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 27 BC, when the Roman Senate gave him the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus.<br />
<br />
==Public life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Rome on 23 September 63 BC, the only son and initially namesake of Caius Octavius, Governor of Macedonia, of an equestrian family, and his second wife Atia Balba, niece of C. Julius Caesar. His father died when he was four, after which he was brought up first by his maternal grandmother, then by his mother.<br />
<br />
In 46 BC, he was shipwrecked on his way to Spain to join Caesar, by this time childless and Dictator for life. After coming ashore, he continued “over roads beset by the enemy with only a very few companions, … and thereby greatly endeared himself to Caesar, who soon formed a high opinion of his character over and above the energy with which he had made the journey.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> VIII 1</ref> He then came so much into his favour that, following Caesar’s assassination on 15 March 44 BC, he was found to have been adopted as his heir in his will, and therefore assumed his names, though still often referred to as Octavian(us).<br />
<br />
Mark Antony, once at least he had become Octavian’s principal foe, alleged that his elevation was due to the teenage boy having granted his great-uncle sexual favours, and Antony’s brother Lucius further claimed “that after sacrificing his honour to Caesar he had given himself to Aulus Hirtius in Spain for three hundred thousand sesterces, and that he used to singe his legs with red-hot nutshells, to make the hair grow softer.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXVIII</ref> However, even Suetonius, whose biographical accounts of the early Roman Emperors are full of salacious gossip, opined that this was too out of character to be more than political slander;<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXXI</ref> little could be more socially damning than for a freeborn Roman male to give himself passively to a man except than to do so for material incentives.<br />
<br />
After an initial power struggle with Antony for leadership of the Caesarian party, Octavian allied with him and Lepidus to form the second triumvirate or rule of three to rule Rome. The triumvirs proceeded to “proscribe” more than two thousand hostile senators and equestrians, which meant to outlaw them, confiscate their possessions and execute such as they caught. Amongst them was M. Favonius, in the auction of whose goods, his “puer delicatus” or catamite, Sarmentus, was bought by Octavian. <ref>Scholiast to Dec. Junius Juvenalis <i>Satires</i> V 3</ref> <br />
<br />
The triumvirs’ decisive victory over Caesar’s assassins at the battle of Philippi in 42 BC led to a territorial division of the empire with Italy, Gaul and Spain under Octavian’s control, but this soon led to a power struggle. The weak Lepidus was easily dismissed into obscurity, and attempts to patch over the rivalry between Octavian and Antony through a marriage alliance between the latter and the former’s sister proved a failure when Antony eloped with and scandalously married Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt. The ensuing civil war ended with Octavian’s decisive victory at Actium in 30 BC, soon followed by the suicides of Antony and Cleopatra.<br />
<br />
Thus left in sole control of the Roman Empire, Octavian maintained the formalities of a republic while effectively gaining a monarchical control symbolised by the Senate’s bestowal in 27 BC of the epithet Augustus, by which he and his successors were thereafter known, though he alone is generally now known by this name. As such, he wielded unchallenged power until his death at Nola on 19 August AD 14 aged nearly seventy-six, having done much in the intervening decades to heal the wounds of decades of civil war and inaugurate badly-needed reforms of many kinds. He was much revered: the then sixth month of the year was renamed August in his honour during his lifetime, and he was proclaimed a god soon after his death.<br />
<br />
==Private life==<br />
<br />
Augustus married thrice, all in his youth. He divorced his first wife, Clodia Pulchra, a step-daughter of Antony, before the marriage had been consummated. In his own words, “unable to put up with her shrewish disposition”, he divorced his second wife Scribonia after only a year, the same day, 30 October 39 BC, she gave birth to his only child, Julia. He then “at once took Livia Drusilla from her husband Tiberius Nero, although she was with child at the time; and he loved and esteemed her to the end without a rival.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXII</ref> They had “no children at all, although he earnestly desired issue. One baby was conceived, but was prematurely born.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXIII</ref><br />
<br />
Through her marriage to him, Livia exercised unprecedented power and influence for a Roman woman, so much so that she was eventually able to secure the succession of her own son [[Tiberius]] rather than his surviving grandson or other blood relations. “When someone asked her how she had obtained such a commanding influence over Augustus, she answered that it was by being scrupulously chaste herself, doing gladly whatever pleased him, not meddling with any of his affairs, and, in particular, by pretending neither to hear nor to notice the favourites of his passion." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=58.2&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LVIII.2.5</ref><br />
<br />
Typically of the Roman male of his era, Augustus was as sexually involved with boys as with females. In 30 BC, Antony’s supporter Q. Dellius defected critically to Caesar, as Augustus was then called, giving as his reason that “he had offended Cleopatra at supper by saying that while sour wine was served to them, Sarmentus, at Rome, was drinking Falernian. Sarmentus was one of the little boy playthings of Caesar, such as the Romans call "deliciae." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, <i>Life of Antony</i> 59</ref> Sarmentus being so well-remembered as Caesar’s catamite twelve years after he was acquired for that obvious purpose in a public auction illustrates how little need to disguise his involvement with boys was felt by a public figure generally careful of his reputation. It should be noted, however, that all the boys Augustus is known to have been sexually involved with appear to have been slaves, a vital distinction between him and his successors Tiberius and Caligula, who offended Roman sensibilities through sexual activity with freeborn boys.<br />
<br />
Much of the high public reputation of Augustus’s private life rested on his adoption of the traditional Roman virtue of frugality. The way he perhaps compromised this most was in lack of sexual self-restraint. “He could not dispose of the charge of lustfulness and they say that even in his later years he was fond of deflowering maidens, who were brought together for him from all quarters, even by his own wife.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, <i>Divus Augustus</i> LXXI</ref> “And though he was much at table or drink, to a certain degree, in fact, abstaining from sleep, he nevertheless used to gratify his lust to the extent of the dishonour of his public reputation. For he was accustomed to lie among twelve catamites and an equal number of girls.” <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref> Taken together, these two judgements illustrate how excessive indulgence in any kind of lust was thought a fault, but whether a man’s sexual partner was a boy or female was a matter of indifference to others as well, it would sometimes appear, of himself.<br />
<br />
Augustus’s sexual life is an exemplary illustration of many Roman mores pertinent to pederasty, mores with broad implications for human sexuality in general: the Roman male’s freedom from censure in enjoying sex with slave-boys as well as females when not carried to excess, his propensity to want both without even a marked preference, and the compatibility of indulging in publicly-known pederasty with an exceptionally successful marriage.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Commodus&diff=14046Commodus2014-10-09T13:15:58Z<p>Edmund: Created page with " Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole Roman Emperor from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father sin..."</p>
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Marcus Aurelius '''Commodus''' Antoninus Augustus (AD 161-192), was sole [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 180 until his death, having been co-Emperor with his father since 177.<br />
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==Life==<br />
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He was born in Lanuvium on 31 August 161, the only son to survive infancy of the thirteen or more children of the reigning Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his wife and first cousin Faustina. He was made Caesar on 12 October 166 and Imperator on 27 November 176. The following 1 January, he became at fifteen the youngest consul yet in Roman history, and later that year Augustus and thus theoretically the equal of his father, whose death on 17 March 180 left him in sole control of the empire.<br />
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“Commodus, his father reared with great care, summoning to Rome from all over the empire men renowned for learning in their own countries. He paid these scholars large fees to live in Rome and supervise his son's education.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C2 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 2 1-2</ref> When, however, the dying Marcus “realized that his son would become emperor while still very young, he was afraid that the undisciplined youth, deprived of parental advice, might neglect his excellent studies and good habits and turn to drinking and debauchery (for the minds of the young, prone to pleasures, are turned very easily from the virtues of education) when he had absolute and unrestrained power.” <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C3 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I 3</ref> <br />
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His fears proved justified. “Our history now descends from a kingdom of gold to one of iron and rust” opined Cassius Dio <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=72.36&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, <i>Roman History</i> LXXII 36 4</ref> on Commodus’s accession, a judgment followed by later historians such as Edward Gibbon, who took it as signifying the beginning of the decline of Rome. <br />
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Commodus abandoned his father’s Danubian campaign for the pleasures of Rome, especially sex and wine. Already childlessly married to Bruttia Crispina, “he herded together women of unusual beauty, keeping them like purchased prostitutes in a sort of brothel for the violation of their chastity. … The son of Salvius Julianus, the commander of the troops, he tried to lead into debauchery, but in vain, and he thereupon plotted against Julianus.” .<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> II-III</ref><br />
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Soon he began to disdain the opinion of the Senate and instead courted the Roman populace with extravagant gladiatorial shows in which he was a proud participant, while leaving.the government in the hands of untrustworthy and thoroughly corrupt cronies, who plotted against him. <br />
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The first of these, Perennis, “being well acquainted with Commodus' character, discovered the way to make himself powerful, namely, by persuading Commodus to devote himself to pleasure while he, Perennis, assumed all the burdens of the government — an arrangement which Commodus joyfully accepted. Under this agreement, then, Commodus lived, rioting in the Palace amid banquets and in baths along with three hundred concubines, gathered together for their beauty and chosen from both matrons and harlots, and also with three hundred pubescent catamites, whom he had collected by force and by purchase indiscriminately from the common people and the nobles solely on the basis of bodily beauty.<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, <i>Commodus Antoninus</i> V.4</ref><br />
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His popularity with ordinary Romans was dented by a devastating fire in 191 and growing signs of his megalomania. Extravagantly renaming himself Lucius Aelius Aurelius Commodus Augustus Herculeus Romanus Exsuperatorius Amazonius Invictus Felix Pius, he opened himself to ridicule through personal naked appearances in the arena to defeat gladiators and slaughter enough wild animals to sicken even the jaded Roman mob.<br />
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==Death==<br />
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On the last day of 192 he announced to his mistress Marcia, praetorian prefect Laetus and steward Eclectus his intention of inaugurating the new year by appearing to the people “not from the imperial palace, in the customary fashion, but from the gladiatorial barracks, clad in armour instead of in the splendid imperial purple.” Infuriated with their pleas not to thus disgrace himself, he put their names on a tablet at the top of the list of those who were to be put to death that night. He then “placed the tablet on his couch, thinking that no one would come into his bedroom. But there was in the palace a very young little boy, one of those who went about bare of clothes but adorned with gold and costly gems. The Roman voluptuaries always took delight in these lads. Commodus was very fond of this child and often slept with him; his name, Philocommodus, clearly indicates the emperor's affection for him. Philocommodus was playing idly about the palace. After Commodus had gone out to his usual baths and drinking bouts, the lad wandered into the emperor's bedroom, as he usually did; picking up the tablet for a plaything, he left the bedroom. By a stroke of fate, he met Marcia. After hugging and kissing him (for she too was fond of the child), she took the tablet from him, afraid that in his heedless play he might accidentally erase something important. When she recognized the emperor's handwriting, she was eager to read the tablet. Discovering that it was a death list and that she was scheduled to die first, followed by Laetus and Eclectus”, she summoned them, and together they then poisoned his wine, and when his death still seemed uncertain, had him strangled. <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17</ref><br />
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“He was the most nobly born of all the emperors who preceded him and was the handsomest man of his time, both in beauty of features and in physical development. If it were fitting to discuss his manly qualities, he was inferior to no man in skill and in marksmanship, if only he had not disgraced these excellent traits by shameful practices.”<ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_01_book1.htm#C17 Herodianus of Syria, <i>History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius</i> I.17</ref> Like Caligula and [[Nero]], his life offers interesting insights into the sexual proclivities of the entirely unrestrained Roman male.<br />
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==In film==<br />
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Commodus has been a leading character in two Hollywood epics: <i>The Fall of the Roman Empire</i> (1964), in which he was played by Christopher Plummer, and <i>Gladiator</i> (2000), in which he was played by Joaquin Phoenix. In both highly fictionalised stories, the existence of Philocommodus and his fellow-catamites is expunged and the exaggeratedly wicked emperor meets his deserved fate at the hands of an invented hero with suitable twentieth-century sensibilities.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=14039Roman emperor2014-10-09T07:32:38Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI,]</ref> and boys <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59]</ref> <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22]</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII],</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Galba*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII],</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Otho*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III],</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vitellius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI],</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vespasian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII],</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Titus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1],</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Domitian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I],</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_03_book3.htm#C10 Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_05_book5.htm#C6 Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
