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Same-sex attitudes and behaviors in ancient Rome often differ markedly from those of the contemporary West. Latin lacks words that would precisely translate "homosexual" and "heterosexual".〔Craig Williams, ''Roman Homosexuality'' (Oxford University Press, 1999, 2010), p. 304, citing Saara Lilja, ''Homosexuality in Republican and Augustan Rome'' (Societas Scientiarum Fennica, 1983), p. 122.〕 The primary dichotomy of ancient Roman sexuality was active/dominant/masculine and passive/submissive/"feminized". Roman society was patriarchal, and the freeborn male citizen possessed political liberty (''libertas'') and the right to rule both himself and his household (''familia''). "Virtue" (''virtus'') was seen as an active quality through which a man (''vir'') defined himself. The conquest mentality and "cult of virility" shaped same-sex relations. Roman men were free to enjoy sex with other males without a perceived loss of masculinity or social status, as long as they took the dominant or penetrative role. Acceptable male partners were slaves, prostitutes, and entertainers, whose lifestyle placed them in the nebulous social realm of ''infamia'', excluded from the normal protections accorded a citizen even if they were technically free. Although Roman men in general seem to have preferred youths between the ages of 12 and 20 as sexual partners, freeborn male minors were strictly off-limits, and professional prostitutes and entertainers might be considerably older.〔Williams, Roman Homosexuality, passim; Elizabeth Manwell, "Gender and Masculinity," in A Companion to Catullus (Blackwell, 2007), p. 118.〕 Same-sex relations among women are less documented. Although Roman women of the upperclasses were educated, and are known to have written poetry and corresponded with male relatives, very few fragments of anything that might have been written by women survive. Male writers took little interest in how women experienced sexuality in general; the Augustan poet Ovid takes an exceptionally keen interest, but advocates for a heterosexual lifestyle contrary to Roman sexual norms.〔Thomas Habinek, "The Invention of Sexuality in the World-City of Rome," in ''The Roman Cultural Revolution'' (Cambridge University Press, 1997), p. 31 ''et passim''.〕 During the Republic and early Principate, little is recorded of sexual relations among women, but better and more varied evidence, though scattered, exists for the later Imperial period. ==Background== During the Republic, a Roman citizen's political liberty (''libertas'') was defined in part by the right to preserve his body from physical compulsion, including both corporal punishment and sexual abuse.〔Thomas A.J. McGinn, ''Prostitution, Sexuality and the Law in Ancient Rome'' (Oxford University Press, 1998), p. 326. See the statement preserved by Aulus Gellius 9.12. 1 that " it was an injustice to bring force to bear against the body of those who are free" (''vim in corpus liberum non aecum ... adferri'').〕 Roman society was patriarchal (see ''paterfamilias''), and masculinity was premised on a capacity for governing oneself and others of lower status.〔Eva Cantarella, ''Bisexuality in the Ancient World'' (Yale University Press, 1992, 2002, originally published 1988 in Italian), p. xii.〕 ''Virtus'', "valor" as that which made a man most fully a man, was among the active virtues.〔Elaine Fantham, "The Ambiguity of ''Virtus'' in Lucan's ''Civil War'' and Statius' ''Thebiad''," ''Arachnion'' 3; Andrew J.E. Bell, "Cicero and the Spectacle of Power," ''Journal of Roman Studies'' 87 (1997), p. 9; Edwin S. Ramage, “Aspects of Propaganda in the ''De bello gallico'': Caesar’s Virtues and Attributes,” ''Athenaeum'' 91 (2003) 331–372; Myles Anthony McDonnell, ''Roman manliness:'' virtus ''and the Roman Republic'' (Cambridge University Press, 2006) ''passim''; Rhiannon Evans, ''Utopia Antiqua: Readings of the Golden Age and Decline at Rome'' (Routledge, 2008), pp. 156–157.〕 Sexual conquest was a common metaphor for imperialism in Roman discourse,〔Davina C. Lopez, "Before Your Very Eyes: Roman Imperial Ideology, Gender Constructs and Paul's Inter-Nationalism," in ''Mapping Gender in Ancient Religious Discourses'' (Brill, 2007), pp. 135–138.〕 and the "conquest mentality" was part of a "cult of virility" that particularly shaped Roman homosexual practices.〔Cantarella, ''Bisexuality in the Ancient World'', p. xi; Marilyn B. Skinner, introduction to ''Roman Sexualities'' (Princeton University Press, 1997), p. 11.〕 Roman ideals of masculinity were thus premised on taking an active role that was also, as Craig A. Williams has noted, "the prime directive of masculine sexual behavior for Romans."〔Craig A. Williams, ''Roman Homosexuality'' (Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 18.〕 In the late 20th and early 21st centuries, scholars have tended to view expressions of Roman male sexuality in terms of a "penetrator-penetrated" binary model; that is, the proper way for a Roman male to seek sexual gratification was to insert his penis in his partner.〔Rebecca Langlands, ''Sexual Morality in Ancient Rome'' (Cambridge University Press, 2006), p. 13.〕 Allowing himself to be penetrated threatened his liberty as a free citizen as well as his sexual integrity.〔For further discussion of how sexual activity defines the free, respectable citizen from the slave or "un-free" person, see Master-slave relations in ancient Rome.〕 It was expected and socially acceptable for a freeborn Roman man to want sex with both female and male partners, as long as he took the penetrative role.〔Amy Richlin, ''The Garden of Priapus: Sexuality and Aggression in Roman Humor'' (Oxford University Press, 1983, 1992), p. 225.〕 The morality of the behavior depended on the social standing of the partner, not gender ''per se''. Both women and young men were considered normal objects of desire, but outside marriage a man was supposed to act on his desires only with slaves, prostitutes (who were often slaves), and the ''infames''. Gender did not determine whether a sexual partner was acceptable, as long as a man's enjoyment did not encroach on another man's integrity. It was immoral to have sex with another freeborn man's wife, his marriageable daughter, his underage son, or with the man himself; sexual use of another man's slave was subject to the owner's permission. Lack of self-control, including in managing one's sex life, indicated that a man was incapable of governing others; too much indulgence in "low sensual pleasure" threatened to erode the elite male's identity as a cultured person.〔Catharine Edwards, "Unspeakable Professions: Public Performance and Prostitution in Ancient Rome," in ''Roman Sexualities'', pp. 67–68.〕 In the Imperial era, anxieties about the loss of political liberty and the subordination of the citizen to the emperor were expressed by a perceived increase in voluntary passive homosexual behavior among free men, accompanied by a documentable increase in the execution and corporal punishment of citizens.〔Amy Richlin, "Sexuality in the Roman Empire," in ''A Companion to the Roman Empire'' (Blackwell, 2006), p. 329. The law began to specify harsher punishments for the lower classes (''humiliores'') than for the elite (''honestiores'').〕 The dissolution of Republican ideals of physical integrity in relation to ''libertas'' contributes to and is reflected by the sexual license and decadence associated with the Empire.〔This is a theme throughout Carlin A. Barton, ''The Sorrows of the Ancient Romans: The Gladiator and the Monster'' (Princeton University Press, 1993).〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Homosexuality in ancient Rome」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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