Alexander as gay icon

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Sandra
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Alexander as gay icon

Post by Sandra »

Am currently working on a research about the image of Alexander and his use as symbol. Have found a lot of information, but during my research process I have found another point. There are some pages on internet, displaying Alexander as gay icon. I would like to know if there is any book (more or less academic) dealing with this issue?
Thank you in advance!
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

Post by amyntoros »

Sandra wrote:Am currently working on a research about the image of Alexander and his use as symbol. Have found a lot of information, but during my research process I have found another point. There are some pages on internet, displaying Alexander as gay icon. I would like to know if there is any book (more or less academic) dealing with this issue?
Thank you in advance!
Sandra, I don't think you will find a book, academic or otherwise, dealing specifically with Alexander as gay icon. There are plenty of articles offering opinions on his sexuality, but always in historical context. Alexander as gay icon is a modern concept which only could have originated in the post Stonewall world. I think you'll need to source books on cultural or social studies to perhaps find what you are looking for, but unfortunately I know of no specific book containing the information you are seeking. You might want to take a look at the second edition of Gideon Nisbet's Ancient Greece in Film and Popular Culture though. There's a chapter on both Rosen's and Stone's Alexander along with mention of all the other failed projects. There's nothing substantial on Alexander as gay icon, but Nisbet's academic specialty is Reception Studies, and given all the pre and post movie controversy about Stone's portrayal of Alexander's sexuality I think you'll find it interesting. As is the rest of the book, by the way (and I'm mentioning this for the benefit of other Pothosians). Definitely has to be the only recent book written by an academic with "slash fiction" listed in the glossary. :D Plus, under Web Resources, he lists Pothos as a "useful, intelligent fan site".

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Re: Alexander as gay icon

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Thank you very much!
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

Post by Efstathios »

There are some instances in the sources about Alexander that show possible homosexuality. But they can be interpreted in various ways since we really dont have any facts about Alexander's sexuality. We know that he had been with women, several of them, and also had a child with Roxanne, but we do not know for sure if he had any sexual contact with men. If he had, then he would be a bisexual, and by no means a gay idol.

There is also a lot of talk about the norm back on those days, but this is still on debate because the ancient Greeks had a word for homosexuality, "kinaidos"=homosexual, and it was an insulting word. The various sources that we have show homosexual and bisexual relationships in ancient Greece but we do not know at which extent. We also have sources that say that these relationships were forbidden, but as usual the laws were broken a lot of times.

The instances about Alexander are few and with no real details, so one cannot make an assumption. For example the kiss to Bagoas, it was after the soldiers' request and we do not know what kind of kiss it was. The soldiers could had just been teasing Alexander to kiss Bagoas because they knew he was an eunuch, meaning they wouldnt tease him to kiss Nearchus for example. Then there is Diogenes who said that Alexander is more concentrated on Hephaestion's thighs than on the campaign, but that could have been the Athenian vs the Macedonians thing speaking. These extracts from the sources do not give us facts.
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

Post by Theseus »

Well I know this isn't any help, but a friend of mine just found this and forwarded to me. Yes it's related to Oliver Stone's film, but I found this interesting.

Alexander The Great
THE GAY LOVERS OF ALEXANDER III OF MACEDON,
known as ‘THE GREAT’




Alexander the Great

Note on Alexander, the movie by Oliver Stone

When Oliver Stone was thinking of doing a movie on the life of the legendary son of king Phillip II of Macedon and queen Olympias, one unexpected obstacle stood in his way: the Greek government. It didn't want one of their greatest heroes 'besmirched' by public knowledge of his male loves. As a result, the film was shot mainly in Morocco and Thailand. No scenes were filmed in Greece, as the Athens News Agency explains, because of government opposition to Stone's portrayal of the Greek hero.

Not surprisingly, these "erotic reality deniers" provided Mr. Stone with free publicity, as well as comic relief. A group of homophobic Greek lawyers even threatened to sue Warner Bros. and the director for implying Alexander the Great was bisexual. The lawyers, trampling their own intellectual heritage underfoot, sent a letter to the studio demanding they state in the title credits that the movie was a fictional tale.

Drama surrounding the "gayness" of Alexander has a precedent. A couple of years previously, a mob of hundreds of Macedonian Greeks stormed an archeological symposium after a speaker presented a paper on the homosexuality of Alexander. Police were then called in to evacuate . . . the scholarly participants!