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Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=14038Roman emperor2014-10-09T07:30:39Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI,]</ref> and boys <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59]</ref> <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22]</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII],</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Galba*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII],</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Otho*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III],</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vitellius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI],</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vespasian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII],</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Titus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1],</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Domitian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I],</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_03_book1.htm#C10 Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_05_book5.htm#C6 Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=14037Roman emperor2014-10-09T07:27:08Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI,]</ref> and boys <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59]</ref> <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22]</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII],</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Galba*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII],</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Otho*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III],</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vitellius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI],</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vespasian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII],</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Titus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1],</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Domitian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I],</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_03_book1.htm#C10 Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_05_book1.htm Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=14036Roman emperor2014-10-09T07:25:01Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI,]</ref> and boys <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59]</ref> <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22]</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII],</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Galba*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII],</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Otho*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III],</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vitellius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI],</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vespasian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII],</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Titus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1],</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Domitian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I],</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Historia_Augusta/Commodus*.html Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_03_book1.htm#C10 Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>[http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/herodian_05_book1.htm#C6 Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Augustus&diff=14024Augustus2014-10-07T07:23:32Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>Imperator Caesar Divi Filius '''Augustus''' (63 BC – AD 14) is reckoned to have been the first [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 27 BC, when the Roman Senate gave him the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus.<br />
<br />
==Public life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Rome on 23 September 63 BC, the only son and initially namesake of Caius Octavius, Governor of Macedonia, of an equestrian family, and his second wife Atia Balba, niece of C. Julius Caesar. His father died when he was four, after which he was brought up first by his maternal grandmother, then by his mother.<br />
<br />
In 46 BC, he was shipwrecked on his way to Spain to join Caesar, by this time childless and Dictator for life. After coming ashore, he continued “over roads beset by the enemy with only a very few companions, … and thereby greatly endeared himself to Caesar, who soon formed a high opinion of his character over and above the energy with which he had made the journey.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] VIII 1</ref> He then came so much into his favour that, following Caesar’s assassination on 15 March 44 BC, he was found to have been adopted as his heir in his will, and therefore assumed his names, though still often referred to as Octavian(us).<br />
<br />
Mark Antony, once at least he had become Octavian’s principal foe, alleged that his elevation was due to the teenage boy having granted his great-uncle sexual favours, and Antony’s brother Lucius further claimed “that after sacrificing his honour to Caesar he had given himself to Aulus Hirtius in Spain for three hundred thousand sesterces, and that he used to singe his legs with red-hot nutshells, to make the hair grow softer.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXVIII</ref> However, even Suetonius, whose biographical accounts of the early Roman Emperors are full of salacious gossip, opined that this was too out of character to be more than political slander;<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXXI</ref> little could be more socially damning than for a freeborn Roman male to give himself passively to a man except than to do so for material incentives.<br />
<br />
After an initial power struggle with Antony for leadership of the Caesarian party, Octavian allied with him and Lepidus to form the second triumvirate or rule of three to rule Rome. The triumvirs proceeded to “proscribe” more than two thousand hostile senators and equestrians, which meant to outlaw them, confiscate their possessions and execute such as they caught. Amongst them was M. Favonius, in the auction of whose goods, his “puer delicatus” or catamite, Sarmentus, was bought by Octavian. <ref>Scholiast to Dec. Junius Juvenalis [i]Satires[/i] V 3</ref> <br />
<br />
The triumvirs’ decisive victory over Caesar’s assassins at the battle of Philippi in 42 BC led to a territorial division of the empire with Italy, Gaul and Spain under Octavian’s control, but this soon led to a power struggle. The weak Lepidus was easily dismissed into obscurity, and attempts to patch over the rivalry between Octavian and Antony through a marriage alliance between the latter and the former’s sister proved a failure when Antony eloped with and scandalously married Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt. The ensuing civil war ended with Octavian’s decisive victory at Actium in 30 BC, soon followed by the suicides of Antony and Cleopatra.<br />
<br />
Thus left in sole control of the Roman Empire, Octavian maintained the formalities of a republic while effectively gaining a monarchical control symbolised by the Senate’s bestowal in 27 BC of the epithet Augustus, by which he and his successors were thereafter known, though he alone is generally now known by this name. As such, he wielded unchallenged power until his death at Nola on 19 August AD 14 aged nearly seventy-six, having done much in the intervening decades to heal the wounds of decades of civil war and inaugurate badly-needed reforms of many kinds. He was much revered: the then sixth month of the year was renamed August in his honour during his lifetime, and he was proclaimed a god soon after his death.<br />
<br />
==Private life==<br />
<br />
Augustus married thrice, all in his youth. He divorced his first wife, Clodia Pulchra, a step-daughter of Antony, before the marriage had been consummated. In his own words, “unable to put up with her shrewish disposition”, he divorced his second wife Scribonia after only a year, the same day, 30 October 39 BC, she gave birth to his only child, Julia. He then “at once took Livia Drusilla from her husband Tiberius Nero, although she was with child at the time; and he loved and esteemed her to the end without a rival.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXII</ref> They had “no children at all, although he earnestly desired issue. One baby was conceived, but was prematurely born.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXIII</ref><br />
<br />
Through her marriage to him, Livia exercised unprecedented power and influence for a Roman woman, so much so that she was eventually able to secure the succession of her own son [[Tiberius]] rather than his surviving grandson or other blood relations. “When someone asked her how she had obtained such a commanding influence over Augustus, she answered that it was by being scrupulously chaste herself, doing gladly whatever pleased him, not meddling with any of his affairs, and, in particular, by pretending neither to hear nor to notice the favourites of his passion." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=58.2&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, [i]Roman History[/i] LVIII.2.5</ref><br />
<br />
Typically of the Roman male of his era, Augustus was as sexually involved with boys as with females. In 30 BC, Antony’s supporter Q. Dellius defected critically to Caesar, as Augustus was then called, giving as his reason that “he had offended Cleopatra at supper by saying that while sour wine was served to them, Sarmentus, at Rome, was drinking Falernian. Sarmentus was one of the little boy playthings of Caesar, such as the Romans call "deliciae." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, [i]Life of Antony[/i] 59</ref> Sarmentus being so well-remembered as Caesar’s catamite twelve years after he was acquired for that obvious purpose in a public auction illustrates how little need to disguise his involvement with boys was felt by a public figure generally careful of his reputation. It should be noted, however, that all the boys Augustus is known to have been sexually involved with appear to have been slaves, a vital distinction between him and his successors Tiberius and Caligula, who offended Roman sensibilities through sexual activity with freeborn boys.<br />
<br />
Much of the high public reputation of Augustus’s private life rested on his adoption of the traditional Roman virtue of frugality. The way he perhaps compromised this most was in lack of sexual self-restraint. “He could not dispose of the charge of lustfulness and they say that even in his later years he was fond of deflowering maidens, who were brought together for him from all quarters, even by his own wife.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXXI</ref> “And though he was much at table or drink, to a certain degree, in fact, abstaining from sleep, he nevertheless used to gratify his lust to the extent of the dishonour of his public reputation. For he was accustomed to lie among twelve catamites and an equal number of girls.” <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref> Taken together, these two judgements illustrate how excessive indulgence in any kind of lust was thought a fault, but whether a man’s sexual partner was a boy or female was a matter of indifference to others as well, it would sometimes appear, of himself.<br />
<br />
Augustus’s sexual life is an exemplary illustration of many Roman mores pertinent to pederasty, mores with broad implications for human sexuality in general: the Roman male’s freedom from censure in enjoying sex with slave-boys as well as females when not carried to excess, his propensity to want both without even a marked preference, and the compatibility of indulging in publicly-known pederasty with an exceptionally successful marriage.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=14015Roman emperor2014-10-06T07:32:42Z<p>Edmund: </p>
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<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII],</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Galba*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII],</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Otho*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III],</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vitellius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI],</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vespasian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII],</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Titus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1],</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Domitian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I],</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Augustus&diff=14014Augustus2014-10-06T07:29:26Z<p>Edmund: Created page with "Imperator Caesar Divi Filius '''Augustus''' (63 BC – AD 14) is reckoned to have been the first Roman Emperor from 27 BC, when the Roman Senate gave him t..."</p>
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<div>Imperator Caesar Divi Filius '''Augustus''' (63 BC – AD 14) is reckoned to have been the first [[Roman Emperors|Roman Emperor]] from 27 BC, when the Roman Senate gave him the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus.<br />
<br />
==Public life==<br />
<br />
He was born in Rome on 23 September 63 BC, the only son and initially namesake of Caius Octavius, Governor of Macedonia, of an equestrian family, and his second wife Atia Balba, niece of C. Julius Caesar. His father died when he was four, after which he was brought up first by his maternal grandmother, then by his mother.<br />
<br />
In 46 BC, he was shipwrecked on his way to Spain to join Caesar, by this time childless and Dictator for life. After coming ashore, he continued “over roads beset by the enemy with only a very few companions, … and thereby greatly endeared himself to Caesar, who soon formed a high opinion of his character over and above the energy with which he had made the journey.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] VIII 1</ref> He then came so much into his favour that, following Caesar’s assassination on 15 March 44 BC, he was found to have been adopted as his heir in his will, and therefore assumed his names, though still often referred to as Octavian(us).<br />
<br />
Mark Antony, once at least he had become Octavian’s principal foe, alleged that his elevation was due to the teenage boy having granted his great-uncle sexual favours, and Antony’s brother Lucius further claimed “that after sacrificing his honour to Caesar he had given himself to Aulus Hirtius in Spain for three hundred thousand sesterces, and that he used to singe his legs with red-hot nutshells, to make the hair grow softer.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXVIII</ref> However, even Suetonius, whose biographical accounts of the early Roman Emperors are full of salacious gossip, opined that this was too out of character to be more than political slander;<ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXXI</ref> little could be more socially damning than for a freeborn Roman male to give himself passively to a man except than to do so for material incentives.<br />
<br />
After an initial power struggle with Antony for leadership of the Caesarian party, Octavian allied with him and Lepidus to form the second triumvirate or rule of three to rule Rome. The triumvirs proceeded to “proscribe” more than two thousand hostile senators and equestrians, which meant to outlaw them, confiscate their possessions and execute such as they caught. Amongst them was M. Favonius, in the auction of whose goods, his “puer delicatus” or catamite, Sarmentus, was bought by Octavian. <ref>Scholiast to Dec. Junius Juvenalis [i]Satires[/i] V 3</ref> <br />
<br />
The triumvirs’ decisive victory over Caesar’s assassins at the battle of Philippi in 42 BC led to a territorial division of the empire with Italy, Gaul and Hispania under Octavian’s control, but this soon led to a power struggle. The weak Lepidus was easily dismissed into obscurity, and attempts to patch over the rivalry between Octavian and Antony through a marriage alliance between the latter and the former’s sister proved a failure when Antony eloped with and scandalously married Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt. The ensuing civil war ended with Octavian’s decisive victory at Actium in 30 BC, soon followed by the suicide of Antony and Cleopatra.<br />
<br />
Thus left in sole control of the Roman Empire, Octavian maintained the formalities of a republic while effectively gaining a monarchical control symbolised by the Senate’s bestowal in 27 BC of the epithet Augustus, by which he and his successors were thereafter known, though he alone is generally now known by this name. As such, he wielded unchallenged power until his death at Nola on 19 August AD 14 aged nearly seventy-six, having done much in the intervening decades to heal the wounds of decades of civil war and inaugurate badly-needed reforms of many kinds. He was much revered: the then sixth month of the year was renamed August in his honour during his lifetime, and he was proclaimed a god soon after his death.<br />
<br />
==Private life==<br />
<br />
Augustus married thrice, all in his youth. He divorced his first wife, Clodia Pulchra, a step-daughter of Antony, before the marriage had been consummated. In his own words, “unable to put up with her shrewish disposition”, he divorced his second wife Scribonia after only a year, the same day, 30 October 39 BC, she gave birth to his only child, Julia. He then “at once took Livia Drusilla from her husband Tiberius Nero, although she was with child at the time; and he loved and esteemed her to the end without a rival.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXII</ref> They had “no children at all, although he earnestly desired issue. One baby was conceived, but was prematurely born.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXIII</ref><br />
