History of lesbianism
Encyclopedia
Societal attitudes towards homosexual women have varied throughout human history and between different cultures. It is notable that there are far fewer historical mentions of lesbianism than male homosexuality, possibly due to many historical writings and records focusing primarily on men.
(ca. 1700 BC), which is widely considered to be the earliest known mention of lesbians in surviving historical documents. The code makes reference to women called the 'salzikrum' (literal translation: "daughter-men"), women that were allowed to marry other women. The code also contains the earliest mention of a transgender person.
has long been considered bisexual. The word "lesbian
" derives from the the island of her birth, Lesbos; her name is also the origin of its nowadays less common synonym "sapphic
". The narrators of many of her poems speak of infatuations and love (sometimes requited, sometimes not) women have for men, but descriptions of physical acts between women are debatable. Her love poems should be placed in the seventh century (BC) context. The poems of Alcaeus and later Pindar
record similar romantic bonds between the members of a given circle.
The 3rd Century philosopher Maximus of Tyre
wrote that Sappho was "small and dark" and that her relationships to her female friends were similar to those of Socrates
, without having sexual relations.
Sappho was married and eventually gave birth to a daughter.
Many of her poems deal with Aphrodite
, a common theme in Greek poetry in general. Modern literary critics have praised the intense imagery in Sappho's work: "You came and I was longing for you; you cooled my heart which was burning with desire", "Love shook my heart like a wind falling on the oaks on a mountain", "Once again limb-loosening Love made me tremble, the bitter-sweet irresistible creature".
and Ianthe
, in Book IX of Ovid
's the Metamorphoses
, is most vivid. When Iphis' mother becomes pregnant, her husband declares that he will kill the child if it is a girl. She bears a girl and attempts to conceal her sex by giving her a name that is of ambiguous gender: Iphis. When the "son" is thirteen, the father chooses a golden-haired maiden named Ianthe as the "boy's" bride. The love of the two girls is written sympathetically:
However, as the marriage draws ever closer, Iphis recoils, calling her love "monstrous and unheard of". The goddess Isis
hears the girl's bemoans and turns her into a boy.
References to love between women are sparse. Phaedrus attempted to explain lesbianism through a myth of his own making: Prometheus
, coming home drunk from a party, had mistakenly exchanged the genitals of some women and some men – "Lust now enjoys perverted pleasure."
It is quite clear that paiderastia and lesbianism were not held in equally good light, possibly because of the violation of strict gender role
s. Seneca the Elder
mentions a husband who killed his wife and her female lover and implies that their crime was worse than that of adultery between a male and female. The Babyloniaca of Iamblichus
describes an Egyptian princess named Berenice who loves and marries another woman. This novelist also states that such love is "wild and lawless".
Another hypermasculine stereotype of the times was documented in Lucian
's Dialogue of the Courtesans, in which Megilla renames herself Megillus and wears a wig to cover her shaved head. She marries Demonassa of Corinth, although Megillus is from Lesbos. Her friend Leaena comments that "They say there are women like that in Lesbos, with faces like men, and unwilling to consort with men, but only with women, as though they themselves were men". Megillus seduces Leaena, who feels that the experience is too disgusting to describe in detail. This is far from the sophisticated aestheticism of Sappho's group.
In another dialogue ascribed to Lucian, two men debate over which is better, male love or heterosexuality. One man protested that if male affairs were legitimized, then lesbianism would soon be condoned as well, an unthinkable notion.
The apocrypha
l Apocalypse of Peter
describes the punishment of lesbians and gay men in Hell
:
came to power, it began to frown on such relations. Later, Penitentials were developed by Celtic Monks in Ireland. They were unofficial guidebooks which became popular, especially in the British Isles
. These books listed crimes and the penance
s that must be done for them. For example, "...he who commits the male crime of the Sodomites
shall do penance for four years." The penitentials of Theodore of Tarsus
, who became archbishop
of Canterbury
in the 7th century, made special references to lesbianism. He states, "If a woman practices vice with a woman she shall do penance for three years." Penitentials soon spread from the isles to mainland Europe
. From the 6th to the 11th centuries, there are thirty-one penitentials that punish male homosexuality and fourteen that punish lesbians.