Not that Hollywood was any better. The film, which Stone had been trying to get on the screen for 15 years, received only lukewarm applause. It later came out that the studio pressured Stone to cut all the scenes of Alexander's affair with that dangerous brat Bagoas. No wonder the critics found the leftovers boring!

The Life of Alexander the Great

Alexander the Great commanded his first battles while only sixteen years old and went on to conquer the entire known world, leading his troops from the mountains of northern Greece all the way to the mountains of northern India. He subdued every opponent in his path, from the Greek city states to the kingdoms of North Africa, Asia Minor and Persia. His relentlessness in battle, often tempered by his magnanimity to the vanquished, was legendary. But so was his devotion to his friends and companions, and the love which he shared almost exclusively with his male peers starting in tender childhood.

This was no chance event. Born in August of 356 BCE, under the sign of the lion, he was the quintessential product of a patriarchal warrior culture, the very paragon of a male dominated world ruled by masculine values and a masculine aesthetic. His tutor from the age of thirteen on was the philosopher Aristotle, who commented on the excesses as well as the values of pederasty, and who had a number of male beloveds of his own. Alexander embodied those ethics for the rest of his brief but volcanic life. However, he stretched the accepted boundaries of ancient male love. Not only did he have love affairs with boys, but above them all, was his love for a man his own age, his childhood friend Hephaestion. This relationship resembled modern gay love and became legendary for it's passion.

What may seem normal to some of us today, the gay love of one man for another, in ancient days was frowned upon as a threat to masculinity and the structure of society. Love between grown men and teenage boys was the only proper way for two males to love each other. The men vied to be chosen by the boys as their lovers and the boys, ideally, were educated and led into adulthood by their lovers. Their love was an erotic love, and it often had its sexual aspects, but, as many of the philosophical and oratory texts show, men were expected to refrain from penetrating their beloved boys. Though in Alexander's world of palaces, power, and passion, the pedagogic ideal was honored more in the breach than the observance, yet boys remained the focus of men's affection. Philip II himself, Alexander's own father, pursued young lovers tirelessly all his life. His very death came at the hand of a vengeful former beloved, Pausanias, who had been spurned by the king for a prettier boy. One trifled with Greek boys at one's peril!

Unlike Philip's affairs, the love between Alexander and Hephaestion never waned. Alexander saw their love as emulating that heroic love between Achilles and Patroclus, another ancient couple that modern gay couples can look to as an example of devotion. Crossing into Asia on their way to Persia, the two halted their campaign in Illium by the ruins of Troy. There Alexander sacrificed and offered garlands at the shrine of Achilles, while Hephaestion did the same at the shrine of Patroclus. Following the ancient custom, Alexander ran naked around the hero's tomb, proclaiming his admiration for Achilles, "fortunate in life to have so faithful a friend, and in death to have so famous a poet."

Male love did not blind the Greeks, nor Alexander, to the lure of beautiful women: he married Roxane, a Persian princess, daughter of Oxyartes of Bactria, and fathered a child with her. Later, as the Roman/Greek historian Arrian reports, Alexander, while in Persia at Susa "…held wedding ceremonies for his Companions; he also took (another) wife himself - Barsine, Darius' eldest daughter, and, according to Aristobulus, another as well, namely Parysatis, the youngest daughter of Ochlus…"(VII.5)

His love of women, however, may have been an acquired taste. The Roman historian Curtius reports that "He scorned (feminine) sensual pleasures to such an extent that Olympias, his mother, was anxious lest he be unable to beget offspring." To whet his appetite for the fair sex, King Philip and Olympias had Kallixeina, a Thessalian hetaira (a professional courtesan) brought in. And one of his contemporary biographers, Eumenes, claimed Alexander "was not at his ease with sex."

The other great male love of Alexander's life that we know about was the eunuch Bagoas. The two met while Alexander was on campaign against the Persian king Darius. The war had raged for some time, with Darius finally on the run, deserted by his vassals and eventually assassinated by one of his own men. His general, Nabarzenes, went to swear fealty to Alexander and to offer rich gifts, a beautiful boy among them. Curtius describes him as "... Bagoas, a eunuch exceptional in beauty and in the very flower of boyhood, with whom Darius was intimate and with whom Alexander would later be intimate," (VI.5.23) The stormy, outspoken character of the boy matched his stunning looks and the friendship and love which grew between him and the warrior king lasted the rest of their lives.