<br />
Through her marriage to him, Livia exercised unprecedented power and influence for a Roman woman, so much so that she was eventually able to secure the succession of her own son [[Tiberius]] rather than his surviving grandson or other blood relations. “When someone asked her how she had obtained such a commanding influence over Augustus, she answered that it was by being scrupulously chaste herself, doing gladly whatever pleased him, not meddling with any of his affairs, and, in particular, by pretending neither to hear nor to notice the favourites of his passion." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=58.2&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0593 Cassius Dio, [i]Roman History[/i] LVIII.2.5</ref><br />
<br />
Typically of the Roman male of his era, Augustus was as sexually involved with boys as with females. In 30 BC, Antony’s supporter Q. Dellius defected critically to Caesar, as Augustus was then called, giving as his reason that “he had offended Cleopatra at supper by saying that while sour wine was served to them, Sarmentus, at Rome, was drinking Falernian. Sarmentus was one of the little boy playthings of Caesar, such as the Romans call "deliciae." <ref>[http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Plut.+Ant.+59&fromdoc=Perseus%3Atext%3A2008.01.0077 Plutarch, [i]Life of Antony[/i] 59</ref> Sarmentus being so well-remembered as Caesar’s catamite twelve years after he was acquired for that obvious purpose in a public auction illustrates how little need to disguise his involvement with boys was felt by a public figure generally careful of his reputation. It should be noted, however, that all the boys Augustus is known to have been sexually involved with appear to have been slaves, a vital distinction between him and his successors Tiberius and Caligula, who offended Roman sensibilities through sexual activity with freeborn boys.<br />
<br />
Much of the high public reputation of Augustus’s private life rested on his adoption of the traditional Roman virtue of frugality. The way he perhaps compromised this most was in lack of sexual self-restraint. “He could not dispose of the charge of lustfulness and they say that even in his later years he was fond of deflowering maidens, who were brought together for him from all quarters, even by his own wife.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, [i]Divus Augustus[/i] LXXI</ref> “And though he was much at table or drink, to a certain degree, in fact, abstaining from sleep, he nevertheless used to gratify his lust to the extent of the dishonour of his public reputation. For he was accustomed to lie among twelve catamites and an equal number of girls.” <ref>[http://www.thelatinlibrary.com/victor.caes2.html Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref> Taken together, these two judgements illustrate how excessive indulgence in any kind of lust was thought a fault, but whether a man’s sexual partner was a boy or female was a matter of indifference to others as well, it would sometimes appear, of himself.<br />
<br />
Augustus’s sexual life is an exemplary illustration of many Roman mores pertinent to pederasty, mores with broad implications for human sexuality in general: the Roman male’s freedom from censure in enjoying sex with slave-boys as well as females when not carried to excess, his propensity to want both without even a marked preference, and the compatibility of indulging in publicly-known pederasty with an exceptionally successful marriage.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Alexander%27s_Choice_(book)&diff=5479Alexander's Choice (book)2013-05-03T11:48:43Z<p>Edmund: </p>
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<div>[[Image:Alexanders-choice-edmund-marlowe-paperback-cover-art.jpg|170px|right]]<br />
'''Alexander's Choice''' is a novel set at [[Boarding school|Eton College]] in 1983-4 by Edmund Marlowe, an old boy of the school, as his début work. It tells of the love affair of Alexander Aylmer, a new boy at the school aged 13-14 and Damian Cavendish, a new, young English master.<br />
<br />
The subject of sex between older and younger boys at Eton has been briefly alluded to in previous fiction, notably in ''The Fourth of June'' by David Benedictus (1962) <ref>Benedictus, David (1977). The Fourth of June. London: Anthony Blond. London: Sphere. ISBN 978-0-7221-1588-6</ref> and ''The Link'' by Robin Maugham (1969)<ref>Maugham, Robin (1969). The Link. London: William Heinemann. ISBN 978-0-4344-5504-1</ref>, <br />
but this is the only novel to have made [[boylove]] there its main theme.<br />
<br />
==Plot introduction==<br />
<br />
Sweet-natured and good-looking, thirteen-year-old aristocrat Alexander Aylmer goes to prestigious Eton College in September 1983 full of optimism. He soon discovers new friends, interesting teachers and the hopes and frustrations that arrive with puberty.<br />
<br />
Timid Julian Smith, three years older, nurses two secrets he is terrified the other boys might discover: his humble background and his being hopelessly in love with Alexander. His father Alfred is a removals man who has saved all his life to send him to Eton. His own German-Jewish father had brought him up to be anglophilic, a sentiment reinforced by his teenage years in Sachsenhausen as the sole survivor of his family.<br />
<br />
Julian has been attracted to younger boys before, but never dared act on his feelings. Now torn between the strength of his feelings and fear of attracting suspicion and derision, he makes painfully little progress in his attempts to befriend Alexander until luck intervenes. Alexander becomes unfairly suspected of a spate of thefts in their house. Though exonerated in most boys’ eyes, he is viciously cornered by the house bully who had once nearly ruined Julian. Julian fortuitously appears and comes furiously to his rescue, thus immediately winning Alexander’s passionately loyal friendship.<br />
<br />
Suddenly though, Alexander’s adored mother dies of a heart-attack. Back at school after her funeral, his friends are sympathetic, but put off by his broken heart. Only Julian remains. Julian postpones furthering his erotic aspirations until the next (summer) term, with which most of the story is concerned.<br />
<br />
Alexander guesses Julian’s feelings. Though not physically attracted by him, he decides to indulge him, influenced by Mary Renault’s fictional depiction of the ideal friendship between his revered ancient namesake and Hephaistion. Julian is determined, but so over-cautious he risks losing everything he cares about.<br />
<br />
Other characters are soon drawn in. Their housemaster, alerted to the unusual friendship, writes to Julian’s father decrying it. Despite knowing the latter to be deeply sympathetic, Julian is unable to admit his feelings to him and is terrified by the possible involvement of his puritanical, feminist mother Denise, otherwise too embroiled in her successful career as a campaigner against child sex abuse to notice her own child’s anguish.<br />
<br />
Alexander also has a new, young English teacher, Damian Cavendish. Romantically only consciously interested in women, he is, however, aware of a special affinity with boys that has brought him enthusiastically to Eton. He burns too with an altruistic longing to find himself badly needed. He has already had one highly emotional encounter with Alexander, which has left him anxiously concerned for the boy’s happiness and Alexander highly receptive to his influence.<br />
<br />
Each of the protagonists brings his own unique experience to bear on the unfolding drama, but through inadequate understanding of the new moral panic about teenage sexuality, none are remotely prepared for what follows. The final consequences shatter lives and are so heart-wrenching that Alfred, awakened to his most horrifying memories of the Third Reich, brings the story to a conclusion with his understanding that his anglophilia had been a deluded response to the inhumanity of man. <br />
<br />
==Major themes==<br />
<br />
''Alexander's Choice'' challenges popular assumptions as to what might drive a pubescent boy and a young man to fall in love. Alexander and Damian slip unconsciously into loving one another without drawing conclusions about their sexual identity. They are both inspired by the ancient Hellenic ideals of pederasty, vividly illustrated in a short story and a dream, and remain as unconscious of the idea of sexual orientation as their classical exemplars. Despite the intensity of their passion for one another, it never occurs to either to question his attraction to the opposite sex, neither considers himself gay, and they simply assume until the end that they will one day find wives.<br />
<br />
A wide variety of attitudes to homosexuality and boylove in particular are explored through the various attitudes of the other boys and schoolmasters, parents, police, social workers and finally the general public, and in some cases the development of these attitudes over time is also examined.<br />
<br />
The theme of the searingly powerful last two chapters is the hopelessness of the inevitable clash once a love founded in timeless ideals was exposed to the social realities of 1984:<br />
<br />
<blockquote><br />
Transported to the 1980s, however, age-stratified relationships are not merely frowned-upon, but pose a threat to hierarchy, and more specifically to the carefully-cultivated image of The Child which serves as the rhetoric of every acknowledged politics; the phantasmal beneficiary of every political intervention. The image of 'The Child' is not simply the last taboo, but also the last possibility of taboo, the last universal mechanism for imposing order upon a decaying world. To contemporary culture, then, Alexander is not a living swarm of affections and passions, but rather an inert categorization, a strategic image - one which must be protected at any cost. Consequently, the irony of the novel's title is that the 'Alexander' visible to society is not entitled to 'choose' anything: as a fixed image that operates in the service of culture, he is always-already stripped of voice and life. <ref>[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Alexanders-Choice-Edmund-Marlowe/dp/1481222112/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360749088&sr=8-1 Review by "Son of Nietzsche" on amazon.co.uk, 31 January 2013],</ref><br />
</blockquote><br />
<br />
==Main characters==<br />
<br />
*Alexander Aylmer, a stunning beauty of 13-14, intelligent, loyal, passionate and self-willed, with a great interest in ancient history.<br />
*Rupert Drysdale, Alexander's best friend of his own age and a worldly influence on him.<br />
*Julian Smith, aged 16-17, kind but ordinary, he is condemned by his timidity to guile and thus never to fulfil his longings.<br />
*Guy Cowburn, a snobbish bully in Julian's year<br />
*Peter Leigh, Guy's principal crony and a thief.<br />
*Damian Cavendish, aged 22-23, darkly handsome, soft-hearted and charming, he has been drawn back to Eton to teach by happy memories of his successful time there as a boy.<br />
*Jack Hodgson, housemaster of Peyntors, Alexander's house at Eton, an impressive classics master too buttoned-up and uninterested in boys to be effective in his house.<br />
*Mr. Allenby, the Head Master of Eton.<br />
*Sir Henry ("Hal") Aylmer, Alexander's father, a Lord Justice of Appeal.<br />
*Penelope Aylmer, Alexander's mother, warm and loving, her maternal attitudes are subtly contrasted with those of Julian's mother, who is almost her antithesis.<br />
*Alfred Smith alias Wertheimber, Julian's adoring father. As a perennial outsider, he is the author's foil for exposing the cruelty and hyopcrisy of society.<br />
*Denise Smith, Julian's mother, a feminist social worker whose prominence as a campaigner against "child sex abuse" only becomes clear towards the end.<br />
*Walter Cavendish, Damian's father, an aristocratic ex-radical.<br />
*Jim Hatchet, a Detective Inspector.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}} <br />
<br />
==External links==<br />
<br />
* [http://www.amazon.com/Alexanders-Choice-Edmund-Marlowe/product-reviews/1481222112/ref=cm_cr_dp_see_all_btm?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending Reviews at amazon.com]<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
[[Category:Literature|Alexander's Choice]]<br />
[[Category:Fiction|Alexander's Choice]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Alexander%27s_Choice_(book)&diff=5478Alexander's Choice (book)2013-05-03T11:47:40Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>[[Image:Alexanders-choice-edmund-marlowe-paperback-cover-art.jpg|170px|right]]<br />
'''Alexander's Choice''' is a novel set at [[Boarding school|Eton College]] in 1983-4 by Edmund Marlowe, an old boy of the school, as his début work. It tells of the love affair of Alexander Aylmer, a new boy at the school aged 13-14 and Damian Cavendish, a new, young English master.<br />
<br />
The subject of sex between older and younger boys at Eton has been briefly alluded to in previous fiction, notably in ''The Fourth of June'' by David Benedictus (1962) <ref>Benedictus, David (1977). The Fourth of June. London: Anthony Blond. London: Sphere. ISBN 978-0-7221-1588-6</ref> and ''The Link'' by [[Robin Maugham]] (1969)<ref>Maugham, Robin (1969). The Link. London: William Heinemann. ISBN 978-0-4344-5504-1</ref>, <br />
but this is the only novel to have made [[boylove]] there its main theme.<br />
<br />
==Plot introduction==<br />
<br />
Sweet-natured and good-looking, thirteen-year-old aristocrat Alexander Aylmer goes to prestigious Eton College in September 1983 full of optimism. He soon discovers new friends, interesting teachers and the hopes and frustrations that arrive with puberty.<br />
<br />
Timid Julian Smith, three years older, nurses two secrets he is terrified the other boys might discover: his humble background and his being hopelessly in love with Alexander. His father Alfred is a removals man who has saved all his life to send him to Eton. His own German-Jewish father had brought him up to be anglophilic, a sentiment reinforced by his teenage years in Sachsenhausen as the sole survivor of his family.<br />
<br />
Julian has been attracted to younger boys before, but never dared act on his feelings. Now torn between the strength of his feelings and fear of attracting suspicion and derision, he makes painfully little progress in his attempts to befriend Alexander until luck intervenes. Alexander becomes unfairly suspected of a spate of thefts in their house. Though exonerated in most boys’ eyes, he is viciously cornered by the house bully who had once nearly ruined Julian. Julian fortuitously appears and comes furiously to his rescue, thus immediately winning Alexander’s passionately loyal friendship.<br />
<br />
Suddenly though, Alexander’s adored mother dies of a heart-attack. Back at school after her funeral, his friends are sympathetic, but put off by his broken heart. Only Julian remains. Julian postpones furthering his erotic aspirations until the next (summer) term, with which most of the story is concerned.<br />
<br />
Alexander guesses Julian’s feelings. Though not physically attracted by him, he decides to indulge him, influenced by Mary Renault’s fictional depiction of the ideal friendship between his revered ancient namesake and Hephaistion. Julian is determined, but so over-cautious he risks losing everything he cares about.<br />
<br />
Other characters are soon drawn in. Their housemaster, alerted to the unusual friendship, writes to Julian’s father decrying it. Despite knowing the latter to be deeply sympathetic, Julian is unable to admit his feelings to him and is terrified by the possible involvement of his puritanical, feminist mother Denise, otherwise too embroiled in her successful career as a campaigner against child sex abuse to notice her own child’s anguish.<br />
<br />
Alexander also has a new, young English teacher, Damian Cavendish. Romantically only consciously interested in women, he is, however, aware of a special affinity with boys that has brought him enthusiastically to Eton. He burns too with an altruistic longing to find himself badly needed. He has already had one highly emotional encounter with Alexander, which has left him anxiously concerned for the boy’s happiness and Alexander highly receptive to his influence.<br />
<br />
Each of the protagonists brings his own unique experience to bear on the unfolding drama, but through inadequate understanding of the new moral panic about teenage sexuality, none are remotely prepared for what follows. The final consequences shatter lives and are so heart-wrenching that Alfred, awakened to his most horrifying memories of the Third Reich, brings the story to a conclusion with his understanding that his anglophilia had been a deluded response to the inhumanity of man. <br />
<br />
==Major themes==<br />
<br />
''Alexander's Choice'' challenges popular assumptions as to what might drive a pubescent boy and a young man to fall in love. Alexander and Damian slip unconsciously into loving one another without drawing conclusions about their sexual identity. They are both inspired by the ancient Hellenic ideals of pederasty, vividly illustrated in a short story and a dream, and remain as unconscious of the idea of sexual orientation as their classical exemplars. Despite the intensity of their passion for one another, it never occurs to either to question his attraction to the opposite sex, neither considers himself gay, and they simply assume until the end that they will one day find wives.<br />
<br />
A wide variety of attitudes to homosexuality and boylove in particular are explored through the various attitudes of the other boys and schoolmasters, parents, police, social workers and finally the general public, and in some cases the development of these attitudes over time is also examined.<br />
