Searching for the Cinaedus in Classical Antiquity

Did Roman cinaedi have sex with women? Or rather, since we have no historical knowledge of any actual Roman cinaedi, was the category of cinaedus defined as capable of or interested in sex with women? The scholarly consensus is that it was, in keeping with the understanding of cinaedi as being gender non-normative, rather than belonging to a sexuality in the modern sense (Richlin 1993, Williams 2010, Ormand 2017).

Alongside depictions of proper, pederastic representations of man-boy lovemaking, it is possible to identify nonstandard images of adult men being sexually penetrated. Given the status of infamia accorded the cinaedus, it is noteworthy that these images fall into two categories: those meant to be seen only by like-minded individuals and those meant for a broad public. In the first category are representations in expensive media (silver, gemstones); in the second, less-refined wall paintings and ceramics available to a broad range of viewers.

Cleomachus, we are told, was a fourth-century BCE boxer who later became a poet. The various ancient accounts concerning his transformation detail several interrelated qualities that can be seen to constitute the figure of the kinaidos/ cinaedus in classical antiquity: sex/ gender deviancy, poetics, and dissimilitude.

In ancient Greece, a κίναιδος is the paradigm of a sexual style. The word itself is extremely rare in the archaic and classical period. It becomes an object of semantic attention in ancient lexica and scholia, especially to Aristophanes. As an attribute of a person, the word is glossed in the Suda as “licentious” (ἀσελγής), “soft” (μαλακός), “female-male” (γύνανδρός). The defining quality of such a person, namely κιναιδία, is a complete lack of shame (ἀναισχυντία), which consists of playing the woman (γῠναικίζω). A κίναιδος is the embodiment of sensuality.