Alexander saw to it that his young beloved was well provided for. As Eumenes recounts, the king installed Bagoas in a villa outside of Babylon and required all his officers and courtesans, both Greek and Persian, to render him honors (to present him with rich gifts). They all did but one, the faithful satrap Orsines, who claimed that he had come "to honor the friends of Alexander, not his whores," and that "it was not the custom of the Persians to take males in marriage who had been turned into women for the sake of being fucked." Enraged, the young Bagoas wrought Orsines' destruction by means of endless calumnies, rousing Alexander's mind to anger until he condemned the man to death. Still not satisfied with his handiwork, Bagoas struck Orsines as he was being led off to execution. Orsines turned and drove home one final insult: "I had heard that women once reigned in Asia; this however is something new, for a eunuch to reign!" (Curtius, X.1.22)

Alexander's favor to Bagoas can also be seen in his later appointment of Bagoas as one of the trierarchs, men of substance who oversaw and funded the construction of the navy for the journey homeward. Their love affair is attested to by many historians of the time, such as Plutarch, who recounts an episode showing that the love between the two was common knowledge among the troops, and much appreciated. At a dancing contest, Bagoas had won the honors then went to sit by the side of the king, "which so pleased the Macedonians that they shouted out for him to kiss Bagoas, and never stopped clapping their hands and shouting till Alexander took him in his arms and kissed him warmly," (Plutarch, The Lives). The episode is attested by several ancient writers.

This new love in no way affected the deep devotion which bound him to Hephaestion, which was itself famous throughout Magna Graecia. The cynic philosopher Diogenes wrote to Alexander about it, berating him for his sexual enslavement (and incidentally casting a light on the type of sexual intercourse preferred by Greek men: face to face, between the thighs): "If you want to be kalos kagathos ("beautiful and good", the Greek expression for noble and ideal) throw away the rag you have on your head and come to us. But you won't be able to, for you are ruled by Hephaestion's thighs." (Diogenes of Sinope, Letters, 24) Their love was undone only by Hephaestion's death during the summer festivities at Ecbatana (in Persia) on their way home from India.

Alexander, who had borne hardship and wounds that would have felled a lesser man, was completely undone by this loss. It is said that he lay upon Hephaestion's body for a day and a night and finally had to be dragged off by his friends. For another three days he remained mute, in tears, fasting. When he rose he sheared off all his hair and ordered all the ornaments in the city broken off the walls and the manes and tails of all the horses sheared. He forbade all music in the city and ordered every town in the empire to carry out mourning rituals. Then he sent envoys to Ammon's oracle at the oasis of Siwah in Egypt to ask that divine honors be granted to his dead friend. The body of Hephaestion was embalmed and carried on to Babylon, where it was cremated on a pyre, in a funeral on which he planned to spend astronomical sums. Little did Alexander know that Babylon was to become his final stop as well. Forced to stay in the town through the hot, mosquito-ridden summer months, he took sick and died after a short illness. By our accounting the year was 323 BCE. Alexander was only 33 years old.
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

Post by athenas owl »

Theseus said:
Drama surrounding the "gayness" of Alexander has a precedent. A couple of years previously, a mob of hundreds of Macedonian Greeks stormed an archeological symposium after a speaker presented a paper on the homosexuality of Alexander. Police were then called in to evacuate . . . the scholarly participants!
Wasn't one of the threatened scholars the venerable and elderly Dr, Badian? I remember that happening. Can't really get into it too much without bringing in the "controversy that shall not be named".
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

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OH yes we don't want to get that started. :wink:
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

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Be warned: All hell about to be broken loose

I would really like to know who wrote that piece of bullcr*p.
His tutor from the age of thirteen on was the philosopher Aristotle, who commented on the excesses as well as the values of pederasty, and who had a number of male beloveds of his own. Alexander embodied those ethics for the rest of his brief but volcanic life. However, he stretched the accepted boundaries of ancient male love. Not only did he have love affairs with boys, but above them all, was his love for a man his own age, his childhood friend Hephaestion. This relationship resembled modern gay love and became legendary for it's passion.
i would really like to know in which historical accounts the person that wrote this was based upon.

That is why Greek lawyers wanted to sue Stone. Because this is how history gets fabricated. In a few years they will be even mentioning that Alexander had an affair with his horse.