<br />
The theme of the searingly powerful last two chapters is the hopelessness of the inevitable clash once a love founded in timeless ideals was exposed to the social realities of 1984:<br />
<br />
<blockquote><br />
Transported to the 1980s, however, age-stratified relationships are not merely frowned-upon, but pose a threat to hierarchy, and more specifically to the carefully-cultivated image of The Child which serves as the rhetoric of every acknowledged politics; the phantasmal beneficiary of every political intervention. The image of 'The Child' is not simply the last taboo, but also the last possibility of taboo, the last universal mechanism for imposing order upon a decaying world. To contemporary culture, then, Alexander is not a living swarm of affections and passions, but rather an inert categorization, a strategic image - one which must be protected at any cost. Consequently, the irony of the novel's title is that the 'Alexander' visible to society is not entitled to 'choose' anything: as a fixed image that operates in the service of culture, he is always-already stripped of voice and life. <ref>[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Alexanders-Choice-Edmund-Marlowe/dp/1481222112/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360749088&sr=8-1 Review by "Son of Nietzsche" on amazon.co.uk, 31 January 2013],</ref><br />
</blockquote><br />
<br />
==Main characters==<br />
<br />
*Alexander Aylmer, a stunning beauty of 13-14, intelligent, loyal, passionate and self-willed, with a great interest in ancient history.<br />
*Rupert Drysdale, Alexander's best friend of his own age and a worldly influence on him.<br />
*Julian Smith, aged 16-17, kind but ordinary, he is condemned by his timidity to guile and thus never to fulfil his longings.<br />
*Guy Cowburn, a snobbish bully in Julian's year<br />
*Peter Leigh, Guy's principal crony and a thief.<br />
*Damian Cavendish, aged 22-23, darkly handsome, soft-hearted and charming, he has been drawn back to Eton to teach by happy memories of his successful time there as a boy.<br />
*Jack Hodgson, housemaster of Peyntors, Alexander's house at Eton, an impressive classics master too buttoned-up and uninterested in boys to be effective in his house.<br />
*Mr. Allenby, the Head Master of Eton.<br />
*Sir Henry ("Hal") Aylmer, Alexander's father, a Lord Justice of Appeal.<br />
*Penelope Aylmer, Alexander's mother, warm and loving, her maternal attitudes are subtly contrasted with those of Julian's mother, who is almost her antithesis.<br />
*Alfred Smith alias Wertheimber, Julian's adoring father. As a perennial outsider, he is the author's foil for exposing the cruelty and hyopcrisy of society.<br />
*Denise Smith, Julian's mother, a feminist social worker whose prominence as a campaigner against "child sex abuse" only becomes clear towards the end.<br />
*Walter Cavendish, Damian's father, an aristocratic ex-radical.<br />
*Jim Hatchet, a Detective Inspector.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}} <br />
<br />
==External links==<br />
<br />
* [http://www.amazon.com/Alexanders-Choice-Edmund-Marlowe/product-reviews/1481222112/ref=cm_cr_dp_see_all_btm?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending Reviews at amazon.com]<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
[[Category:Literature|Alexander's Choice]]<br />
[[Category:Fiction|Alexander's Choice]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4057Roman emperor2013-03-01T16:18:01Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII],</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Galba*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII],</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Otho*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III],</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vitellius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI],</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Vespasian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII],</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Titus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1],</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Domitian*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I],</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4056Roman emperor2013-03-01T16:13:44Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII],</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Galba*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII],</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4054Roman emperor2013-03-01T16:11:49Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII],</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4053Roman emperor2013-03-01T16:09:53Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4052Roman emperor2013-03-01T16:08:32Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Nero*.html Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13],</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4050Roman emperor2013-03-01T16:06:48Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Claudius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2],</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4049Roman emperor2013-03-01T16:04:42Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Caligula*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3],</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4048Roman emperor2013-03-01T16:02:44Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Tiberius*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV],</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4047Roman emperor2013-03-01T15:59:50Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI],</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4046Roman emperor2013-03-01T15:55:11Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>[http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/L/Roman/Texts/Suetonius/12Caesars/Augustus*.html C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4045Roman emperor2013-03-01T15:38:51Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with Asiaticus, an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy), who returned as his freedman to become his dominant advisor during his brief reign. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=4044Roman emperor2013-03-01T15:31:10Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and his predecessor Nero's gelded catamite Sporus. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}<br />
<br />
[[Category:Ancient Rome]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3877Roman emperor2013-02-23T15:04:58Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and a boy. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, ''History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius'' V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Alexander Severus'' XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3876Roman emperor2013-02-23T15:02:39Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and a boy. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2</ref> <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> <ref>Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius V.6</ref><br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2</ref>. Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3875Roman emperor2013-02-23T13:15:57Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and a boy. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref><br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name.<ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Hadrianus'' XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref> <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Lucius Verus'' 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Commodus Antoninus'' V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved <ref>Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10</ref>, as well as two wives <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Septimus Severus'' III</ref>.<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXXVII.7</ref><br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Macrinus'' IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Diadumenianus'' III 2</ref><br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. <ref>Scriptores Historiae Augustae, ''Elagabalus'' 5-6, 10 & 31</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXXX.9, 13 & 24</ref> Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3874Roman emperor2013-02-23T12:51:22Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” <ref>Philo of Alexandria, ''On the Embassy to Gaius'' 2</ref>.<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13</ref> <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and a boy <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIV.8</ref>.<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> <ref>P. Cornelius Tacitus, ''Histories'' II 2</ref><br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVII.6</ref>; the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams <ref>M. Valerius Martialis, ''Epigrammata'' IX 16,36 & 56</ref>.<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXVIII 7 & 21</ref> <ref>''Historia Augusta'': Hadrianus II</ref>, and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name<ref>''Historia Augusta'': Hadrianus XI & XIII</ref> <ref>Cassius Dio, ''Roman History'' LXIX 11</ref> <ref>Eusebius Sophronius Hieronymus (St. Jerome), ''Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius'', years CCXXIV & CCXXVII</ref>. <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). <ref>M. Aurelius Antoninus Augustus, ''Meditations'' I 16</ref><br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” <ref>''Historia Augusta'', Lucius Verus 4</ref><br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. <ref>''Historia Augusta'', Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11)</ref><br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. <ref>Scriptores Historia Augusta, ''Pertinax'' 7 & 13</ref><br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3873Roman emperor2013-02-23T12:33:39Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys <ref>Plutarch, ''Life of Antony'' 59</ref> <ref>Sextus Aurelius Victor, ''Epitome de Caesaribus'' I 22</ref>, without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” (Philo of Alexandria, On the Embassy to Gaius 2).<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13; <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and a boy (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIV.8).<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> Tacitus, Histories II 2)<br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVII.6); the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams (Martialis, Epigrams IX 16,36 & 56)<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVIII 7 & 21; Historia Augusta: Hadrianus II), and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name. ((Historia Augusta: Hadrianus XI & XIII; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIX 11; Jerome, Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius, years CCXXIV & CCXXVII) <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” (Historia Augusta, Lucius Verus 4)<br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. (Historia Augusta, Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11).<br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. (Historia Augusta, Pertinax 7 & 13).<br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3872Roman emperor2013-02-23T12:27:39Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Augustus'' LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI</ref> and boys (Plutarch, Life of Antony 59; Sextus Aurelius Victor, Epitome de Caesaribus I 22), without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Tiberius'' VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV</ref>.<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Caligula'' XXIV 2 & XXV 3</ref>, but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” (Philo of Alexandria, On the Embassy to Gaius 2).<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Claudius'' XXXIII 2</ref> <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13; <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Nero'' XXVIII</ref><br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Galba'' XXII</ref><br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Otho'' III</ref> and a boy (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIV.8).<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Vitellius'' III & VI</ref><br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Vespasianus'' III & XXII</ref><br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Divus Titus'' VII 1</ref> Tacitus, Histories II 2)<br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVII.6); the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams (Martialis, Epigrams IX 16,36 & 56)<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian <ref>C. Suetonius Tranquillus, ''Domitianus'' I</ref>. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVIII 7 & 21; Historia Augusta: Hadrianus II), and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name. ((Historia Augusta: Hadrianus XI & XIII; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIX 11; Jerome, Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius, years CCXXIV & CCXXVII) <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” (Historia Augusta, Lucius Verus 4)<br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. (Historia Augusta, Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11).<br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. (Historia Augusta, Pertinax 7 & 13).<br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3871Roman emperor2013-02-23T12:13:36Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females (Suetonius, Divus Augustus LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI) and boys (Plutarch, Life of Antony 59; Sextus Aurelius Victor, Epitome de Caesaribus I 22), without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference (Suetonius, Tiberius VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV).<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife (Suetonius, Caligula XXIV 2 & XXV 3), but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” (Philo of Alexandria, On the Embassy to Gaius 2).<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” (Suetonius, Divus Claudius XXXIII 2). <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13; Suetonius, Nero XXVIII)<br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” (Suetonius, Galba XXII)<br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife (Suetonius, Otho III) and a boy (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIV.8).<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). (Suetonius, Vitellius III & VI)<br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women (Suetonius, Divus Vespasianus III & XXII)<br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. (Suetonius, Divus Titus VII 1; Tacitus, Histories II 2)<br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVII.6); the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams (Martialis, Epigrams IX 16,36 & 56)<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian (Suetonius, Domitianus I). This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVIII 7 & 21; Historia Augusta: Hadrianus II), and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name. ((Historia Augusta: Hadrianus XI & XIII; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIX 11; Jerome, Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius, years CCXXIV & CCXXVII) <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” (Historia Augusta, Lucius Verus 4)<br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. (Historia Augusta, Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11).<br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. (Historia Augusta, Pertinax 7 & 13).<br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==References==<br />
