public performance in the modern world before the second half of the twentieth
century.
This comic reversal suggests that the social reality of pederastic relations in
Athens must have been rather different from Plato’s ideal. If we ask what might be
implied in Pausanias’s phrase ‘yield to a lover’, social convention which fell short of
approving actual penetration allowed intercrural intercourse between the thighs of
the eromenos, as sometimes depicted on vases. Status was a vital factor. Any adult
taking the passive role was frowned upon and subject to ridicule, as is evident in the
plays of Aristophanes. Particular standards of sexual behaviour were expected of
adult male citizens. For instance, it was illegal for an adult male citizen to engage in
prostitution or to hire out a citizen boy for similar purposes; in this latter case seller
and buyer could lose their political rights. It is doubtful that there was any such
protection offered to non citizens boys or slaves. Male prostitutes could not hold
office but most of these were probably non citizens.
Very many vases survive, mostly Attic, from the sixth century onwards which
are decorated with scenes implicating pederasty. On many of them is the generic
inscription, ho pais kalos, ‘the boy is beautiful’, indicating that pederasty was widely
appreciated and practiced. In most cases, the beardless eromenosas well as the erastes,
is an athletic individual with a well-developed chest and strong legs as in figures 31
and 33, having the appearance of a late adolescent rather than a young boy. Such
was the predominant artistic convention. The majority of the scenes have been
classified as courtship scenes where the erastespresents or has presented a gift to the
eromenos, often of a hare or a cock or occasionally a lyre. Various stages in this
courtship are represented; sometimes the eromenosis fully clothed, sometimes his
cloak is open to reveal his naked body. In many, the erastes touches or gestures
towards the head of the eromenoswith one hand and his genitals with the other. The
erastes may reveal an erection as in figure 33 but the eromenos is invariably shown to
be passively unaroused. Some representations, a minority of what survives, show as
do the two illustrated here a relationship beyond courtship. In figure 31, the eromenos
is more actively responsive, stroking the chest of the erastes; while the pair gaze
intently into one another’s eyes. In 33 the eromenos has his arm around the neck of
his erastes who is positioned as if ready for consummation. The courtship gift in this
case is a bag of dice or knucklebones. The props behind the erastes, the strigil and
sponge, indicate the setting for this scene is the gymnasium. In figure 31 the context
is the symposium. The wreaths on their heads, the lute and the table in front of the
luxurious reclining couch on which are placed two wine cups, kylikes, evoke the
festivity of this social ritual. The broad two handled kylixis the cup used in the
symposium generally. A slave boy filled them for the symposiasts from the large
mixing bowl called a kraterwhich held the wine. Many of the representations of
pederastic encounters are, in fact, found on these kylikes,whether round the sides, the
RELIGION AND SOCIAL LIFE 123