It isnt about ethnic pride, it's about historical facts. People are not dum, at least not Greek people. When they see their culture being invaded and altered in order to serve other people's interests, they rise up. That is why the scholars were evacuated in Thessaloniki. And yes, the fact that Badian was there had a lot to do with it. Greece is being pounded from all sides, by people that want to crush our ethnic identity so we can become easily controllable, like a bunch of other nations, but they should know better. The Persian gold was spread throught Greece, but the Persian empire eventually got smacked by Alexander, a man that was proud to be Greek, and that punished all those that went with the Persians.

Heck, i am an amateur astronomer. My beliefs surpass our little earthly quarrels, and i look to the stars cause they may be the future of mankind united. But not like this. Theseus, my flame isnt for you. But you should at least comment on the completely unhistorical accounts on the text you have quoted.
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

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I didn't have the time to comment when I first posted it and I appologize for that. I won't make excuses, please accept my appology.

I posted this because it has to do with that very touchy subject of Alexander's sexuality which is the topic of this thread. Alexander's sexuality isn't a big deal to me, he was who he was, an amazing leader and someone that changed things that still effect us today. I guess that's why I can't understand why it matters so much if Alexander was gay/bi or straight. Does it really matter that much? I am guessing by your response it does. I am one of those that tends to lean towards the idea that yes Alexander had both male and female lovers and based my opinion on the information found in ancient text as well as newer books re:Alexander, Hephaistian and Bagoas. We all have our own beliefs on this. This is my opinion.

I have the utmost respect for Greeks and Macedonians, your culture is rich and beautiful and in no way do I want to take away from that. We all have different opinions and I respect yours as I do everyone elses here.
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

Post by Phoebus »

Can I offer my two cents' worth?

I'm not worried by the idea that Alexander could have had male lovers. It doesn't change what the man did, for good or for bad. What I am worried about is when people speak in definites about a man whose historical record is sadly lacking. Especially when said definites are about parts of his life that are sadly lacking.

So when an article makes a statement like ...

"Not only did he have love affairs with boys, but above them all, was his love for a man his own age, his childhood friend Hephaestion. This relationship resembled modern gay love and became legendary for it's passion."

... I'm not bothered by the fact that its claims have to do with homoeroticism, homosexuality, or pederasty; I'm bothered by the fact that it assumes that there is definite knowledge on the topics it tries to bring up. Or, to qualify it better... If you're going to bring up Philip's lovers as a way to illustrate how the sexual drama of the Macedonian royal court could bite someone in the proverbial ass, at least draw an accurate picture. Pausanias the murderer was no "boy", but a man old enough to be inducted in the king's personal bodyguard. The other Pausanias, who had "replaced" him was himself old enough to die in battle after not being able to tolerate the former beloved's insults.

Many of those aforementioned Greek lawyers may very well have been bigots, homophobes, etc. But I wouldn't be surprised if many of them were simply tired of seeing conclusions drawn and labels--any labels--applied for one reason or another.

Incidentally, and somewhat off topic, I don't condone shouting down or trying to intimidate your intellectual opposition. That having been said, I would like those not entirely familiar with Greece to know that what these lawyers did is by no means limited to academics who imply homoerotic habits on men modern Greeks view as heroes: the same thing happens in our nation's forums of football, basketball, politics, journalism, so on and so forth.

Finally, and since that blasted movie is associated with this article, I have to say this. I've really, really, wanted to like Oliver Stone's movie. I mean this. You know that you want a movie to grow on you, to do justice to its subject matter, when you've watched it more than a dozen times on all three formats it's been released on ("Maybe the Director's Cut includes scenes that put things in context, or balance out the final product. Nope. Maybe the Final Cut does this. Nope. Nice props and customes in the extra tent scene, though. Gah, almost $100 down the drain, from movie tickets to DVD purchases!"). But the assertion the article made on Hollywood's "lukewarm applause" and the "leftover parts" of the movie being boring? Please! The movie was universally panned primarily on account of Alexander's characterization and Stone's way of presenting the overall timeline. And I agree with the critics in this case: Alexander hardly looks like the product of the deadly, macho world of the royal Macedonian warrior-court, and that has nothing to do with whom he may or may not have had sex with. Just as Alexander wasn't defined by whom he had sex with, so do I doubt that any additional context on his sexual life would fail to atone for his depiction out of bed.
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

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Theseus my anger is not towards you, but to those who wrote this, and i totally agree with Phoebus with what he said. Also, it does not matter what Alexander's sexuality was, not so much at least, but naming him the king of gays, and Aristotle the king of pederasty, well that's insulting to say the least. And all this of course based on non existent historical sources.

