A Brief History of LGBT in the Ancient World

Rebecca Link

The LGBT community has a long history, which starts with the Ancient World, extending all across Europe and throughout Asia. In Ancient Greece, the cult of the Phrygian goddess Cybele and her consort Attis flourished in 300BC, and one of its defining characteristics was the Galli; this was the transgender clergy who identified as female. It is thought that the cult originated in Mesopotamia and spread across Asia. The cult is also thought to have originated from the cult of Inanna and her clergy. However, many years before 300 BC, same-sex relationships were common in Ancient Greece. In a number of his dialogues, Plato praises same-sex relationships.

Likewise, Aristotle was indifferent to same-sex relationships. The Spartans encouraged male-male relationships in the Agoge, which was the Spartan education programme; it was thought that lovers would fight more effectively in order to protect and impress their partner. The Sacred Band of Thebes, a troop of same-sex lovers, famously proved this paradigm as they went undefeated in battle from 371 to 338 BC. 2022 marked the 1900th anniversary of the Roman Emperor Hadrian’s visit to Londinium (now named ‘London’). When Hadrian visited the city in the year 122 AD, his entourage included young men with whom he was clearly intimate. He would have been entirely open about it, and many bystanders would have thought his behaviour quite normal, if only because they themselves had same-sex relationships.

Yet, it is only recently that scholars have come to accept that such attitudes prevailed in Roman London. It is now known from documents that the Londinium of Hadrian’s time believed that same-sex relationships were normal. But it would be a mistake to regard that society as sexually ‘liberated’ or as having much in common with present-day LGBTQ values and definitions.