1 00:01:10,350 --> 00:01:15,450 If rocks could talk, oh, what stories they could tell. 2 00:01:17,650 --> 00:01:23,030 Here in the early part of the 21st century, on the small Greek island of 3 00:01:23,030 --> 00:01:29,270 Astapalia, Dr. Andreas Vlahopoulos, a noted archaeologist, 4 00:01:29,410 --> 00:01:34,170 found rocks here that told an ancient story of same sex. 5 00:01:35,710 --> 00:01:38,570 The markings chiseled into the limestone 6 00:01:39,280 --> 00:01:45,200 say that 2,500 years ago, two men were having sex here on this spot. 7 00:01:47,460 --> 00:01:51,380 They memorialized their love the way lovers still do. 8 00:01:52,860 --> 00:01:57,500 Some would say that theirs was an unnatural act. I know that charge 9 00:01:57,500 --> 00:02:03,040 firsthand as I was arrested for soliciting another man to commit an 10 00:02:03,040 --> 00:02:04,040 unnatural act. 11 00:02:06,640 --> 00:02:07,960 It was Boston. 12 00:02:08,350 --> 00:02:09,350 1975. 13 00:02:10,590 --> 00:02:16,190 A jury, dressed up to celebrate an Irish Catholic holiday, convicted me. 14 00:02:17,130 --> 00:02:21,590 Then and now, I never thought my same-sex desires were unnatural. 15 00:02:22,670 --> 00:02:27,890 And neither did they when they proclaimed their love centuries before 16 00:02:27,890 --> 00:02:30,490 the word homosexual was invented. 17 00:02:55,760 --> 00:03:01,460 We know experiences in which people clearly desired same-sex relationships 18 00:03:01,460 --> 00:03:05,800 that went beyond the norm of heterosexual relations. 19 00:03:06,300 --> 00:03:10,980 Lesbians, gays, transvestites, transgenders existed in Asia for 20 00:03:10,980 --> 00:03:11,980 centuries. 21 00:03:15,300 --> 00:03:21,800 And I find so much of same-sex references, etc., in our temples, 22 00:03:21,960 --> 00:03:22,960 depictions. 23 00:03:39,180 --> 00:03:41,020 The how 24 00:03:41,020 --> 00:03:48,340 and 25 00:03:48,340 --> 00:03:54,320 why we were able to rediscover so much ancient same-sex material just recently 26 00:03:54,890 --> 00:03:57,350 is in itself an exciting part of our story. 27 00:03:58,210 --> 00:04:04,690 All of my work in the ancient world is based on archives of an ancient sort 28 00:04:04,690 --> 00:04:11,270 because without preserving this, our lives are totally wiped 29 00:04:11,270 --> 00:04:16,029 out. You know, each fragment, I mean, it depends upon each fragment of 30 00:04:16,029 --> 00:04:17,510 information being saved. 31 00:04:25,640 --> 00:04:32,320 What was it about people like me that so disturbed so many 32 00:04:32,320 --> 00:04:33,320 others? 33 00:04:34,060 --> 00:04:35,280 Was it fear? 34 00:04:37,080 --> 00:04:38,080 Affect? 35 00:04:39,700 --> 00:04:42,380 And what made so many lovers hide? 36 00:04:43,280 --> 00:04:44,580 Was it shame? 37 00:04:45,720 --> 00:04:49,720 Or the despicable acts committed against people like me? 38 00:04:51,280 --> 00:04:54,360 Some material we found is pretty ugly. 39 00:04:54,810 --> 00:04:55,970 It's part of the story. 40 00:04:56,510 --> 00:05:03,250 But I find myself drawn more to the beauty from our past, the heroism, an 41 00:05:03,250 --> 00:05:08,230 ability to struggle, to survive, and even flourish. 42 00:05:09,370 --> 00:05:12,370 To insist, we will be remembered. 43 00:05:14,870 --> 00:05:20,890 There are monuments now to our dead. Berlin has a big concrete vault. 44 00:05:21,340 --> 00:05:25,080 to commemorate the many homosexuals who were murdered by the Nazis. 45 00:05:27,140 --> 00:05:31,380 But what picks me up are the monuments to our cultural artifacts. 46 00:05:31,920 --> 00:05:37,720 This one, across town, preserves the traces of our vivid path. 47 00:05:42,920 --> 00:05:47,540 In Amsterdam, on my way to lecture about gay history, 48 00:05:48,330 --> 00:05:51,770 I lay flowers at another monument to the gay dead. 49 00:05:52,730 --> 00:05:56,830 But suffering is just a part of our history. People are being arrested, 50 00:05:56,950 --> 00:06:00,610 hung, killed and also celebrated all over the world. 51 00:06:00,850 --> 00:06:03,930 And stories are being told and history is being made. 52 00:06:04,450 --> 00:06:10,090 The thing about history being... 