The Old French
legal treatise Li livres de jostice et de plet
(c. 1260) is the earliest reference to legal punishment for lesbianism akin to that for male homosexuality. It prescribed dismemberment on the first two offences and death by burning for the third: a near exact parallel to the penalty for a man, though what "dismemberment" could mean for a medieval woman is unknown.
Ancient History
The recorded history of lesbianism goes back to the Code of HammurabiCode of Hammurabi
The Code of Hammurabi is a well-preserved Babylonian law code, dating to ca. 1780 BC . It is one of the oldest deciphered writings of significant length in the world. The sixth Babylonian king, Hammurabi, enacted the code, and partial copies exist on a human-sized stone stele and various clay...
(ca. 1700 BC), which is widely considered to be the earliest known mention of lesbians in surviving historical documents. The code makes reference to women called the 'salzikrum' (literal translation: "daughter-men"), women that were allowed to marry other women. The code also contains the earliest mention of a transgender person.
Sappho
Because she wrote love poems addressed to both women and men, SapphoSappho
Sappho was an Ancient Greek poet, born on the island of Lesbos. Later Greeks included her in the list of nine lyric poets. Her birth was sometime between 630 and 612 BC, and it is said that she died around 570 BC, but little is known for certain about her life...
has long been considered bisexual. The word "lesbian
Lesbian
Lesbian is a term most widely used in the English language to describe sexual and romantic desire between females. The word may be used as a noun, to refer to women who identify themselves or who are characterized by others as having the primary attribute of female homosexuality, or as an...
" derives from the the island of her birth, Lesbos; her name is also the origin of its nowadays less common synonym "sapphic
Sapphic
Sapphic can refer to:* Related to Sappho, a 7th century BC poetess** Sapphic stanza, a four line poetic form* Sapphic love, related to female homosexuality...
". The narrators of many of her poems speak of infatuations and love (sometimes requited, sometimes not) women have for men, but descriptions of physical acts between women are debatable. Her love poems should be placed in the seventh century (BC) context. The poems of Alcaeus and later Pindar
Pindar
Pindar , was an Ancient Greek lyric poet. Of the canonical nine lyric poets of ancient Greece, his work is the best preserved. Quintilian described him as "by far the greatest of the nine lyric poets, in virtue of his inspired magnificence, the beauty of his thoughts and figures, the rich...
record similar romantic bonds between the members of a given circle.
The 3rd Century philosopher Maximus of Tyre
Maximus of Tyre
Cassius Maximus Tyrius Cassius Maximus Tyrius Cassius Maximus Tyrius (Maximus of Tyre; was a Greek rhetorician and philosopher who flourished in the time of the Antonines and Commodus. His writings contain many allusions to the history of Greece, while there is little reference to Rome; hence it...
wrote that Sappho was "small and dark" and that her relationships to her female friends were similar to those of Socrates
Socrates
Socrates was a classical Greek Athenian philosopher. Credited as one of the founders of Western philosophy, he is an enigmatic figure known chiefly through the accounts of later classical writers, especially the writings of his students Plato and Xenophon, and the plays of his contemporary ...
, without having sexual relations.
Sappho was married and eventually gave birth to a daughter.
Many of her poems deal with Aphrodite
Aphrodite
Aphrodite is the Greek goddess of love, beauty, pleasure, and procreation.Her Roman equivalent is the goddess .Historically, her cult in Greece was imported from, or influenced by, the cult of Astarte in Phoenicia....
, a common theme in Greek poetry in general. Modern literary critics have praised the intense imagery in Sappho's work: "You came and I was longing for you; you cooled my heart which was burning with desire", "Love shook my heart like a wind falling on the oaks on a mountain", "Once again limb-loosening Love made me tremble, the bitter-sweet irresistible creature".
