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Supposing the kinaidos is a trans woman, what then? For several decades now, the science of classical antiquity has fruitfully engaged with, on the one hand, gay and lesbian studies and queer theory (Dover, Foucault, Winkler, Halperin, Richlin, Parker, Williams), and on the other, feminism and feminisms (Gold, Hallett, Rabinowitz), thereby transforming our understanding of sexuality and gender in the ancient world and also in our discipline.

B. Baldwin declared that Suetonius is “adamantine in his hostility towards male homosexuality” (503). Rightly cautioning against psychological inferences, Baldwin continues that since “diatribes against homosexuals are such a Roman commonplace,” Suetonius’ “tone need not be more than a conventional motif” (503). While Baldwin’s verdict initially appears valid, a reconsideration of key passages in the Caesares together with scholarship on Roman imperial ideals both in- and outside Suetonius’ text (e.g., Wallace-Hadrill, Bradley, Noreña) leads to a more nuanced assessment.

Cupid is a rapist. A predominant model of erotic attraction is that of a pathogen: the lover, observing an attractive physical feature or social action, is infected through the eyes, and is laid low. The body is unwillingly penetrated, the lover is taken by storm, the lover is feminized. Eros’ nosopoietic effects are both physical and social; lovers waste away and behave like women.

Tibullus 1.4 is ostensibly a poem about aging men trying to attract the affections of boys, but a coded solicitation of a different sort is legible at verses 77-8. This paper argues that the poetic Ego of Tibullus 1.4, an adult man, uses ambiguous wording to express his desire to be sexually penetrated by other men without running afoul of social conventions and the generic conventions of Roman elegy, both of which proscribed this desire.

In Livy's narrative of the Bacchanalian affair of 186 BCE (39.8-20), we see a process through which Roman society's views on religious and sexual norms are brought to coincide with practices by means of legal restrictions. The celebration of the Bacchic mysteries, a religious activity primarily belonging to the sphere of women, spills over to the sexual practices of male citizens, especially those of young age.

The sources which describe the protocol in operation for the reception of foreign envoys at the court in Constantinople, whether they are Corripus or Peter the Patrician, reused by Constantine Porphyrogenitus, give the impression of a very codified ceremonial which may seem frozen or even ossified. However, as the writings of Priscus of Pannonia, Malchus of Philadelphia or Menander Rhetor, amongst others, show, emperors did not hesitate to play

Villagers in Late Roman Egypt left us the histories of their misfortunes on hundreds of papyrus petitions. They wrote in order to motivate the local magistrates to deliver them from injustice. Magistrates apparently needed the extra motivation: Benjamin Kelly writes that although officials did their best, obstruction abounded and cases caromed around within the justice system. Kelly can't escape the depressing conclusion that the system was so badly engineered that litigants often just gave up. (78) I argue that this is no bug of the system; this is a feature.

Letters are generally perceived as personal communications, thus sharing a letter is typically understood as a very inclusive gesture towards the third reader, if not a violation of the author’s intimacy (Rosenmeyer 2001:1-2). Though, it seems that under certain circumstances, sharing letters and even performing public readings of letters is suitable, or at least was considered suitable, as we may see in Synesius’ letters.

Judging by the large number of buildings known to date in many cities throughout late antique Palestine, theatrical performances were quite popular in drawing audiences of thousands. The vibrancy of these shows was not alien to the Jews, who frequented them on a regular basis, as did their non-Jewish neighbors. The rabbis, like the church fathers, objected to public performances on moral and religious grounds, and looked askance upon this cultural behavior.

Choice of language is one of the most important aspects of oral performance that is closely related to the issues of social differentiation, power and control in the society. Language was an instrument that created the special relationship between the speaker, the audience, and the message in the multilingual culture of Late Antiquity. The goal of this study is to investigate the meaning and purpose of the remarks that a particular language was used by characters of the early Christian narratives, and the correspondence of these remarks to the context of the performance.