53 00:06:10,970 --> 00:06:15,490 circular, is that yes, history repeats itself, but the circles get bigger and 54 00:06:15,490 --> 00:06:18,410 bigger and bigger, and at some point you better be sure that it doesn't go off 55 00:06:18,410 --> 00:06:19,410 the fucking edge. 56 00:06:21,050 --> 00:06:23,930 The Nazis burnt the first gay film ever made. 57 00:06:24,570 --> 00:06:28,410 Some brave soul saved a copy. We found it hidden in Prague. 58 00:06:30,250 --> 00:06:37,250 And so the circle repeats, making, destroying, hiding, and saving. 59 00:06:41,320 --> 00:06:43,260 We started with an old shoebox. 60 00:06:48,400 --> 00:06:52,120 This says René Vivian, 1906, this one here. 61 00:06:52,940 --> 00:06:58,380 I'm teaching in my class how local resistance was organized to fight. 62 00:07:02,100 --> 00:07:08,990 When C.P. Kefafi, the famous Greek poet, wrote Hidden Things in 1908, He must 63 00:07:08,990 --> 00:07:12,490 have expected that someday somebody would find it. 64 00:07:12,770 --> 00:07:18,270 From all I did and all I said, let no one try to find out who I was. 65 00:07:18,830 --> 00:07:22,850 The past, as Qafafi says, is not finished. 66 00:07:23,210 --> 00:07:28,990 Later, in a more perfect society, someone else, made just like me, is 67 00:07:28,990 --> 00:07:31,370 certain to appear and act freely. 68 00:07:36,650 --> 00:07:42,070 During the 60s, like many students, I was involved in the anti-Vietnam War 69 00:07:42,070 --> 00:07:44,930 movement. Free speech and academic free speech here at the university. 70 00:07:45,770 --> 00:07:49,390 For me, it was also a time of the sexual revolution. 71 00:07:52,130 --> 00:07:56,770 Free love was in the air and the Kama Sutra was fast becoming our Bible. 72 00:07:57,250 --> 00:08:00,930 But I knew then that some things had been left out. 73 00:08:01,919 --> 00:08:04,520 They just don't have that chapter. So most people are not aware that that 74 00:08:04,520 --> 00:08:05,520 chapter is there. 75 00:08:05,640 --> 00:08:08,920 Even the glossy coffee table kind of versions of the Kama Sutra that float 76 00:08:08,920 --> 00:08:11,840 around in the West, they're all heterosexualized. You don't have this 77 00:08:11,840 --> 00:08:15,400 stuff in it. So people don't know this about the tradition. 78 00:08:16,520 --> 00:08:20,260 There's a chapter in the Kama Sutra. It divides people into men who desire women 79 00:08:20,260 --> 00:08:23,620 and men who desire other men. And then goes on to give a very detailed 80 00:08:23,620 --> 00:08:27,720 description of oral sex, like sucking a mango and so on. Quite non-judgmental 81 00:08:27,720 --> 00:08:28,720 and even quite playful. 82 00:08:45,000 --> 00:08:51,920 But back in the early 1980s, when three young producers, including myself, 83 00:08:52,360 --> 00:08:57,420 began to make the film before Stonewall, we ran into some obstacles. 84 00:08:58,960 --> 00:09:01,320 We weren't able to do... 85 00:09:03,630 --> 00:09:09,150 Anything earlier than 1920, when we did Before Stonewall, basically 86 00:09:09,150 --> 00:09:12,630 there was hardly any material. 87 00:09:13,690 --> 00:09:16,510 Who gets to define and analyze history? 88 00:09:18,190 --> 00:09:24,110 With the gay revolution of the 1990s in academia and anthropology, all of a 89 00:09:24,110 --> 00:09:26,570 sudden gay folks in these worlds had influence. 90 00:09:26,790 --> 00:09:31,750 That is, they had tenure at universities, grants for research, and 91 00:09:31,750 --> 00:09:32,750 the like. 92 00:09:33,230 --> 00:09:36,910 which meant a new focus on same-sex history. 93 00:09:37,210 --> 00:09:43,690 Anti-gay forces tried to suppress any knowledge of the historical existence of 94 00:09:43,690 --> 00:09:49,130 gay people or gay feelings or any kind of self-expression of those feelings. 95 00:09:49,370 --> 00:09:55,930 So just excavating them and getting them back from under the years of 96 00:09:55,930 --> 00:10:01,190 neglect and censorship was a way of saying... 