Roman Empire and early Christianity
The lesbian love story between IphisIphis
Iphis was a name attributed to three individuals:-Daughter of Ligdus :According to Greek mythology and the Roman poet Ovid, who wrote about transformations in his Metamorphoses, Iphis was the daughter of Telethusa and Ligdus in Crete. Ligdus had already threatened to kill his pregnant wife's...
and Ianthe
Ianthe
Ianthe was a name attributed to three figures in Greek mythology.*Ianthe was a Cretan girl who was betrothed to Iphis. Iphis was a woman raised as a man; she also fell in love with Ianthe and prayed to the gods to allow the two women to marry...
, in Book IX of Ovid
Ovid
Publius Ovidius Naso , known as Ovid in the English-speaking world, was a Roman poet who is best known as the author of the three major collections of erotic poetry: Heroides, Amores, and Ars Amatoria...
's the Metamorphoses
Metamorphoses (poem)
Metamorphoses is a Latin narrative poem in fifteen books by the Roman poet Ovid describing the history of the world from its creation to the deification of Julius Caesar within a loose mythico-historical framework. Completed in AD 8, it is recognized as a masterpiece of Golden Age Latin literature...
, is most vivid. When Iphis' mother becomes pregnant, her husband declares that he will kill the child if it is a girl. She bears a girl and attempts to conceal her sex by giving her a name that is of ambiguous gender: Iphis. When the "son" is thirteen, the father chooses a golden-haired maiden named Ianthe as the "boy's" bride. The love of the two girls is written sympathetically:
They were of equal age, they both were lovely,
Had learned the ABC from the same teachers,
And so love came to both of them together
In simple innocence, and filled their hearts
With equal longing.
However, as the marriage draws ever closer, Iphis recoils, calling her love "monstrous and unheard of". The goddess Isis
Isis
Isis or in original more likely Aset is a goddess in Ancient Egyptian religious beliefs, whose worship spread throughout the Greco-Roman world. She was worshipped as the ideal mother and wife as well as the matron of nature and magic...
hears the girl's bemoans and turns her into a boy.
References to love between women are sparse. Phaedrus attempted to explain lesbianism through a myth of his own making: Prometheus
Prometheus
In Greek mythology, Prometheus is a Titan, the son of Iapetus and Themis, and brother to Atlas, Epimetheus and Menoetius. He was a champion of mankind, known for his wily intelligence, who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to mortals...
, coming home drunk from a party, had mistakenly exchanged the genitals of some women and some men – "Lust now enjoys perverted pleasure."
It is quite clear that paiderastia and lesbianism were not held in equally good light, possibly because of the violation of strict gender role
Gender role
Gender roles refer to the set of social and behavioral norms that are considered to be socially appropriate for individuals of a specific sex in the context of a specific culture, which differ widely between cultures and over time...
s. Seneca the Elder
Seneca the Elder
Lucius or Marcus Annaeus Seneca, known as Seneca the Elder and Seneca the Rhetorician , was a Roman rhetorician and writer, born of a wealthy equestrian family of Cordoba, Hispania...
mentions a husband who killed his wife and her female lover and implies that their crime was worse than that of adultery between a male and female. The Babyloniaca of Iamblichus
Iamblichus (novelist)
Iamblichus was an Ancient Syrian Greek novelist.Iamblichus was an Emesene that achieved wide prominence in the 2nd century. He describes himself on being having ‘descended from the ancient dynasts’, including the Priest Kings of the Emesani Dynasty...
describes an Egyptian princess named Berenice who loves and marries another woman. This novelist also states that such love is "wild and lawless".
Another hypermasculine stereotype of the times was documented in Lucian
Lucian
Lucian of Samosata was a rhetorician and satirist who wrote in the Greek language. He is noted for his witty and scoffing nature.His ethnicity is disputed and is attributed as Assyrian according to Frye and Parpola, and Syrian according to Joseph....