Anyway, the thing with the Greek lawyers is as Phoebus said. They wanted to sue Stone and anyone else involved because there are no facts, but some indications as far as the things that Stone depicts in the movie. Yet he labeled them as historical facts. And many people do that with a lot of things, that's why there was a lot of anger from the Greek people. It' isn't only about Alexander, but also about Skopja and the Macedonian debate, and other things. If Greece had not been the country it is, and was let's say like Israel, FYROM wouldn't even be on the map now. But we are not like this. And people take advantage of it. Try to understand how it is when you live in a country that has some five thousands of years of recorded history, your ancestors have contributed to everything, and you see history being changed, fabricated e.t.c. just to suit some people's interests.
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

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Efstathios wrote:Theseus my anger is not towards you, but to those who wrote this, and i totally agree with Phoebus with what he said. Also, it does not matter what Alexander's sexuality was, not so much at least, but naming him the king of gays, and Aristotle the king of pederasty, well that's insulting to say the least. And all this of course based on non existent historical sources.

Anyway, the thing with the Greek lawyers is as Phoebus said. They wanted to sue Stone and anyone else involved because there are no facts, but some indications as far as the things that Stone depicts in the movie. Yet he labeled them as historical facts. And many people do that with a lot of things, that's why there was a lot of anger from the Greek people. It' isn't only about Alexander, but also about Skopja and the Macedonian debate, and other things. If Greece had not been the country it is, and was let's say like Israel, FYROM wouldn't even be on the map now. But we are not like this. And people take advantage of it. Try to understand how it is when you live in a country that has some five thousands of years of recorded history, your ancestors have contributed to everything, and you see history being changed, fabricated e.t.c. just to suit some people's interests.
Thank you Efstathios. I do understand that it is a touchy subject. We do not have 100% proof either way on this topic. I had some issues with the article as well. Mr. Stone should have worded things differently as he didn't have all of his facts straight for that film.

I do think it is amazing how after thousands of years there is so much interest and passion associated with Alexander. I am one of those that feels that people are forgetting about our past and that they think it doesn't matter or have anything to do with us today. I beg to differ on that. Our past is what makes us who we are today. By what Alexander accomplished in affect laid down the foundations of future societies. I sometimes wonder what our world would have been like if Alexander hadn't existed. I don't think I'd like that world much. For those that are trying to take advantage of Greece I have no respect for them. As I have said I really truly respect the Greek people and am truly passionate about their culture and history. Greece is on the top of my list of places I need to see before I'm gone. I think I would just get lost there and wander around for weeks and take it all in. What a beautiful country.
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

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And i wish that you will come one day.
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Re: Alexander as gay icon

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Phoebus wrote:If you're going to bring up Philip's lovers as a way to illustrate how the sexual drama of the Macedonian royal court could bite someone in the proverbial ass, at least draw an accurate picture. Pausanias the murderer was no "boy", but a man old enough to be inducted in the king's personal bodyguard. The other Pausanias, who had "replaced" him was himself old enough to die in battle after not being able to tolerate the former beloved's insults.
“Personal” bodyguard (like “confidential” bodyguard) implies membership of “the seven” – somatophylax. That the murderer Pausanias was so is not likely. The description of him at Philip’s murder is as one of the agema of the hypaspists or “royal” hypaspist. This is also what the “younger” (likely the age of an Athenian ephebe) Pausanias is when he steps in front of Philip to take the killing blow / thrust.

Seleucus, in India, is clearly separated from the “confidential” bodyguards (Ptolemy, Perdiccas, and Lysimachus) and is termed “hetairos”. Here he commands those same hypaspists: the agemea, yet another set of “king’s guards”.
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Wicked men, you sin against your fathers, who conquered the whole world under Philip and Alexander.

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Re: Alexander as gay icon

Post by Taphoi »

Paralus wrote:“Personal” bodyguard (like “confidential” bodyguard) implies membership of “the seven” – somatophylax. That the murderer Pausanias was so is not likely. The description of him at Philip’s murder is as one of the agema of the hypaspists or “royal” hypaspist.
No. The word that is used for Pausanias at both Diodorus 16.93.3 and 16.93.9 is somatophylax, which, as you suggest, usually means one of the seven personal Bodyguards. Arguments to the contrary are disingenuous imho.

Best wishes,

Andrew
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