97 00:10:01,520 --> 00:10:02,540 We are here. 98 00:10:03,580 --> 00:10:09,440 But gay and lesbian academics of the 1990s did more than find and save 99 00:10:09,440 --> 00:10:13,740 material. They also went about reinterpreting some of the classic 100 00:10:13,740 --> 00:10:16,020 stories with a gay sensibility. 101 00:10:17,080 --> 00:10:24,040 Michelangelo's David is a titanic work of art in the Renaissance as an 102 00:10:24,040 --> 00:10:25,040 artistic culture. 103 00:10:25,220 --> 00:10:28,540 Now, what it means to me personally, he is... 104 00:10:28,860 --> 00:10:34,440 David, not only the killer of Goliath, but David, the lover of Jonathan. 105 00:10:35,640 --> 00:10:41,780 David, who says when Jonathan dies, your love to me was more beautiful than that 106 00:10:41,780 --> 00:10:42,780 of women. 107 00:10:44,040 --> 00:10:49,540 Then Jonathan and David made a covenant because he loved him as his own soul. 108 00:10:50,040 --> 00:10:54,740 And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him and gave it to 109 00:10:54,740 --> 00:10:55,740 David. 110 00:10:58,570 --> 00:11:05,530 Certain individuals would live those desires out, even in the face of taboos 111 00:11:05,530 --> 00:11:06,530 or laws. 112 00:11:06,850 --> 00:11:11,910 And so we've come with that heritage up to the present time. 113 00:11:27,240 --> 00:11:31,820 that we could have begun before Stonewall thousands of years ago in the 114 00:11:31,820 --> 00:11:34,980 caves of Zimbabwe or under the streets in Prague. 115 00:11:36,740 --> 00:11:38,640 One thing has become very clear. 116 00:11:39,220 --> 00:11:40,220 Genes don't lie. 117 00:11:41,120 --> 00:11:45,180 Our genes have been around for a long time, and so have the gay genes. 118 00:11:45,400 --> 00:11:48,880 If you're talking about Neanderthal men, they probably had gay genes too. 119 00:11:49,080 --> 00:11:54,160 What the research shows is that sexual orientation has a strong genetic basis. 120 00:11:54,750 --> 00:11:58,150 It's the most important single contributor to whether people are 121 00:11:58,150 --> 00:12:03,170 attracted to members of the opposite sex or the same sex or to both sexes. And 122 00:12:03,170 --> 00:12:08,470 since our genes have not changed over the last 50,000 years, we can be sure 123 00:12:08,470 --> 00:12:13,530 that there were gay genes and bisexual genes and lesbian genes long, long, long 124 00:12:13,530 --> 00:12:16,070 before the word homosexual was invented. 125 00:12:25,390 --> 00:12:31,010 Even the scientific community kept from us information about our closest genetic 126 00:12:31,010 --> 00:12:34,130 relative, the fun-loving bonobo. 127 00:12:34,950 --> 00:12:38,930 The bonobo life is the life of the sexual candy store. 128 00:12:39,150 --> 00:12:43,130 When I was invited to do this lecture, I realized many of you don't even know the 129 00:12:43,130 --> 00:12:46,230 difference between a monkey and an ape, let alone a bonobo and a LGBTQ. 130 00:12:47,830 --> 00:12:52,050 They not only use sex for everything, they have sex with everyone. 131 00:12:52,940 --> 00:12:55,080 Male, male, female, female. 132 00:12:55,720 --> 00:12:57,060 I'll show you some footage. 133 00:12:59,320 --> 00:13:05,940 The males will hang from trees and they'll do what's called penis fencing. 134 00:13:06,680 --> 00:13:07,800 They fence. 135 00:13:08,360 --> 00:13:11,560 Bonobos substitute sex for aggression, so do male homos. 136 00:13:12,000 --> 00:13:14,380 Actually, gay men substitute sex for everything. 137 00:13:14,820 --> 00:13:16,360 I mean, it's a lovely thing. 138 00:13:16,800 --> 00:13:21,260 The bonobos are us without repression, religion, and shame. 139 00:13:26,960 --> 00:13:30,540 I think the first thing to say about same-sex relationships in the ancient 140 00:13:30,540 --> 00:13:33,840 world is that they're quite different. 141 00:13:36,700 --> 00:13:41,860 Islamic law prohibited same-sex relationships for men, male 142 00:13:41,860 --> 00:13:43,260 homosexuality explicitly. 143 00:13:43,640 --> 00:13:48,060 In practice, same-sex relations were common cultural practices. 144 00:14:03,340 --> 00:14:07,100 There's a finely nuanced slang vocabulary for all sorts of gay sex 145 00:14:07,100 --> 00:14:09,280 acts, but no word for homosexuals. 