{{Reflist}}</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3870Roman emperor2013-02-23T12:12:27Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females (Suetonius, Divus Augustus LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI) and boys (Plutarch, Life of Antony 59; Sextus Aurelius Victor, Epitome de Caesaribus I 22), without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference (Suetonius, Tiberius VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV).<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife (Suetonius, Caligula XXIV 2 & XXV 3), but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” (Philo of Alexandria, On the Embassy to Gaius 2).<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” (Suetonius, Divus Claudius XXXIII 2). <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13; Suetonius, Nero XXVIII)<br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” (Suetonius, Galba XXII)<br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife (Suetonius, Otho III) and a boy (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIV.8).<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). (Suetonius, Vitellius III & VI)<br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women (Suetonius, Divus Vespasianus III & XXII)<br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. (Suetonius, Divus Titus VII 1; Tacitus, Histories II 2)<br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVII.6); the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams (Martialis, Epigrams IX 16,36 & 56)<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian (Suetonius, Domitianus I). This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVIII 7 & 21; Historia Augusta: Hadrianus II), and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref>, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name. ((Historia Augusta: Hadrianus XI & XIII; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIX 11; Jerome, Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius, years CCXXIV & CCXXVII) <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” (Historia Augusta, Lucius Verus 4)<br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. (Historia Augusta, Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11).<br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. (Historia Augusta, Pertinax 7 & 13).<br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==Footnotes==</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3869Roman emperor2013-02-23T12:11:48Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females (Suetonius, Divus Augustus LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI) and boys (Plutarch, Life of Antony 59; Sextus Aurelius Victor, Epitome de Caesaribus I 22), without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference (Suetonius, Tiberius VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV).<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife (Suetonius, Caligula XXIV 2 & XXV 3), but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” (Philo of Alexandria, On the Embassy to Gaius 2).<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” (Suetonius, Divus Claudius XXXIII 2). <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13; Suetonius, Nero XXVIII)<br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” (Suetonius, Galba XXII)<br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife (Suetonius, Otho III) and a boy (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIV.8).<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). (Suetonius, Vitellius III & VI)<br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women (Suetonius, Divus Vespasianus III & XXII)<br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. (Suetonius, Divus Titus VII 1; Tacitus, Histories II 2)<br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVII.6); the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams (Martialis, Epigrams IX 16,36 & 56)<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian (Suetonius, Domitianus I). This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVIII 7 & 21; Historia Augusta: Hadrianus II), and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 <ref>Royston Lambert, ''Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous'', 1984</ref?, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name. ((Historia Augusta: Hadrianus XI & XIII; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIX 11; Jerome, Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius, years CCXXIV & CCXXVII) <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” (Historia Augusta, Lucius Verus 4)<br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. (Historia Augusta, Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11).<br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. (Historia Augusta, Pertinax 7 & 13).<br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==Footnotes==</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3868Roman emperor2013-02-23T12:06:26Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names in English were:<br />
*[[Augustus]] (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females (Suetonius, Divus Augustus LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI) and boys (Plutarch, Life of Antony 59; Sextus Aurelius Victor, Epitome de Caesaribus I 22), without indication of preference.<br />
*[[Tiberius]] (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference (Suetonius, Tiberius VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV).<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife (Suetonius, Caligula XXIV 2 & XXV 3), but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” (Philo of Alexandria, On the Embassy to Gaius 2).<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” (Suetonius, Divus Claudius XXXIII 2). <br />
*[[Nero]] (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13; Suetonius, Nero XXVIII)<br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” (Suetonius, Galba XXII)<br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife (Suetonius, Otho III) and a boy (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIV.8).<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). (Suetonius, Vitellius III & VI)<br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women (Suetonius, Divus Vespasianus III & XXII)<br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. (Suetonius, Divus Titus VII 1; Tacitus, Histories II 2)<br />
*[[Domitian]] (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVII.6); the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams (Martialis, Epigrams IX 16,36 & 56)<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian (Suetonius, Domitianus I). This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*[[Trajan]] (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVIII 7 & 21; Historia Augusta: Hadrianus II), and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*[[Hadrian]] (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 (Royston Lambert, Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous, 1984), whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name. ((Historia Augusta: Hadrianus XI & XIII; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIX 11; Jerome, Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius, years CCXXIV & CCXXVII) <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” (Historia Augusta, Lucius Verus 4)<br />
*[[Commodus]] (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. (Historia Augusta, Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11).<br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. (Historia Augusta, Pertinax 7 & 13).<br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*[[Elagabalus]] (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==Footnotes==</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3866Roman emperor2013-02-23T12:02:34Z<p>Edmund: </p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men took a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names were:<br />
*Augustus (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females (Suetonius, Divus Augustus LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI) and boys (Plutarch, Life of Antony 59; Sextus Aurelius Victor, Epitome de Caesaribus I 22), without indication of preference.<br />
*Tiberius (42 BC - AD 37), whose first wife was apparently his only love, but was described in old age as sexually debauched with boys and girls without indication of preference (Suetonius, Tiberius VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV).<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), whose only loves were (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife (Suetonius, Caligula XXIV 2 & XXV 3), but indulged “in lust after boys and women.” (Philo of Alexandria, On the Embassy to Gaius 2).<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” (Suetonius, Divus Claudius XXXIII 2). <br />
*Nero (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13; Suetonius, Nero XXVIII)<br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” (Suetonius, Galba XXII)<br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife (Suetonius, Otho III) and a boy (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIV.8).<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). (Suetonius, Vitellius III & VI)<br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women (Suetonius, Divus Vespasianus III & XXII)<br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. (Suetonius, Divus Titus VII 1; Tacitus, Histories II 2)<br />
*Domitian (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVII.6); the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams (Martialis, Epigrams IX 16,36 & 56)<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian (Suetonius, Domitianus I). This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. <br />
*Trajan (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVIII 7 & 21; Historia Augusta: Hadrianus II), and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*Hadrian (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19 (Royston Lambert, Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous, 1984), whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name. ((Historia Augusta: Hadrianus XI & XIII; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIX 11; Jerome, Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius, years CCXXIV & CCXXVII) <br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” (Historia Augusta, Lucius Verus 4)<br />
*Commodus (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. (Historia Augusta, Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11).<br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. (Historia Augusta, Pertinax 7 & 13).<br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*Elagabalus (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==Footnotes==</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Roman_emperor&diff=3863Roman emperor2013-02-23T11:44:19Z<p>Edmund: New page: The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus an...</p>
<hr />
<div>The '''Roman emperors''' were the rulers of the Roman state during the imperial period, conventionally considered to have started when the Roman Senate gave Octavian the titles Augustus and Princeps Senatus in 27 BC, and to have ended when the empire in the west finally fell in AD 476. Despite their initially similar titles, the later emperors in the east are generally termed Byzantine rather than Roman.<br />
<br />
Officially, the Roman Empire remained always a republic. The English word emperor derives from imperator, meaning a military commander, but this was only one of several titles the Senate accorded the man who unofficially exercised almost absolute power, and not one limited to holders of that position. <br />
<br />
For two reasons, the lives of the Roman emperors offer possibly unrivalled insight into how many men take a sexual interest in boys in societies with reasonably neutral attitudes towards boylove. First, Roman society accepted boylove as well as heterosexuality as legitimate and normal without having the idealistic bias towards it that the ancient Greeks had. The principal caveat to this is that, unlike in Greek society, it was unacceptable for a freeborn male to take on a passive sexual role, so men could only hope for sex with slave-boys without meeting public disapproval. Secondly, the private lives of the early Roman emperors are mostly well-documented, so they offer themselves to the historian of sex as a usable sample of men defined by rank rather than sexual proclivity.<br />
<br />
The definition of emperor used in the following brief survey of imperial Roman pederasty is bestowal by the Senate of the title Augustus. Two in the following list, Lucius Verus and Diadumenian, bore the title at the same time as another who wielded the real power, but they are included to ensure the selection is objective.<br />
<br />
The first twenty-six emperors listed here by their conventional short names were:<br />
*Augustus (63 BC - AD 14), attested to have been sexually active with females and boys, without indication of preference (Plutarch, Life of Antony 59; Sextus Aurelius Victor, Epitome de Caesaribus I 22; Suetonius, Divus Augustus LXII-LXIII, LXIX & LXXI).<br />
*Tiberius (42 BC - AD 37), only known to have loved his first wife, but described in old age as sexually active with boys and girls without indication of preference (Suetonius, Tiberius VII 3 & XLIII-XLIV).<br />
*Caligula (AD 12 – 41), only known to have loved (incestuously) his sister Drusilla and then his wife (Suetonius, Caligula XXIV 2 & XXV 3), but described as indulging “in lust after boys and women.” (Philo of Alexandria, On the Embassy to Gaius 2).<br />
*Claudius (10 BC – AD 54), of whom it was considered worthy of remark that he was “very excessively passionate for females, entirely uninvolved with males.” (Suetonius, Divus Claudius XXXIII 2). <br />
*Nero (AD 37 – 68), who indulged his lust for women, boys and men, the latter together with his general lack of restraint provoking ridicule. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXI.10, LXII.28 & LXIII.13; Suetonius, Nero XXVIII)<br />
*Galba (3 BC – AD 69), “more inclined to desire for males, and in gratifying it preferred the tough and full-grown.” (Suetonius, Galba XXII)<br />
*Otho (AD 32 – 69), enamoured of both his wife (Suetonius, Otho III) and a boy. (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIV.8).<br />
*Vitellius (AD 15 – 69), twice married with children, but also “debauched into mutual lust” with an “adulescentulum” (early adolescent boy). (Suetonius, Vitellius III & VI)<br />
*Vespasian (AD 9 – 79), only recorded as sexually involved with women (Suetonius, Divus Vespasianus III & XXII)<br />
*Titus (AD 39 – 81), who enjoyed a troop of catamites and eunuchs, as well as entanglements with women. (Suetonius, Divus Titus VII 1; Tacitus, Histories II 2)<br />
*Domitian (AD 51 – 96), “most profligate and lewd towards women and boys alike,” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVII.6); the poet Martial celebrated the beauty of his boy favourites in three of his epigrams (Martialis, Epigrams IX 16,36 & 56)<br />
*Nerva (AD 30 – 98), rumoured to have debauched his predecessor Domitian during the latter’s pubescence, though the context suggests this could be a calumny of Domitian. This is anyway the only romantic entanglement recorded for Nerva, whose private life is so obscure that it is not even known if he married. (Suetonius, Domitianus I) <br />
*Trajan (AD 53 – 117), happily but childlessly married, was only interested in boys, so far as is recorded (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXVIII 7 & 21; Historia Augusta: Hadrianus II), and was most obviously of all the Roman Emperors a boylover.<br />
*Hadrian (AD 76 – 138), though active with women too, was far better known for his love affairs with boys, most notably Antinous. After seven years as the imperial beloved, Antinous drowned in the Nile, aged 19, whereupon his lover proclaimed him a god, built temples to him and founded a city in his name. ((Historia Augusta: Hadrianus XI & XIII; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXIX 11; Jerome, Interpr. Chronicon Eusebius, years CCXXIV & CCXXVII; Royston Lambert, Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous, 1984)<br />
*Antoninus Pius (AD 86 – 161) overcame “all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys).” (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Marcus Aurelius (121-180), a Stoic philosopher, listed among the good examples his predecessor had given him “that he had overcome all passion for meirakion (adolescent boys). (Marcus Aurelius, Meditations I 16)<br />
*Lucius Verus (130 – 169), whose “name was smirched not only by the licence of an unbridled life, but also by adulteries and by love-affairs with youths.” (Historia Augusta, Lucius Verus 4)<br />
*Commodus (161 – 192) had three hundred pubescent catamites besides the same number of concubines living with him. (Historia Augusta, Commodus Antoninus V 4 & 11).<br />
*Pertinax (126 – 193), who besides having a wife and mistress, brought back his predecessor’s catamites to minister to his pleasures. (Historia Augusta, Pertinax 7 & 13).<br />
*Julius Didius (133 or 137 – 193), a brief and obscure Emperor of whose sexual life nothing can be inferred beyond his having fathered a daughter.<br />
*Septimus Severus (145 – 211), said to have had a boy beloved (Herodianus of Syria, History of the Roman Empire from the Death of Marcus Aurelius III.10), as well as two wives (Historia Augusta, Septimus Severus III).<br />
*Caracalla (188 – 217) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys.” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Geta (189-211) “dishonoured women and sexually outraged boys” (Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXXVII.7).<br />
*Macrinus (ca. 165 – 218), of whose sexual life nothing is known other than that he fathered a child on his wife, and the claim reported as doubtful that he had been a “public prostitute” in his youth. (Historia Augusta, Macrinus IV 2) <br />
*Diadumenian (208 - 218), killed aged nine and without known sexual experience, despite “his mouth designed for a kiss” and being “beloved of all because of his beauty.” (Historia Augusta, Diadumenianus III 2)<br />
*Elagabalus (203 or 204 – 222), a boy himself who included “catamites” in his varied erotic antics, but is better known for the outrage he provoked by assuming the passive role with men publicly sought out for their large organs. (Historia Augusta, Elagabalus 5-6, 10 & 31; Cassius Dio, Roman History LXXX.9, 13 & 24; Herodianus, History V.6)<br />
<br />
Following the overthrow and murder of Elagabalus, there was a puritanical reaction against his sexual profligacy. His successor Alexander Severus, who “was temperate in the enjoyment of love and would have nothing to do with catamites” made special provisions regarding the taxation of boy prostitutes and considered prohibiting them, which was actually done by the Emperor Philip “the Arab” two decades later (Historia Augusta, Alexander Severus XXIV 3-4 & XXXIX 2). Attitudes to homosexuality thereafter continued to deteriorate and, especially after the rise of Christianity in the following century, it was repressed with increasingly brutal legislation.<br />
<br />
==Footnotes==</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Boarding_school&diff=3736Boarding school2013-02-17T05:30:42Z<p>Edmund: /* References and further reading */</p>
<hr />