's Dialogue of the Courtesans, in which Megilla renames herself Megillus and wears a wig to cover her shaved head. She marries Demonassa of Corinth, although Megillus is from Lesbos. Her friend Leaena comments that "They say there are women like that in Lesbos, with faces like men, and unwilling to consort with men, but only with women, as though they themselves were men". Megillus seduces Leaena, who feels that the experience is too disgusting to describe in detail. This is far from the sophisticated aestheticism of Sappho's group.
In another dialogue ascribed to Lucian, two men debate over which is better, male love or heterosexuality. One man protested that if male affairs were legitimized, then lesbianism would soon be condoned as well, an unthinkable notion.
The apocrypha
Apocrypha
The term apocrypha is used with various meanings, including "hidden", "esoteric", "spurious", "of questionable authenticity", ancient Chinese "revealed texts and objects" and "Christian texts that are not canonical"....
l Apocalypse of Peter
Apocalypse of Peter
The recovered Apocalypse of Peter or Revelation of Peter is an example of a simple, popular early Christian text of the 2nd century; it is an example of Apocalyptic literature with Hellenistic overtones. The text is extant in two incomplete versions of a lost Greek original, one Koine Greek, and an...
describes the punishment of lesbians and gay men in Hell
Hell
In many religious traditions, a hell is a place of suffering and punishment in the afterlife. Religions with a linear divine history often depict hells as endless. Religions with a cyclic history often depict a hell as an intermediary period between incarnations...
:
Middle Ages (476—1049 AD)
When RomeAncient Rome
Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....
came to power, it began to frown on such relations. Later, Penitentials were developed by Celtic Monks in Ireland. They were unofficial guidebooks which became popular, especially in the British Isles
British Isles
The British Isles are a group of islands off the northwest coast of continental Europe that include the islands of Great Britain and Ireland and over six thousand smaller isles. There are two sovereign states located on the islands: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and...
. These books listed crimes and the penance
Penance
Penance is repentance of sins as well as the proper name of the Roman Catholic, Orthodox Christian, and Anglican Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation/Confession. It also plays a part in non-sacramental confession among Lutherans and other Protestants...
s that must be done for them. For example, "...he who commits the male crime of the Sodomites
Sodomites
Sodomite may refer to:* A person who practices sodomy* A resident of Sodom* Sodomites , a short film by Gaspar Noé...
shall do penance for four years." The penitentials of Theodore of Tarsus
Theodore of Tarsus
Theodore was the eighth Archbishop of Canterbury, best known for his reform of the English Church and establishment of a school in Canterbury....
, who became archbishop
Archbishop
An archbishop is a bishop of higher rank, but not of higher sacramental order above that of the three orders of deacon, priest , and bishop...
of Canterbury
Canterbury
Canterbury is a historic English cathedral city, which lies at the heart of the City of Canterbury, a district of Kent in South East England. It lies on the River Stour....
in the 7th century, made special references to lesbianism. He states, "If a woman practices vice with a woman she shall do penance for three years." Penitentials soon spread from the isles to mainland Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
. From the 6th to the 11th centuries, there are thirty-one penitentials that punish male homosexuality and fourteen that punish lesbians.
The Old French
Old French
Old French was the Romance dialect continuum spoken in territories that span roughly the northern half of modern France and parts of modern Belgium and Switzerland from the 9th century to the 14th century...
legal treatise Li livres de jostice et de plet
Li livres de jostice et de plet
Li livres de jostice et de plet is an Old French legal treatise compiled by the postglossators of the school of Orléans in the mid-thirteenth century...
(c. 1260) is the earliest reference to legal punishment for lesbianism akin to that for male homosexuality. It prescribed dismemberment on the first two offences and death by burning for the third: a near exact parallel to the penalty for a man, though what "dismemberment" could mean for a medieval woman is unknown.