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From Plato’s Symposium to Methodius’ and Late Antique Hagiography: “Female” Readings of Male Sexuality

  • Stephanos Efthymiadis and Charis Messis
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Sex and the Ancient City
This chapter is in the book Sex and the Ancient City

Abstract

Diotima’s presence among philosophising men in Plato’s Symposium finds its Christian parallel in three texts from late antiquity that also treat questions of love and sexuality. The Symposium attributed to Methodius of Olympus (third-fourth centuries AD) has ten female interlocutors speak in favour of chastity and virginity. In the Pseudo-Clementines, an apocryphal text of the New Testament (first half of the third century), a “woman’s voice” presents an apologia for chastity and continence. The same ideas about gender and sexuality prevail in a later text, the Christian Martyrdom of Sts Nereus and Achilles, two eunuchs advocating the rejection of marriage and sexuality. With the appearance of Christianity, a novel use of Diotima’s paradigm can be noted in literature: female voices become a powerful instrument in the service of male writers, who dispute established social values and denounce the spread of gendered violence.

Abstract

Diotima’s presence among philosophising men in Plato’s Symposium finds its Christian parallel in three texts from late antiquity that also treat questions of love and sexuality. The Symposium attributed to Methodius of Olympus (third-fourth centuries AD) has ten female interlocutors speak in favour of chastity and virginity. In the Pseudo-Clementines, an apocryphal text of the New Testament (first half of the third century), a “woman’s voice” presents an apologia for chastity and continence. The same ideas about gender and sexuality prevail in a later text, the Christian Martyrdom of Sts Nereus and Achilles, two eunuchs advocating the rejection of marriage and sexuality. With the appearance of Christianity, a novel use of Diotima’s paradigm can be noted in literature: female voices become a powerful instrument in the service of male writers, who dispute established social values and denounce the spread of gendered violence.

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter I
  2. Acknowledgements V
  3. Contents VII
  4. List of Figures XI
  5. Sex, Sexuality, Sexual Intercourse and Gender: The Terms and Contexts of the Volume 1
  6. Part I: Aspects of Homoeroticism
  7. Dover’s “Pseudo-sexuality” and the Athenian Laws on Male Prostitutes in Politics 19
  8. Group Sex, Exhibitionism/Voyeurism and Male Homosociality 43
  9. Making the Body Speak: The (Homo)Sexual Dimensions of Sneezing in Ancient Greek Literature 71
  10. “Fell in Love with an Anus”: Sexual Fantasies for Young Male Bodies and the Pederastic Gaze in Rhianus’ Epigrams 89
  11. Silencing Female Intimacies: Sexual Practices, Silence and Cultural Assumptions in Lucian, Dial. Meretr. 5 111
  12. Part II: Sex and Medicine
  13. Clitoridectomy in Ancient Greco-Roman Medicine and the Definition of Sexual Intercourse 141
  14. Sex and Epilepsy: Seizures and Fluids in Greek Medical Imagination 173
  15. Part III: The Use and Abuse of Sex Objects
  16. Some Dirty Thoughts about Chairs and Stools: Iconography of Erotic Foreplay 193
  17. Olive Oil, Dildos and Sandals: Greek Sex Toys Reassessed 221
  18. Statues as Sex Objects 245
  19. Having Sex with Statues: Some Cases of Agalmatophilia in Latin Poetry 263
  20. Part IV: Sexual Liminality
  21. Hephaistos Among the Satyrs: Semen, Ejaculation and Autochthony in Greek Culture 285
  22. Human-animal Sex in Ancient Greece 307
  23. The Womb Inside the Male Member: A Lucianic Twist 323
  24. Part V: Sex and Disgust
  25. Sex and Disgust in Martial’s Epigrams 351
  26. Part VI: The Scripts of Sexuality: Drama, Novel, Papyri and Later Texts
  27. To Voice the Physical: Sex and the Soil in Aeschylus 377
  28. Seminal Figures: Aristophanes and the Tradition of Sexual Imagery 425
  29. The Maiden who Knew Nothing about Sex: A Scabrous Theme in Novella and Comedy 445
  30. Sex and Abuse in Unhappy Marriages in Late Antique Oxyrhynchus: The Case of Two Women’s Narratives Preserved on Papyrus 471
  31. “Asexuality” in the Greek Papyrus Letters 487
  32. From Plato’s Symposium to Methodius’ and Late Antique Hagiography: “Female” Readings of Male Sexuality 509
  33. Notes on Editors and Contributors 529
  34. Index Locorum 531
  35. General Index 535
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110695793-022

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter I
  2. Acknowledgements V
  3. Contents VII
  4. List of Figures XI
  5. Sex, Sexuality, Sexual Intercourse and Gender: The Terms and Contexts of the Volume 1
  6. Part I: Aspects of Homoeroticism
  7. Dover’s “Pseudo-sexuality” and the Athenian Laws on Male Prostitutes in Politics 19
  8. Group Sex, Exhibitionism/Voyeurism and Male Homosociality 43
  9. Making the Body Speak: The (Homo)Sexual Dimensions of Sneezing in Ancient Greek Literature 71
  10. “Fell in Love with an Anus”: Sexual Fantasies for Young Male Bodies and the Pederastic Gaze in Rhianus’ Epigrams 89
  11. Silencing Female Intimacies: Sexual Practices, Silence and Cultural Assumptions in Lucian, Dial. Meretr. 5 111
  12. Part II: Sex and Medicine
  13. Clitoridectomy in Ancient Greco-Roman Medicine and the Definition of Sexual Intercourse 141
  14. Sex and Epilepsy: Seizures and Fluids in Greek Medical Imagination 173
  15. Part III: The Use and Abuse of Sex Objects
  16. Some Dirty Thoughts about Chairs and Stools: Iconography of Erotic Foreplay 193
  17. Olive Oil, Dildos and Sandals: Greek Sex Toys Reassessed 221
  18. Statues as Sex Objects 245
  19. Having Sex with Statues: Some Cases of Agalmatophilia in Latin Poetry 263
  20. Part IV: Sexual Liminality
  21. Hephaistos Among the Satyrs: Semen, Ejaculation and Autochthony in Greek Culture 285
  22. Human-animal Sex in Ancient Greece 307
  23. The Womb Inside the Male Member: A Lucianic Twist 323
  24. Part V: Sex and Disgust
  25. Sex and Disgust in Martial’s Epigrams 351
  26. Part VI: The Scripts of Sexuality: Drama, Novel, Papyri and Later Texts
  27. To Voice the Physical: Sex and the Soil in Aeschylus 377
  28. Seminal Figures: Aristophanes and the Tradition of Sexual Imagery 425
  29. The Maiden who Knew Nothing about Sex: A Scabrous Theme in Novella and Comedy 445
  30. Sex and Abuse in Unhappy Marriages in Late Antique Oxyrhynchus: The Case of Two Women’s Narratives Preserved on Papyrus 471
  31. “Asexuality” in the Greek Papyrus Letters 487
  32. From Plato’s Symposium to Methodius’ and Late Antique Hagiography: “Female” Readings of Male Sexuality 509
  33. Notes on Editors and Contributors 529
  34. Index Locorum 531
  35. General Index 535
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