<div>'''Boarding schools''' are schools with dormitories where pupils live during the term. Boarding schools have long been considered as hot-beds of sexual activity among students, or sometimes between students and teachers and over the course of history, semi-pornographic novels from ''The adventures of a schoolboy'' (1866) to ''The boys of Swithins hall'' (1999) have only reinforced this notion. While sexual contact between boys in boarding schools is often being regarded in terms of "situational homosexuality", a close examination of the nature and social context of these contacts reveals it had more to do with [[pederasty]] or [[boylove|boy-love]] than situational [[homosexuality]].<br />
<br />
==English public schools ==<br />
<br />
The English public (that is, private) school has been the exemplar boarding school in this aspect. The “prefect-fagging” system in particular, formally established by Thomas Arnold in order to enhance “character building”, quite accidentally, facilitated this bond between older and younger students. Under the prefect-fagging system senior boys (“prefects”, ages 17-18) “were given a major role in governing the school, wielding discipline, and carrying responsibility” while new boys (“fags”, ages 12-13), were appointed as servants to the prefects (Nash 1961). Their duties consisted “of almost anything” prefects cared to impose, from running errands, carrying messages, cooking, blacking shoes, kindling fires, warming beds and toilet seats, to sexual favours (Nash 1961; Wakeford 1969; Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). Fags were chosen among the “cutest” young boys and senior students often made “top 10” lists of the best looking ones. Cute boys were given feminine nicknames and, in cases where they welcomed the “attentions” of older boys, they were called “tarts” (Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). Prefects on the other hand, were chosen by teachers (“masters”) according to their performance in sports (“games”) which were highly idealized by younger boys (Mangan 1981) while their leadership and academic skills were taken into account only secondarily (Wilkinson 1964; Wakeford 1969; Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992).<br />
<br />
Relationships between older and younger boys (or between prefects and fags) were sometimes chaste (see [[Edward Carpenter|Edward Carpenter]]’s ''The intermediate sex''), sometimes overtly sexual (see [[John Addington Symonds|John Addington Symonds’]] ''Memoirs'') but always sentimentalized (Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). In turn, this tradition led to the creation and proliferation of romantic public school novels (most notably ''The loom of youth'' (1917) and ''The hill'' (1905)) and [[Uranian poetry]].<br />
<br />
Evelyn Waugh once wrote: “Most good schoolmasters are homosexual by inclination-how else could they endure their work?” (quoted in Gathome-Hardy 1977: 164). Although “masters” tried to sublimate their feelings, relationships between “masters” and pupils also occurred (the most notorious cases being Eton headmaster Nicholas Udall in 1541 ("Udall, Nicholas". ''Dictionary of National Biography'') and Harrow headmaster [[C. J. Vaughan]]) (Ellis 1926; Hickson 1992). Despite Waugh’s observation, however, most English public school masters tried to repress homosexuality by taking several measures including dormitory patrols, enlisting students to spy on another, removing doors from lavatories, prohibiting students of different age groups talk to each other, prohibiting young boys to smile on the presence of older boys, changing the chapel seats arrangement (so as young and old boys would not face each other) and increasing the number of supervised activities especially strenuous sports (Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992; Edsall 2003).<br />
<br />
== Boarding schools in other countries ==<br />
<br />
Besides England, Scotland and Wales, the English public school proliferated in a number of other countries, most notably in [[Australia]], [[New Zealand]], [[Canada]] and [[South Africa]] but our knowledge is rather limited compared to England. In [[Canada]], however, historian Steven Maynard (1997) observed that boys developed sexual relations with men in private boarding schools during the late 19th and early 20th century.<br />
<br />
In [[Germany]], A. Hoche's research (1896) described similar situations in schools. Chaste romantic friendships occurred between boys of usually different ages and school-classes. Boys with girlish complexion played the passive role and the relationship included “kissing, poems, love-letters, scenes of jealousy, sometimes visits to each other in bed, but without masturbation, [[pederasty]], or other grossly physical manifestations” (Ellis 1926).<br />
<br />
Albert Nortal’s, ''Les adolescents passionnés'' (1913), is an autobiographical story, is a notably intimate and precise study of homosexuality in [[France|French]] schools (Ellis 1926: 325). Similarly, [[Japan|Japanese]] higher schools during the Meiji period that operated as boarding schools, initiation rites were full of homosexual overtones (Roden 1980).<br />
<br />
== References and further reading ==<br />
<br />
'''Historical and sociological studies'''<br />
<br />
*[[Vern Bullough|Bullough, V. L.]] (1980) “Homosexuality in nineteenth century English public schools,” in J. Harry and M. Sing Das, eds. ''Homosexuality in International Perspective''. New Delhi: Vikas Pub House, 123-131.<br />
* [[Edward Carpenter|Carpenter, E]]. (1908) ''[http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/pwh/carpenter-is.html The intermediate sex].'' London: Sonnenschein.<br />
*Chandos, J. (1984) ''Boys together: English public schools, 1800-1864''. New Haven: Yale University Press.<br />
*Edsall, N. C. (2003) ''Toward Stonewall: Homosexuality and Society in the Modern Western World''. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.<br />
*[[Havelock Ellis|Ellis, H]]. (1927) ''[http://www.psyplexus.com/ellis/16.htm Studies in the Psychology of Sex: Vol. I, Sexual inversion]'' (first edition 1897) ([[John Addington Symonds]] appears as the co-author in the first printing. The reference to Symonds' authorship was removed in subsequent printings).<br />
*Gathome-Hardy, J. (1977) ''The old school tie: the phenomenon of English public school''. New York: Viking.<br />
*Hickson, A. (1992) ''The poisoned bowl: sex and the public school''. London: Duckworth.<br />
*Johansson, A., and W. A. Percy. (1990) “Public schools.” In W. R. Dynes, ed. ''Encyclopedia of homosexuality,'' vol. II. New York: Garland, 1083-1085.<br />
*Lambert, R., Bullock, R. & Millham, S. (1975) ''The chance of a lifetime? A study of boys’ and coeducational boarding schools in England and Wales''. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.<br />
*Mangan, J. A. (1981) ''Athleticism in the Victorian and Edwardian Public School''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. <br />
*Maynard, S. (1997) “[http://home.wanadoo.nl/ipce/library_two/pdf/horr_temp.pdf 'Horrible temptations': sex, men, and working-class male youth in urban Ontario, 1890-1935],” ''Canadian Historical Review'' 6: 99-124. (.pdf file)<br />
*Nash, P. (1961) "Training an elite: the prefect-fagging system in the English public school." ''History of Education Quarterly'' 1: 14-21.<br />
*Poynting, S. (2005) “Snakes and Leaders: Hegemonic Masculinity in Ruling-Class Boys’ Boarding Schools,” ''Men and Masculinities'' 7(4): 325-346.<br />
*Roden, D. T. (1980) ''Schooldays in Imperial Japan''. Los Angeles: University of California Press.<br />
*Rotundo, A. E. (1989) “Romantic Friendship: Male Intimacy and Middle-Class Youth in the Northern [[United States]], 1800-1900,” ''Journal of Social History'' 23: 1-25.<br />
*Schaverien, J. (2004) “Boarding school: the trauma of the 'privileged' child,” ''Journal of Analytical Psychology'' 49(5): 683-705.<br />
*Wakeford, J. (1969) ''The cloistered elite: a sociological analysis of the English public boarding school''. London: MacMillan.<br />
*Wilkinson, R. (1964) ''The prefects: British leadership and the public school tradition''. London: Oxford University Press.<br />
<br />
'''Memoirs'''<br />
<br />
*Anonymous, ''Memoirs of a Voluptuary'' (1906)<br />
*Anonymous, "Admissions of a director of admissions," ''[[International Journal of Greek Love]]'' 2 (1966): 38-39.<br />
*Boyd, D. “[http://observer.guardian.co.uk/life/story/0,,538842,00.html A suitable boy],” ''Observer'', August 21, 2001.<br />
*Dahl, R. ''Boy: tales of childhood'' (London: Cape, 1984)<br />
*Fry, S. ''Moab is my washpot'' (London: Hutchinson, 1997)<br />
*Lewis, C. S. ''Surprised by joy: the shape of my early life'' (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1955)<br />
* [[John Addington Symonds|Symonds, J. A.]] (1984) ''The Memoirs of John Addington Symonds'' (London: Hutchinson, 1984, originally written in 1897)<br />
*Various authors, “[http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1589948,00.html When I was at school…]” ''Guardian'', October 12, 2005.<br />
*Waugh, E. ''A little learning'' (London: Chapman and Hall, 1964)<br />
See also the second part of Hickson’s (1992) book: “tales out of school” (pp. 105-212) with unpublished accounts of sexuality public schools.<br />
<br />
'''Fiction'''<br />
<br />
*Hughes, Thomas, ''Tom Brown’s schooldays'' (1857)<br />
*Farrar, Frederic W., ''Eric, or Little by Little'' (1858): religiously earnest story of a boy's fall from grace<br />
*Reddie, J., ''The adventures of a schoolboy'' (1866)<br />
*Vachell, H. ''The hill: a romance of friendship'' (1905)<br />
*Waugh, Alec, ''The loom of youth'' (1917): semi-autobiographical account of his days at Sherborne, from which he was expelled for a love affair with a younger boy.<br />
*Waugh, Evelyn, ''Decline and fall'' (1928)<br />
*Dilke, Christopher, ''The rotten Apple'' (1968)<br />
*Aldiss, Brian W., ''The hand-reared boy'' (1970)<br />
*Fuller, R. ''The ruined boys'' (1987)<br />
*Fry, Stephen, ''The liar'' (1991): semi-autobiographical, as can be seen from its similarities to his ''Moab is my Washpot''<br />
*Vernon, Frances, ''The Fall of Doctor Onslow'' (1994): 1858 scandal about a headmaster, loosely based on the above-mentioned Charles Vaughan, and a boy of 16.<br />
*Kent, Chris, ''The boys of Swithins hall'' (1999), ''Boys in Shorts'' (2000), ''The Real Tom Brown's Schooldays'' (2002): all semi-erotic, the last set in the present despite the title <br />
*Marlowe, Edmund, ''[["Alexander's Choice"]]'' (2012): love affair of a 14-year-old and a young teacher at Eton in 1984<br />
* [[Roger Peyrefitte|Peyrefitte, R.]] ''Les amitiés particulières'' (1944), translated into English as ''Special Friendships'' (1958): tragedy in a Catholic school in the 1920s<br />
*[[Henry de Montherlant|de Montherlant, H.]] ''Les garçons'' (1969), translated into English as ''The Boys'' (1969)<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
[[Category:Encyclopedia]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Boarding_school&diff=3735Boarding school2013-02-17T05:29:03Z<p>Edmund: /* References and further reading */</p>
<hr />
<div>'''Boarding schools''' are schools with dormitories where pupils live during the term. Boarding schools have long been considered as hot-beds of sexual activity among students, or sometimes between students and teachers and over the course of history, semi-pornographic novels from ''The adventures of a schoolboy'' (1866) to ''The boys of Swithins hall'' (1999) have only reinforced this notion. While sexual contact between boys in boarding schools is often being regarded in terms of "situational homosexuality", a close examination of the nature and social context of these contacts reveals it had more to do with [[pederasty]] or [[boylove|boy-love]] than situational [[homosexuality]].<br />
<br />
==English public schools ==<br />
<br />
The English public (that is, private) school has been the exemplar boarding school in this aspect. The “prefect-fagging” system in particular, formally established by Thomas Arnold in order to enhance “character building”, quite accidentally, facilitated this bond between older and younger students. Under the prefect-fagging system senior boys (“prefects”, ages 17-18) “were given a major role in governing the school, wielding discipline, and carrying responsibility” while new boys (“fags”, ages 12-13), were appointed as servants to the prefects (Nash 1961). Their duties consisted “of almost anything” prefects cared to impose, from running errands, carrying messages, cooking, blacking shoes, kindling fires, warming beds and toilet seats, to sexual favours (Nash 1961; Wakeford 1969; Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). Fags were chosen among the “cutest” young boys and senior students often made “top 10” lists of the best looking ones. Cute boys were given feminine nicknames and, in cases where they welcomed the “attentions” of older boys, they were called “tarts” (Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). Prefects on the other hand, were chosen by teachers (“masters”) according to their performance in sports (“games”) which were highly idealized by younger boys (Mangan 1981) while their leadership and academic skills were taken into account only secondarily (Wilkinson 1964; Wakeford 1969; Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992).<br />
<br />
Relationships between older and younger boys (or between prefects and fags) were sometimes chaste (see [[Edward Carpenter|Edward Carpenter]]’s ''The intermediate sex''), sometimes overtly sexual (see [[John Addington Symonds|John Addington Symonds’]] ''Memoirs'') but always sentimentalized (Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). In turn, this tradition led to the creation and proliferation of romantic public school novels (most notably ''The loom of youth'' (1917) and ''The hill'' (1905)) and [[Uranian poetry]].<br />
<br />
Evelyn Waugh once wrote: “Most good schoolmasters are homosexual by inclination-how else could they endure their work?” (quoted in Gathome-Hardy 1977: 164). Although “masters” tried to sublimate their feelings, relationships between “masters” and pupils also occurred (the most notorious cases being Eton headmaster Nicholas Udall in 1541 ("Udall, Nicholas". ''Dictionary of National Biography'') and Harrow headmaster [[C. J. Vaughan]]) (Ellis 1926; Hickson 1992). Despite Waugh’s observation, however, most English public school masters tried to repress homosexuality by taking several measures including dormitory patrols, enlisting students to spy on another, removing doors from lavatories, prohibiting students of different age groups talk to each other, prohibiting young boys to smile on the presence of older boys, changing the chapel seats arrangement (so as young and old boys would not face each other) and increasing the number of supervised activities especially strenuous sports (Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992; Edsall 2003).<br />
<br />
== Boarding schools in other countries ==<br />
<br />
Besides England, Scotland and Wales, the English public school proliferated in a number of other countries, most notably in [[Australia]], [[New Zealand]], [[Canada]] and [[South Africa]] but our knowledge is rather limited compared to England. In [[Canada]], however, historian Steven Maynard (1997) observed that boys developed sexual relations with men in private boarding schools during the late 19th and early 20th century.<br />
<br />
In [[Germany]], A. Hoche's research (1896) described similar situations in schools. Chaste romantic friendships occurred between boys of usually different ages and school-classes. Boys with girlish complexion played the passive role and the relationship included “kissing, poems, love-letters, scenes of jealousy, sometimes visits to each other in bed, but without masturbation, [[pederasty]], or other grossly physical manifestations” (Ellis 1926).<br />
<br />
Albert Nortal’s, ''Les adolescents passionnés'' (1913), is an autobiographical story, is a notably intimate and precise study of homosexuality in [[France|French]] schools (Ellis 1926: 325). Similarly, [[Japan|Japanese]] higher schools during the Meiji period that operated as boarding schools, initiation rites were full of homosexual overtones (Roden 1980).<br />
<br />
== References and further reading ==<br />
<br />
'''Historical and sociological studies'''<br />
<br />
*[[Vern Bullough|Bullough, V. L.]] (1980) “Homosexuality in nineteenth century English public schools,” in J. Harry and M. Sing Das, eds. ''Homosexuality in International Perspective''. New Delhi: Vikas Pub House, 123-131.<br />
* [[Edward Carpenter|Carpenter, E]]. (1908) ''[http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/pwh/carpenter-is.html The intermediate sex].'' London: Sonnenschein.<br />
*Chandos, J. (1984) ''Boys together: English public schools, 1800-1864''. New Haven: Yale University Press.<br />
*Edsall, N. C. (2003) ''Toward Stonewall: Homosexuality and Society in the Modern Western World''. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.<br />
*[[Havelock Ellis|Ellis, H]]. (1927) ''[http://www.psyplexus.com/ellis/16.htm Studies in the Psychology of Sex: Vol. I, Sexual inversion]'' (first edition 1897) ([[John Addington Symonds]] appears as the co-author in the first printing. The reference to Symonds' authorship was removed in subsequent printings).<br />
*Gathome-Hardy, J. (1977) ''The old school tie: the phenomenon of English public school''. New York: Viking.<br />
*Hickson, A. (1992) ''The poisoned bowl: sex and the public school''. London: Duckworth.<br />
*Johansson, A., and W. A. Percy. (1990) “Public schools.” In W. R. Dynes, ed. ''Encyclopedia of homosexuality,'' vol. II. New York: Garland, 1083-1085.<br />
*Lambert, R., Bullock, R. & Millham, S. (1975) ''The chance of a lifetime? A study of boys’ and coeducational boarding schools in England and Wales''. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.<br />
