Welcome back to the podcast! Our first for 2014!
In this merry adventure, we find out what happens to Julius Caesar after Sulla runs him out of Rome for refusing to divorce his wife; how he makes peace with Sulla; his first military experience; why he became known as the “Queen of Bithynia”; and – yes – pirates!
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I know this is an old podcast, but I want to clarify that the Romans did in fact have similar views on homosexuality as the Greeks. It was seen as completely normal and ok if a grown man took a young boy as his lover, this was not seen as “gay” or “effeminate”. It was different if two grown men had a sexual relationship, they were ridiculed as cinaedi, effeminate men, homosexuals. That’s why if you read Martial’s epigrams for example, you’ll find that he makes fun of cinaedi in one poem, while declaring his love to a young slave boy in the next. To give you an example from the eleventh book of his epigrams (it’s pretty vulgar, yes):
When you see that I want it, Telesphorus, and that I’m stiff
you make demands – suppose I want to deny you; could I
and until I’ve promised and said “I’ll give” you deny me
those buttocks which give you power over me.
Imagine my barber, with drawn razor flashing,
should then demand freedom and riches –
I would promise: for it’s not a barber who’s asking
but a thief; fear is an imperious emotion.
But once the blade was safely in the curved sheath,
I would break the barber’s legs and his hands too.
You I won’t punish, but once it’s been wiped off
my prick will tell your greed to go to hell.
Thanks for that, Sulph. I think should do a show on that at some stage. It’s very interesting and I think we didn’t position it clearly in the show.