Alexander

According to the November 2004 "Smithsonian" . . .
In the November 2004 "Smithsonian," is a long article about Alexander the Great. Alexander's male lover is named. I can't spot it of a minute. The most I remember is that it began with an "H" (I think!) and how distraught A. was over H.'s death.

The article doesn't dwell on this fact. There is the barest mention of it. Likewise, the PBS special on TV recently about Lawrence of Arabia. "A small note in passing."[/color]

Hephaustus?

Hephistus?

Its pretty well documented.

Alexander was reported to have laid on H's body for three days without "seeing to his personal needs", which I took to meant he made quite a mess. Not to mention he refused to let them embalm H....

True love...

There's hardly any disagreement among historians that Alex was gay. His lover was Hephaestion. When H. was killed in battle, A was beside himself with grief and arranged the most grandiose funeral ever seen.

If they're going to sue the film-makers, they have to sue one helluva lot of writers and historians as well. I always thought this was common knowledge.

But, I don't know about the gay thing...

He was married, too.

And, the thing I find interesting is the difference in his relationship with H. and the Man Love rite of passage Greeks and some of their contemporary cultures found commonplace. The boys of a few cultures during that time shipped their male children off to military training--where an older soldier would take them under their wing, and into bed... They thought it trained the men to fight perhaps more vigorously for their loved ones--and solidified some more intense loyalty or Esprit d'corps.

<chuckle>

His marriage had nothing to do with his sexual preference. All rulers gor married as a matter of form. One was, after all, expected to leave an heir.

Not to mention Bagoas, his Persian slave boy, previously slave to the Persian King - who was well known to history, I believe. (Edit - I mean a well known lover, in addition to Hephaestion, of course.)

And the broadly accepted romances bewteen young men and older ones. I believe the ideal was for these to be platonic - but....


They were certainly not homo-phobic - as modern Greek/Macedonian culture seems to be...

Hephaestion and Bagoas
"Alexander was a handsome youth with shoulder length blond hair, prominent forehead, ruddy complexion and 'a certain melting look in his eyes.' Historical sources suggest Alexander was bisexual, an orientation that bore no stigma in his day. He had at least two male lovers - his childhood friend and fellow soldier Hephaestion, and the Persian eunuch Bagoas - and fathered a child with his Sogdian wife, Roxane, and perhaps one with his Persian mistress. Even so, he had an ambivalent attitude toward sex. 'Sex and sleep alone make me conscious that I am mortal,' he supposedly once remarked."

Smithsonian Magazine, November 2004, p. 76.[/color]

Since I've just had a "problem" putting this URL here, it's posted straight away. I'll check it to make certain it "works."

http://www.smithsonianmag.si.edu/smithsonian/issues04/nov04/alexander.html

Ah, Bagoas. Thanks for reminding me, dlowan. I had forgotten about that eunuch who had pretty well single-handedly placed Darius III on the throne of Persia. He switched sides quickly when Alex defeated Darius on his way to India.

Yeech. Yes, Alexander the Great WAS bisexual, as was his father. The two most well known cases of his sexuality were Hephaestion, his best friend since they were very little, and the Bagoas as Merry Andrew mentioned.

Some good sites for evidence are listed here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hephaestion
http://www.gayheroes.com/alex.htm

If those don't convince you read 'The Persian Boy' by Mary Renault, it's about Bagosas and entirely factual.

On this note I am doing an essay for school proving that Alexander was a bisexual man deeply in love with Hephaestion. Now before you scorn me hear the facts that convinced me out. When Hephaestion died of what is thought to be Tuberculosis, Alexander stayed by his dead friend for three days without sleeping, eating, or releiving himself. In the end his generals had to drag him bodily from the room. After that, Alexander went mad with grief. He shaved his head and the manes of all horses in his calvery. Alexander had always been a heavy drinker, but now he was contantly in a state of drunkedness. In fact he died three months after the death of Hephaestion from Malaria contracted from lying drunk in a gutter in Babylon for some days.

^It thar didn't convince you, nothing will.

Mary Renault also recounts the Hephaestion affair in Fire from Heaven, a novel dealing with Alexander's youth and adolscence. But be careful with that 'entirely factual' label, Nitogumi. Renault is a novelist, not a historian. While her facts may be essentially accurate, she is writing a novel, not irrefutable historical truth. As a writer, she is entitled to some 'artitistic license.'

Mos of which, in my edition, (I have the trilogy in one book) she comments on.

Here is the Google scholar url on this:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&lr=&q=Alexander+AND+Hephaestion&btnG=Search


And - as an example of the cultural acceptance and indeed ideal of man/young man love, (I have just remembered their name - been casting around for it since this question was asked) there is, of course, the reality, or legend, of Theban Band - an entire force of Theban soldiers made up of lovers - and known for their fierceness and courage - since - as was part of the warrior/young warrior love thing - neither partner would be shamed in front of the other, and would fight for the others' life.