*Mangan, J. A. (1981) ''Athleticism in the Victorian and Edwardian Public School''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. <br />
*Maynard, S. (1997) “[http://home.wanadoo.nl/ipce/library_two/pdf/horr_temp.pdf 'Horrible temptations': sex, men, and working-class male youth in urban Ontario, 1890-1935],” ''Canadian Historical Review'' 6: 99-124. (.pdf file)<br />
*Nash, P. (1961) "Training an elite: the prefect-fagging system in the English public school." ''History of Education Quarterly'' 1: 14-21.<br />
*Poynting, S. (2005) “Snakes and Leaders: Hegemonic Masculinity in Ruling-Class Boys’ Boarding Schools,” ''Men and Masculinities'' 7(4): 325-346.<br />
*Roden, D. T. (1980) ''Schooldays in Imperial Japan''. Los Angeles: University of California Press.<br />
*Rotundo, A. E. (1989) “Romantic Friendship: Male Intimacy and Middle-Class Youth in the Northern [[United States]], 1800-1900,” ''Journal of Social History'' 23: 1-25.<br />
*Schaverien, J. (2004) “Boarding school: the trauma of the 'privileged' child,” ''Journal of Analytical Psychology'' 49(5): 683-705.<br />
*Wakeford, J. (1969) ''The cloistered elite: a sociological analysis of the English public boarding school''. London: MacMillan.<br />
*Wilkinson, R. (1964) ''The prefects: British leadership and the public school tradition''. London: Oxford University Press.<br />
<br />
'''Memoirs'''<br />
<br />
*Anonymous, ''Memoirs of a Voluptuary'' (1906)<br />
*Anonymous, "Admissions of a director of admissions," ''[[International Journal of Greek Love]]'' 2 (1966): 38-39.<br />
*Boyd, D. “[http://observer.guardian.co.uk/life/story/0,,538842,00.html A suitable boy],” ''Observer'', August 21, 2001.<br />
*Dahl, R. ''Boy: tales of childhood'' (London: Cape, 1984)<br />
*Fry, S. ''Moab is my washpot'' (London: Hutchinson, 1997)<br />
*Lewis, C. S. ''Surprised by joy: the shape of my early life'' (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1955)<br />
* [[John Addington Symonds|Symonds, J. A.]] (1984) ''The Memoirs of John Addington Symonds'' (London: Hutchinson, 1984, originally written in 1897)<br />
*Various authors, “[http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1589948,00.html When I was at school…]” ''Guardian'', October 12, 2005.<br />
*Waugh, E. ''A little learning'' (London: Chapman and Hall, 1964)<br />
See also the second part of Hickson’s (1992) book: “tales out of school” (pp. 105-212) with unpublished accounts of sexuality public schools.<br />
<br />
'''Fiction'''<br />
<br />
*Hughes, Thomas, ''Tom Brown’s schooldays'' (1857)<br />
*Farrar, Frederic W., ''Eric, or Little by Little'' (1858): religiously earnest story of a boy's fall from grace<br />
*Reddie, J., ''The adventures of a schoolboy'' (1866)<br />
*Vachell, H. ''The hill: a romance of friendship'' (1905)<br />
*Waugh, Alec, ''The loom of youth'' (1917): semi-autobiographical account of his days at Sherborne, from which he was expelled for a love affair with a younger boy.<br />
*Waugh, Evelyn, ''Decline and fall'' (1928)<br />
*Dilke, Christopher, ''The rotten Apple'' (1968)<br />
*Aldiss, Brian W., ''The hand-reared boy'' (1970)<br />
*Fuller, R. ''The ruined boys'' (1987)<br />
*Fry, Stephen, ''The liar'' (1991): semi-autobiographical, as can be seen from its similarities to his ''Moab is my Washpot''<br />
*Vernon, Frances, ''The Fall of Doctor Onslow'' (1994): 1858 scandal about a headmaster, loosely based on the above-mentioned Charles Vaughan, and a boy of 16.<br />
*Kent, Chris, ''The boys of Swithins hall'' (1999), ''Boys in Shorts'' (2000), ''The Real Tom Brown's Schooldays'' (2002): all semi-erotic, the last set in the present despite the title <br />
*Marlowe, Edmund, ''[["Alexander's Choice"]] (2012): love affair of a 14-year-old and a young teacher at Eton in 1984<br />
* [[Roger Peyrefitte|Peyrefitte, R.]] ''Les amitiés particulières'' (1944), translated into English as ''Special Friendships'' (1958): tragedy in a Catholic school in the 1920s<br />
*[[Henry de Montherlant|de Montherlant, H.]] ''Les garçons'' (1969), translated into English as ''The Boys'' (1969)<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
[[Category:Encyclopedia]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Boarding_school&diff=3685Boarding school2013-02-14T03:42:40Z<p>Edmund: /* References and further reading */</p>
<hr />
<div>'''Boarding schools''' are schools with dormitories where pupils live during the term. Boarding schools have long been considered as hot-beds of sexual activity among students, or sometimes between students and teachers and over the course of history, semi-pornographic novels from ''The adventures of a schoolboy'' (1866) to ''The boys of Swithins hall'' (1999) have only reinforced this notion. While sexual contact between boys in boarding schools is often being regarded in terms of "situational homosexuality", a close examination of the nature and social context of these contacts reveals it had more to do with [[pederasty]] or [[boylove|boy-love]] than situational [[homosexuality]].<br />
<br />
==English public schools ==<br />
<br />
The English public (that is, private) school has been the exemplar boarding school in this aspect. The “prefect-fagging” system in particular, formally established by Thomas Arnold in order to enhance “character building”, quite accidentally, facilitated this bond between older and younger students. Under the prefect-fagging system senior boys (“prefects”, ages 17-18) “were given a major role in governing the school, wielding discipline, and carrying responsibility” while new boys (“fags”, ages 12-13), were appointed as servants to the prefects (Nash 1961). Their duties consisted “of almost anything” prefects cared to impose, from running errands, carrying messages, cooking, blacking shoes, kindling fires, warming beds and toilet seats, to sexual favours (Nash 1961; Wakeford 1969; Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). Fags were chosen among the “cutest” young boys and senior students often made “top 10” lists of the best looking ones. Cute boys were given feminine nicknames and, in cases where they welcomed the “attentions” of older boys, they were called “tarts” (Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). Prefects on the other hand, were chosen by teachers (“masters”) according to their performance in sports (“games”) which were highly idealized by younger boys (Mangan 1981) while their leadership and academic skills were taken into account only secondarily (Wilkinson 1964; Wakeford 1969; Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992).<br />
<br />
Relationships between older and younger boys (or between prefects and fags) were sometimes chaste (see [[Edward Carpenter|Edward Carpenter]]’s ''The intermediate sex''), sometimes overtly sexual (see [[John Addington Symonds|John Addington Symonds’]] ''Memoirs'') but always sentimentalized (Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). In turn, this tradition led to the creation and proliferation of romantic public school novels (most notably ''The loom of youth'' (1917) and ''The hill'' (1905)) and [[Uranian poetry]].<br />
<br />
Evelyn Waugh once wrote: “Most good schoolmasters are homosexual by inclination-how else could they endure their work?” (quoted in Gathome-Hardy 1977: 164). Although “masters” tried to sublimate their feelings, relationships between “masters” and pupils also occurred (the most notorious cases being Eton headmaster Nicholas Udall in 1541 ("Udall, Nicholas". ''Dictionary of National Biography'') and Harrow headmaster [[C. J. Vaughan]]) (Ellis 1926; Hickson 1992). Despite Waugh’s observation, however, most English public school masters tried to repress homosexuality by taking several measures including dormitory patrols, enlisting students to spy on another, removing doors from lavatories, prohibiting students of different age groups talk to each other, prohibiting young boys to smile on the presence of older boys, changing the chapel seats arrangement (so as young and old boys would not face each other) and increasing the number of supervised activities especially strenuous sports (Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992; Edsall 2003).<br />
<br />
== Boarding schools in other countries ==<br />
<br />
Besides England, Scotland and Wales, the English public school proliferated in a number of other countries, most notably in [[Australia]], [[New Zealand]], [[Canada]] and [[South Africa]] but our knowledge is rather limited compared to England. In [[Canada]], however, historian Steven Maynard (1997) observed that boys developed sexual relations with men in private boarding schools during the late 19th and early 20th century.<br />
<br />
In [[Germany]], A. Hoche's research (1896) described similar situations in schools. Chaste romantic friendships occurred between boys of usually different ages and school-classes. Boys with girlish complexion played the passive role and the relationship included “kissing, poems, love-letters, scenes of jealousy, sometimes visits to each other in bed, but without masturbation, [[pederasty]], or other grossly physical manifestations” (Ellis 1926).<br />
<br />
Albert Nortal’s, ''Les adolescents passionnés'' (1913), is an autobiographical story, is a notably intimate and precise study of homosexuality in [[France|French]] schools (Ellis 1926: 325). Similarly, [[Japan|Japanese]] higher schools during the Meiji period that operated as boarding schools, initiation rites were full of homosexual overtones (Roden 1980).<br />
<br />
== References and further reading ==<br />
<br />
'''Historical and sociological studies'''<br />
<br />
*[[Vern Bullough|Bullough, V. L.]] (1980) “Homosexuality in nineteenth century English public schools,” in J. Harry and M. Sing Das, eds. ''Homosexuality in International Perspective''. New Delhi: Vikas Pub House, 123-131.<br />
* [[Edward Carpenter|Carpenter, E]]. (1908) ''[http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/pwh/carpenter-is.html The intermediate sex].'' London: Sonnenschein.<br />
*Chandos, J. (1984) ''Boys together: English public schools, 1800-1864''. New Haven: Yale University Press.<br />
*Edsall, N. C. (2003) ''Toward Stonewall: Homosexuality and Society in the Modern Western World''. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.<br />
*[[Havelock Ellis|Ellis, H]]. (1927) ''[http://www.psyplexus.com/ellis/16.htm Studies in the Psychology of Sex: Vol. I, Sexual inversion]'' (first edition 1897) ([[John Addington Symonds]] appears as the co-author in the first printing. The reference to Symonds' authorship was removed in subsequent printings).<br />
*Gathome-Hardy, J. (1977) ''The old school tie: the phenomenon of English public school''. New York: Viking.<br />
*Hickson, A. (1992) ''The poisoned bowl: sex and the public school''. London: Duckworth.<br />
*Johansson, A., and W. A. Percy. (1990) “Public schools.” In W. R. Dynes, ed. ''Encyclopedia of homosexuality,'' vol. II. New York: Garland, 1083-1085.<br />
*Lambert, R., Bullock, R. & Millham, S. (1975) ''The chance of a lifetime? A study of boys’ and coeducational boarding schools in England and Wales''. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.<br />
*Mangan, J. A. (1981) ''Athleticism in the Victorian and Edwardian Public School''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. <br />
*Maynard, S. (1997) “[http://home.wanadoo.nl/ipce/library_two/pdf/horr_temp.pdf 'Horrible temptations': sex, men, and working-class male youth in urban Ontario, 1890-1935],” ''Canadian Historical Review'' 6: 99-124. (.pdf file)<br />
*Nash, P. (1961) "Training an elite: the prefect-fagging system in the English public school." ''History of Education Quarterly'' 1: 14-21.<br />
*Poynting, S. (2005) “Snakes and Leaders: Hegemonic Masculinity in Ruling-Class Boys’ Boarding Schools,” ''Men and Masculinities'' 7(4): 325-346.<br />
*Roden, D. T. (1980) ''Schooldays in Imperial Japan''. Los Angeles: University of California Press.<br />
*Rotundo, A. E. (1989) “Romantic Friendship: Male Intimacy and Middle-Class Youth in the Northern [[United States]], 1800-1900,” ''Journal of Social History'' 23: 1-25.<br />
*Schaverien, J. (2004) “Boarding school: the trauma of the 'privileged' child,” ''Journal of Analytical Psychology'' 49(5): 683-705.<br />
*Wakeford, J. (1969) ''The cloistered elite: a sociological analysis of the English public boarding school''. London: MacMillan.<br />
*Wilkinson, R. (1964) ''The prefects: British leadership and the public school tradition''. London: Oxford University Press.<br />
<br />
'''Memoirs'''<br />
<br />
*Anonymous, ''Memoirs of a Voluptuary'' (1906)<br />
*Anonymous, "Admissions of a director of admissions," ''[[International Journal of Greek Love]]'' 2 (1966): 38-39.<br />
*Boyd, D. “[http://observer.guardian.co.uk/life/story/0,,538842,00.html A suitable boy],” ''Observer'', August 21, 2001.<br />
*Dahl, R. ''Boy: tales of childhood'' (London: Cape, 1984)<br />
*Fry, S. ''Moab is my washpot'' (London: Hutchinson, 1997)<br />
*Lewis, C. S. ''Surprised by joy: the shape of my early life'' (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1955)<br />
* [[John Addington Symonds|Symonds, J. A.]] (1984) ''The Memoirs of John Addington Symonds'' (London: Hutchinson, 1984, originally written in 1897)<br />
*Various authors, “[http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1589948,00.html When I was at school…]” ''Guardian'', October 12, 2005.<br />
*Waugh, E. ''A little learning'' (London: Chapman and Hall, 1964)<br />
See also the second part of Hickson’s (1992) book: “tales out of school” (pp. 105-212) with unpublished accounts of sexuality public schools.<br />
<br />
'''Fiction'''<br />
<br />
*Hughes, Thomas, ''Tom Brown’s schooldays'' (1857)<br />
*Farrar, Frederic W., ''Eric, or Little by Little'' (1858): religiously earnest story of a boy's fall from grace<br />
*Reddie, J., ''The adventures of a schoolboy'' (1866)<br />
*Vachell, H. ''The hill: a romance of friendship'' (1905)<br />
*Waugh, Alec, ''The loom of youth'' (1917): semi-autobiographical account of his days at Sherborne, from which he was expelled for a love affair with a younger boy.<br />
*Waugh, Evelyn, ''Decline and fall'' (1928)<br />
*Dilke, Christopher, ''The rotten Apple'' (1968)<br />
*Aldiss, Brian W., ''The hand-reared boy'' (1970)<br />
*Fuller, R. ''The ruined boys'' (1987)<br />
*Fry, Stephen, ''The liar'' (1991): semi-autobiographical, as can be seen from its similarities to his ''Moab is my Washpot''<br />
*Vernon, Frances, ''The Fall of Doctor Onslow'' (1994): 1858 scandal about a headmaster, loosely based on the above-mentioned Charles Vaughan, and a boy of 16.<br />
*Kent, Chris, ''The boys of Swithins hall'' (1999), ''Boys in Shorts'' (2000), ''The Real Tom Brown's Schooldays'' (2002): all semi-erotic, the last set in the present despite the title <br />
*Marlowe, Edmund, ''[["Alexander's Choice"]](2012): love affair of a 14-year-old and a young teacher at Eton in 1984<br />
* [[Roger Peyrefitte|Peyrefitte, R.]] ''Les amitiés particulières'' (1944), translated into English as ''Special Friendships'' (1958): tragedy in a Catholic school in the 1920s<br />
*[[Henry de Montherlant|de Montherlant, H.]] ''Les garçons'' (1969), translated into English as ''The Boys'' (1969)<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
[[Category:Encyclopedia]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Boarding_school&diff=3684Boarding school2013-02-14T03:40:43Z<p>Edmund: /* References and further reading */</p>
<hr />
<div>'''Boarding schools''' are schools with dormitories where pupils live during the term. Boarding schools have long been considered as hot-beds of sexual activity among students, or sometimes between students and teachers and over the course of history, semi-pornographic novels from ''The adventures of a schoolboy'' (1866) to ''The boys of Swithins hall'' (1999) have only reinforced this notion. While sexual contact between boys in boarding schools is often being regarded in terms of "situational homosexuality", a close examination of the nature and social context of these contacts reveals it had more to do with [[pederasty]] or [[boylove|boy-love]] than situational [[homosexuality]].<br />
<br />
==English public schools ==<br />
<br />
The English public (that is, private) school has been the exemplar boarding school in this aspect. The “prefect-fagging” system in particular, formally established by Thomas Arnold in order to enhance “character building”, quite accidentally, facilitated this bond between older and younger students. Under the prefect-fagging system senior boys (“prefects”, ages 17-18) “were given a major role in governing the school, wielding discipline, and carrying responsibility” while new boys (“fags”, ages 12-13), were appointed as servants to the prefects (Nash 1961). Their duties consisted “of almost anything” prefects cared to impose, from running errands, carrying messages, cooking, blacking shoes, kindling fires, warming beds and toilet seats, to sexual favours (Nash 1961; Wakeford 1969; Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). Fags were chosen among the “cutest” young boys and senior students often made “top 10” lists of the best looking ones. Cute boys were given feminine nicknames and, in cases where they welcomed the “attentions” of older boys, they were called “tarts” (Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). Prefects on the other hand, were chosen by teachers (“masters”) according to their performance in sports (“games”) which were highly idealized by younger boys (Mangan 1981) while their leadership and academic skills were taken into account only secondarily (Wilkinson 1964; Wakeford 1969; Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992).<br />
<br />
