SEX AMONG THE GREEKS

SEX AMONG THE GREEKS

The Greeks knew that some prefer people of their sex, others those of the opposite sex, and others have no preference: as Plato explains through the myth of the androgynous.
But even those who had preferences for their sex were obliged by Greek society to have heterosexual relationships, even if only matrimonial ones.

In Greece, having sex with teenagers was a practice permitted by law, celebrated by art and literature; the example was given by Jupiter the king of the Gods, who fell in love with a child abducts him to use him at his convenience on Olympus. But the thing was not easy, the boys who gave themselves too easily, or the effeminate became the object of mockery. The relationship between men had to be explained among an adult, but it was not an easy thing, active and a teenager, passive.It was part of the education of the child, possibly when he did not yet have pubic hair.

According to Phenocles Orpheus fell madly in love with the young Calais.

"O like the son of Oiagro, the Thracian Orpheus
he loved Calais son of Boreas,
and often in the shady woods he sat singing
his love, and his heart had no peace,
but always sleepless pains in the soul
they tormented him by watching the thriving Calais.”

The relationship between adult and boy was different from relationships with women, first of all it had a higher value, because it was also spiritual, dictated by Venus Urania, while the love for woman was lower, a mere matter of senses, dictated by Venus Pandemia.

The love and courtship of the boy could be carried out anywhere, and the refusal was allowed, while for women the refusal was not, because forced to marriage by parents and then subjected totally to the wishes of her husband.

The relationship with the boy by an adult became disreputable for the teenager when he grew a beard. Moreover as an adult the Greek was obliged to marry to give children to the homeland, whether he liked women or not.

The active role of the male was glorified as an expression of superiority over the partner, or because he was younger, or because he was a woman. If with slaves and women it was not a problem, the former were only objects, and women had to submit, it became a problem for the adult who had to become absolutely active, in turn, so never indulge for money or favors on pain of contempt and foreclosure to any public office.

There is an ancient Greek anecdote for which Jupiter quarreled with Juno about who, between the’man and the woman, felt more pleasure. Juno, in fact, believed it was the’man, Jupiter the woman, so they asked the diviner Tiresias who could well know, since one day he had hit with a stick two snakes that joined, separating them, and this had transformed him into a woman.

Seven years later he had struck again the two serpents, for which he had returned man. Thus questioned by Jupiter and Juno, he replied that to feel more pleasure was the woman. Juno did not like the answer so he blinded him. Jupiter, to reward him with the damage, granted him the prediction of the future.
What's wrong with the myth? That's rehashed.

The original myth was that Jupiter asked Tiresias who was the most valid lover between a man and a woman. Tiresias took his time, then gave the answer: "Let's go wrong, unfortunately from my investigations I found that the woman is nine times more powerful than the man in sexual ability."

Juno is the domesticated female who must not feel too much pleasure, otherwise it blurs the sexual power of the male, who does not forgive her to be able to feel pleasure even after an orgasm, while the male must wait for time to recover.

This is because man founded superiority over woman on a fairy-tale sexual power. While in the ancient icons of the Great Mother it was the vulva to excel and to be carried in procession, in the subsequent and patriarchal rites it is the phallus.

The difference is that the vulva is a symbol of the fecundity of nature, while the male phallus is fecundity but also domination that denies the feminine.

It is no coincidence that in the revised and correct myth of Athena, the Goddess (Le eumenidi) even denies the fertility of the woman: she is only the land where the male seed is laid, but he is the only one who is really fertile.

The ephebe consequently had to behave a little like a woman, so as not to test the sexual power of the adult male.He was not to give himself for his pleasure, but only for the esteem he had for the adult: a virtuous and praiseworthy man who loved him deserved to be rewarded with sexual favor.

In short, in Athens the man ranged in various categories of women:

His wife, 14, for the creation of children, betrothed since childhood, married at the age of 14, without rights or participation in male social life.

Concubine often a foreigner, in order to have stable sexual relations, he had the duties of his wife but had no protection.

The ether, cultured, intelligent, ideal accompanist in banquets between men, but it was fine because confined to the role of luxury prostitute, working for a fee and well paid, also because it lasted so long was young.

The prostitute who practiced the trade in the streets, slave or plebeian, however poor, who gave himself for the equivalent of a bottle of wine.

And Sappho?

“To me it seems equal to the Gods
It seems to me the same as the gods
who near you so sweet
I play listen while you talk
and laugh amorously, right at me
the heart is stirring in the chest
only as soon as I see you, and the voice
he gets lost on his inert tongue.
A thin fire quickly surfaces to the skin,
and I got dark in my eyes and the rumble
blood in the ears.
And all in sweat and trembling
as grass patita scoloro:
and death does not seem far away
to me kidnapped by mente.”

Explicit lesbianism, but Sappho (among other things bisexual) is of the VI-V sec. a.c., when Greek women were still respected and could be educated since childhood to poetry and music, as Sappho did, in short, before they took away all rights relegating them to the role of slaves in the gynaeceums, without education and without contacts, many times they had to wake up.

Not all Greeks thought so: Plato stated that many women should have been educated like men and considered equal. But was it true? Why in the symposium is it declared that pure love is only that addressed to the ephebes.

In the time of Pindar c’era still the respect of nature, woman, ether that embodies Aphrodite among men:
"You hospitable maidens, maidservants of Peito of Opulent Corinth, who kindle for her the blond tears of’incense, often mindful of the Mother of the Gods of’love, of the Celestial Aphrodite! She makes innocent donates on the grateful pillows the fruit of your tender youth. That always is good what wants need. "

The patriarchate will abolish sacred prostitution but will feed the profane, despising it because it is granted for a fee, while the male who pays will maintain his honor.