Sexual life in ancient Greece : with thirty-two full-page plates

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year of the 89th Olympiad (421 B.c.) Eupolis brought on the stage his comedy Awtolycus, which was revised some ten years later and was performed for the second time. Autolycus was the son of Lycon and Rhodia, a youth of such beauty that Xenophon (Symposion, i, 9) says of him in admiration: “As a light flashes up in the night and draws the eyes of all upon it, so the clear beauty of Autolycus turned the gaze of all upon him. And no one who saw him went away without a wound in his heart.” Now this Autolycus was the favourite of Callias, known for his wealth and his frivolous life, who, after he had gained the victory in the pancratium in 422 at the great Panathenza, gave the beautiful youth that banquet described by Xenophon in his well-known Symposion. The end of Autolycus was a sad one, for after the conquest of Athens by Lysander he was put to death by order of the Thirty. As for the content of the piece all that can be said with certainty seems to be that the love of Callias and Autolycus was represented in a very unfavourable light, and that even the parents of the young man, who took part in the banquet, were pelted with scorn and dirt, just as the banquet itself was derided (Ath., v. 216 ; Eupolis, frag. 56: edrprjavos Tapa To Terphaba tov AdrdérvKov 6 EHimoNts CKMT TEL} frag. 61: avadAacLos (onanism).

In 415 Eupolis brought on the Bapte (the ‘ Baptizers ”), a sportive piece, in which the private life of Alcibiades was severely criticized. Among these baptee we might understand the comrades of Alcibiades, who carried on nightly orgies in honour of Cotytto, the goddess of lewdness, at which they imitated female dances and in which lascivious baths and purifications played a part. That the piece reeked with indecency, is clear from Lucian (Adv. Ind., 27), who says: “‘ And did you not blush to read this piece ? ”

The Flatierers (performed in 423) was evidently devoted entirely to pzederasty. Demos himself

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