Relationships between older and younger boys (or between prefects and fags) were sometimes chaste (see [[Edward Carpenter|Edward Carpenter]]’s ''The intermediate sex''), sometimes overtly sexual (see [[John Addington Symonds|John Addington Symonds’]] ''Memoirs'') but always sentimentalized (Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992). In turn, this tradition led to the creation and proliferation of romantic public school novels (most notably ''The loom of youth'' (1917) and ''The hill'' (1905)) and [[Uranian poetry]].<br />
<br />
Evelyn Waugh once wrote: “Most good schoolmasters are homosexual by inclination-how else could they endure their work?” (quoted in Gathome-Hardy 1977: 164). Although “masters” tried to sublimate their feelings, relationships between “masters” and pupils also occurred (the most notorious cases being Eton headmaster Nicholas Udall in 1541 ("Udall, Nicholas". ''Dictionary of National Biography'') and Harrow headmaster [[C. J. Vaughan]]) (Ellis 1926; Hickson 1992). Despite Waugh’s observation, however, most English public school masters tried to repress homosexuality by taking several measures including dormitory patrols, enlisting students to spy on another, removing doors from lavatories, prohibiting students of different age groups talk to each other, prohibiting young boys to smile on the presence of older boys, changing the chapel seats arrangement (so as young and old boys would not face each other) and increasing the number of supervised activities especially strenuous sports (Gathome-Hardy 1977; Chandos 1984; Hickson 1992; Edsall 2003).<br />
<br />
== Boarding schools in other countries ==<br />
<br />
Besides England, Scotland and Wales, the English public school proliferated in a number of other countries, most notably in [[Australia]], [[New Zealand]], [[Canada]] and [[South Africa]] but our knowledge is rather limited compared to England. In [[Canada]], however, historian Steven Maynard (1997) observed that boys developed sexual relations with men in private boarding schools during the late 19th and early 20th century.<br />
<br />
In [[Germany]], A. Hoche's research (1896) described similar situations in schools. Chaste romantic friendships occurred between boys of usually different ages and school-classes. Boys with girlish complexion played the passive role and the relationship included “kissing, poems, love-letters, scenes of jealousy, sometimes visits to each other in bed, but without masturbation, [[pederasty]], or other grossly physical manifestations” (Ellis 1926).<br />
<br />
Albert Nortal’s, ''Les adolescents passionnés'' (1913), is an autobiographical story, is a notably intimate and precise study of homosexuality in [[France|French]] schools (Ellis 1926: 325). Similarly, [[Japan|Japanese]] higher schools during the Meiji period that operated as boarding schools, initiation rites were full of homosexual overtones (Roden 1980).<br />
<br />
== References and further reading ==<br />
<br />
'''Historical and sociological studies'''<br />
<br />
*[[Vern Bullough|Bullough, V. L.]] (1980) “Homosexuality in nineteenth century English public schools,” in J. Harry and M. Sing Das, eds. ''Homosexuality in International Perspective''. New Delhi: Vikas Pub House, 123-131.<br />
* [[Edward Carpenter|Carpenter, E]]. (1908) ''[http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/pwh/carpenter-is.html The intermediate sex].'' London: Sonnenschein.<br />
*Chandos, J. (1984) ''Boys together: English public schools, 1800-1864''. New Haven: Yale University Press.<br />
*Edsall, N. C. (2003) ''Toward Stonewall: Homosexuality and Society in the Modern Western World''. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.<br />
*[[Havelock Ellis|Ellis, H]]. (1927) ''[http://www.psyplexus.com/ellis/16.htm Studies in the Psychology of Sex: Vol. I, Sexual inversion]'' (first edition 1897) ([[John Addington Symonds]] appears as the co-author in the first printing. The reference to Symonds' authorship was removed in subsequent printings).<br />
*Gathome-Hardy, J. (1977) ''The old school tie: the phenomenon of English public school''. New York: Viking.<br />
*Hickson, A. (1992) ''The poisoned bowl: sex and the public school''. London: Duckworth.<br />
*Johansson, A., and W. A. Percy. (1990) “Public schools.” In W. R. Dynes, ed. ''Encyclopedia of homosexuality,'' vol. II. New York: Garland, 1083-1085.<br />
*Lambert, R., Bullock, R. & Millham, S. (1975) ''The chance of a lifetime? A study of boys’ and coeducational boarding schools in England and Wales''. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.<br />
*Mangan, J. A. (1981) ''Athleticism in the Victorian and Edwardian Public School''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. <br />
*Maynard, S. (1997) “[http://home.wanadoo.nl/ipce/library_two/pdf/horr_temp.pdf 'Horrible temptations': sex, men, and working-class male youth in urban Ontario, 1890-1935],” ''Canadian Historical Review'' 6: 99-124. (.pdf file)<br />
*Nash, P. (1961) "Training an elite: the prefect-fagging system in the English public school." ''History of Education Quarterly'' 1: 14-21.<br />
*Poynting, S. (2005) “Snakes and Leaders: Hegemonic Masculinity in Ruling-Class Boys’ Boarding Schools,” ''Men and Masculinities'' 7(4): 325-346.<br />
*Roden, D. T. (1980) ''Schooldays in Imperial Japan''. Los Angeles: University of California Press.<br />
*Rotundo, A. E. (1989) “Romantic Friendship: Male Intimacy and Middle-Class Youth in the Northern [[United States]], 1800-1900,” ''Journal of Social History'' 23: 1-25.<br />
*Schaverien, J. (2004) “Boarding school: the trauma of the 'privileged' child,” ''Journal of Analytical Psychology'' 49(5): 683-705.<br />
*Wakeford, J. (1969) ''The cloistered elite: a sociological analysis of the English public boarding school''. London: MacMillan.<br />
*Wilkinson, R. (1964) ''The prefects: British leadership and the public school tradition''. London: Oxford University Press.<br />
<br />
'''Memoirs'''<br />
<br />
*Anonymous, ''Memoirs of a Voluptuary'' (1906)<br />
*Anonymous, "Admissions of a director of admissions," ''[[International Journal of Greek Love]]'' 2 (1966): 38-39.<br />
*Boyd, D. “[http://observer.guardian.co.uk/life/story/0,,538842,00.html A suitable boy],” ''Observer'', August 21, 2001.<br />
*Dahl, R. ''Boy: tales of childhood'' (London: Cape, 1984)<br />
*Fry, S. ''Moab is my washpot'' (London: Hutchinson, 1997)<br />
*Lewis, C. S. ''Surprised by joy: the shape of my early life'' (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1955)<br />
* [[John Addington Symonds|Symonds, J. A.]] (1984) ''The Memoirs of John Addington Symonds'' (London: Hutchinson, 1984, originally written in 1897)<br />
*Various authors, “[http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1589948,00.html When I was at school…]” ''Guardian'', October 12, 2005.<br />
*Waugh, E. ''A little learning'' (London: Chapman and Hall, 1964)<br />
See also the second part of Hickson’s (1992) book: “tales out of school” (pp. 105-212) with unpublished accounts of sexuality public schools.<br />
<br />
'''Fiction'''<br />
<br />
*Hughes, Thomas, ''Tom Brown’s schooldays'' (1857)<br />
*Farrar, Frederic W., ''Eric, or Little by Little'' (1858): religiously earnest story of a boy's fall from grace<br />
*Reddie, J., ''The adventures of a schoolboy'' (1866)<br />
*Vachell, H. ''The hill: a romance of friendship'' (1905)<br />
*Waugh, Alec, ''The loom of youth'' (1917): semi-autobiographical account of his days at Sherborne, from which he was expelled for a love affair with a younger boy.<br />
*Waugh, Evelyn, ''Decline and fall'' (1928)<br />
*Dilke, Christopher, ''The rotten Apple'' (1968)<br />
*Aldiss, Brian W., ''The hand-reared boy'' (1970)<br />
*Fuller, R. ''The ruined boys'' (1987)<br />
*Fry, Stephen, ''The liar'' (1991): semi-autobiographical, as can be seen from its similarities to his ''Moab is my Washpot''<br />
*Vernon, Frances, ''The Fall of Doctor Onslow'' (1994): 1858 scandal about a headmaster, loosely based on the above-mentioned Charles Vaughan, and a boy of 16.<br />
*Kent, Chris, ''The boys of Swithins hall'' (1999), ''Boys in Shorts'' (2000), ''The Real Tom Brown's Schooldays'' (2002): all semi-erotic, the last set in the present despite the title <br />
*Marlowe, Edmund,''[[Alexander's Choice]]'' (2012): love affair of a 14-year-old and a young teacher at Eton in 1984<br />
* [[Roger Peyrefitte|Peyrefitte, R.]] ''Les amitiés particulières'' (1944), translated into English as ''Special Friendships'' (1958): tragedy in a Catholic school in the 1920s<br />
*[[Henry de Montherlant|de Montherlant, H.]] ''Les garçons'' (1969), translated into English as ''The Boys'' (1969)<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
[[Category:Encyclopedia]]</div>Edmundhttps://www.boywiki.org/en/index.php?title=Alexander%27s_Choice_(book)&diff=3682Alexander's Choice (book)2013-02-14T03:26:18Z<p>Edmund: /* Main characters */</p>
<hr />
<div>[[Image:Alexanders-choice-edmund-marlowe-paperback-cover-art.jpg|170px|right]]<br />
'''Alexander's Choice''' is a novel set at [[Boarding school|Eton College]] in 1983-4 by Edmund Marlowe, an old boy of the school, as his début work. It tells of the love affair of Alexander Aylmer, a new boy at the school aged 13-14 and Damian Cavendish, a new, young English master.<br />
<br />
The subject of sex between older and younger boys at Eton has been briefly alluded to in previous fiction, notably in ''The Fourth of June'' by David Benedictus (1962) <ref>Benedictus, David (1977). The Fourth of June. London: Anthony Blond. London: Sphere. ISBN 978-0-7221-1588-6</ref>. <br />
but this is the only novel to have made [[boylove]] there its main theme.<br />
<br />
==Plot introduction==<br />
<br />
Sweet-natured and good-looking, thirteen-year-old aristocrat Alexander Aylmer goes to prestigious Eton College in September 1983 full of optimism. He soon discovers new friends, interesting teachers and the hopes and frustrations that arrive with puberty.<br />
<br />
Timid Julian Smith, three years older, nurses two secrets he is terrified the other boys might discover: his humble background and his being hopelessly in love with Alexander. His father Alfred is a removals man who has saved all his life to send him to Eton. His own German-Jewish father had brought him up to be anglophilic, a sentiment reinforced by his teenage years in Sachsenhausen as the sole survivor of his family.<br />
<br />
Julian has been attracted to younger boys before, but never dared act on his feelings. Now torn between the strength of his feelings and fear of attracting suspicion and derision, he makes painfully little progress in his attempts to befriend Alexander until luck intervenes. Alexander becomes unfairly suspected of a spate of thefts in their house. Though exonerated in most boys’ eyes, he is viciously cornered by the house bully who had once nearly ruined Julian. Julian fortuitously appears and comes furiously to his rescue, thus immediately winning Alexander’s passionately loyal friendship.<br />
<br />
Suddenly though, Alexander’s adored mother dies of a heart-attack. Back at school after her funeral, his friends are sympathetic, but put off by his broken heart. Only Julian remains. Julian postpones furthering his erotic aspirations until the next (summer) term, with which most of the story is concerned.<br />
<br />
Alexander guesses Julian’s feelings. Though not physically attracted by him, he decides to indulge him, influenced by Mary Renault’s fictional depiction of the ideal friendship between his revered ancient namesake and Hephaistion. Julian is determined, but so over-cautious he risks losing everything he cares about.<br />
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Other characters are soon drawn in. Their housemaster, alerted to the unusual friendship, writes to Julian’s father decrying it. Despite knowing the latter to be deeply sympathetic, Julian is unable to admit his feelings to him and is terrified by the possible involvement of his puritanical, feminist mother Denise, otherwise too embroiled in her successful career as a campaigner against child sex abuse to notice her own child’s anguish.<br />
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Alexander also has a new, young English teacher, Damian Cavendish. Romantically only consciously interested in women, he is, however, aware of a special affinity with boys that has brought him enthusiastically to Eton. He burns too with an altruistic longing to find himself badly needed. He has already had one highly emotional encounter with Alexander, which has left him anxiously concerned for the boy’s happiness and Alexander highly receptive to his influence.<br />
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Each of the protagonists brings his own unique experience to bear on the unfolding drama, but through inadequate understanding of the new moral panic about teenage sexuality, none are remotely prepared for what follows. The final consequences shatter lives and are so heart-wrenching that Alfred, awakened to his most horrifying memories of the Third Reich, brings the story to a conclusion with his understanding that his anglophilia had been a deluded response to the inhumanity of man. <br />
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==Major themes==<br />
<br />
''Alexander's Choice'' challenges popular assumptions as to what might drive a pubescent boy and a young man to fall in love. Alexander and Damian slip unconsciously into loving one another without drawing conclusions about their sexual identity. They are both inspired by the ancient Hellenic ideals of pederasty, vividly illustrated in a short story and a dream, and remain as unconscious of the idea of sexual orientation as their classical exemplars. Despite the intensity of their passion for one another, it never occurs to either to question his attraction to the opposite sex, neither considers himself gay, and they simply assume until the end that they will one day find wives.<br />
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A wide variety of attitudes to homosexuality and boylove in particular are explored through the various attitudes of the other boys and schoolmasters, parents, police, social workers and finally the general public, and in some cases the development of these attitudes over time is also examined.<br />
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The theme of the searingly powerful last two chapters is the hopelessness of the inevitable clash once a love founded in timeless ideals was exposed to the social realities of 1984:<br />
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<blockquote><br />
Transported to the 1980s, however, age-stratified relationships are not merely frowned-upon, but pose a threat to hierarchy, and more specifically to the carefully-cultivated image of The Child which serves as the rhetoric of every acknowledged politics; the phantasmal beneficiary of every political intervention. The image of 'The Child' is not simply the last taboo, but also the last possibility of taboo, the last universal mechanism for imposing order upon a decaying world. To contemporary culture, then, Alexander is not a living swarm of affections and passions, but rather an inert categorization, a strategic image - one which must be protected at any cost. Consequently, the irony of the novel's title is that the 'Alexander' visible to society is not entitled to 'choose' anything: as a fixed image that operates in the service of culture, he is always-already stripped of voice and life. <ref>[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Alexanders-Choice-Edmund-Marlowe/dp/1481222112/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360749088&sr=8-1 Review by "Son of Nietzsche" on amazon.co.uk, 31 January 2013],</ref><br />
</blockquote><br />
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==Main characters==<br />
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*Alexander Aylmer, a stunning beauty of 13-14, intelligent, loyal, passionate and self-willed, with a great interest in ancient history.<br />
*Rupert Drysdale, Alexander's best friend of his own age and a worldly influence on him.<br />
*Julian Smith, aged 16-17, kind but ordinary, he is condemned by his timidity to guile and thus never to fulfil his longings.<br />
*Guy Cowburn, a snobbish bully in Julian's year<br />
*Peter Leigh, Guy's principal crony and a thief.<br />
*Damian Cavendish, aged 22-23, darkly handsome, soft-hearted and charming, he has been drawn back to Eton to teach by happy memories of his successful time there as a boy.<br />
*Jack Hodgson, housemaster of Peyntors, Alexander's house at Eton, an impressive classics master too buttoned-up and uninterested in boys to be effective in his house.<br />
*Mr. Allenby, the Head Master of Eton.<br />
*Sir Henry ("Hal") Aylmer, Alexander's father, a Lord Justice of Appeal.<br />
*Penelope Aylmer, Alexander's mother, warm and loving, her maternal attitudes are subtly contrasted with those of Julian's mother, who is almost her antithesis.<br />
*Alfred Smith alias Wertheimber, Julian's adoring father. As a perennial outsider, he is the author's foil for exposing the cruelty and hyopcrisy of society.<br />
*Denise Smith, Julian's mother, a feminist social worker whose prominence as a campaigner against "child sex abuse" only becomes clear towards the end.<br />
*Walter Cavendish, Damian's father, an aristocratic ex-radical.<br />
*Jim Hatchet, a Detective Inspector.<br />
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==References==<br />
{{Reflist}} <br />
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==External links==<br />
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* [http://www.amazon.com/Alexanders-Choice-Edmund-Marlowe/product-reviews/1481222112/ref=cm_cr_dp_see_all_btm?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending Reviews at amazon.com]<br />
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[[Category:Literature]]<br />
[[Category:Fiction]]</div>Edmund