146 00:14:09,500 --> 00:14:12,280 The people of Huizhou call it treading on dofu. 147 00:14:12,880 --> 00:14:15,700 The people of Jiangxi call it casting a crucible. 148 00:14:16,220 --> 00:14:19,180 The people of Ningbo call it good, good. 149 00:14:24,940 --> 00:14:29,620 Perhaps the best example of male intimacy, the most controversial 150 00:14:29,620 --> 00:14:35,000 example, is the tomb chapel of Neacnum and Cnumhotep, and comes from around 151 00:14:35,000 --> 00:14:36,520 2400 BC. 152 00:14:36,920 --> 00:14:41,280 On the walls of the tomb chapel, the usual iconographic position that's taken 153 00:14:41,280 --> 00:14:47,040 by the man and his wife isn't taken by a man and a woman in this tomb. It's taken 154 00:14:47,040 --> 00:14:53,260 by the two separate tomb owners, Neacnum and Cnumhotep. And the central images... 155 00:14:53,690 --> 00:14:57,570 in the iconography show these two men embracing and kissing. 156 00:14:58,610 --> 00:15:04,570 We do have a few examples of less formal texts and works of art. 157 00:15:04,790 --> 00:15:10,410 There's also a long so-called erotic papyrus. It's there for a bit of 158 00:15:10,410 --> 00:15:11,830 frivolous filth, I think. 159 00:15:16,670 --> 00:15:22,430 Many of our ancient myths and stories come down to us somewhat embellished. 160 00:15:22,750 --> 00:15:24,430 with bigger-than-life heroes. 161 00:15:26,610 --> 00:15:30,990 These stories tended to downplay same-sex activities. 162 00:15:33,610 --> 00:15:39,730 However, in the 21st century, same-sex myths were being reconstructed, 163 00:15:39,750 --> 00:15:43,090 especially in the world of gay fan art. 164 00:15:47,630 --> 00:15:49,790 First, let me tell you what the story's about. 165 00:15:50,050 --> 00:15:51,250 Stay with me now. 166 00:15:52,730 --> 00:15:56,710 Horace was the god of the sky, Set the god of the desert. 167 00:15:57,570 --> 00:16:00,130 For years they fought for dominance and the throne. 168 00:16:01,870 --> 00:16:06,330 One day Set tells Horace, how lovely is your backside. 169 00:16:08,190 --> 00:16:13,170 And soon the two are locked, penis and thighs, with Set taking the top role. 170 00:16:14,050 --> 00:16:18,430 Now what Set doesn't know, in the clinch, Horace grabs his semen and 171 00:16:18,430 --> 00:16:19,450 throws it in the river. 172 00:16:21,130 --> 00:16:25,590 Then Horace masturbates on some lettuce, which happens to be Set's favorite food. 173 00:16:26,450 --> 00:16:30,090 Later on, Set's bragging to the other gods that Horace submitted to his 174 00:16:30,090 --> 00:16:35,430 seduction. And as proof, Set summons his semen, but it springs forth from the 175 00:16:35,430 --> 00:16:36,430 river. 176 00:16:36,550 --> 00:16:41,510 When Horace summons his semen, it springs from Set's forehead in the form 177 00:16:41,510 --> 00:16:43,790 of a golden disc, proving his dominance. 178 00:16:44,290 --> 00:16:46,270 Thus did Horace become king. 179 00:17:01,450 --> 00:17:07,369 But in ancient Greece, same-sex was very much a part of the culture. 180 00:17:14,589 --> 00:17:19,890 The Greeks were moving in a direction that you might say mainstreamed 181 00:17:19,890 --> 00:17:20,890 sexuality. 182 00:17:23,030 --> 00:17:27,970 In Athens, same-sex relationships between free-born men were sort of 183 00:17:27,970 --> 00:17:29,190 official rite of passage. 184 00:17:33,870 --> 00:17:38,390 Once it's more accepting, more other gay people can express themselves, can be 185 00:17:38,390 --> 00:17:41,390 out, perhaps more likely to come into a position of power. 186 00:17:45,010 --> 00:17:49,970 So this is sort of a classic example of how biology and culture can feed upon 187 00:17:49,970 --> 00:17:50,970 one another. 188 00:17:51,670 --> 00:17:56,290 Amongst the Greeks, who had a homosexual orientation, I'm sure some of them came 189 00:17:56,290 --> 00:17:57,430 into positions of power. 190 00:17:58,050 --> 00:17:59,970 Some say the gays saved democracy. 191 00:18:06,220 --> 00:18:12,860 One pair of lovers was credited with the reestablishment of Athenian 192 00:18:12,860 --> 00:18:13,860 democracy. 193 00:18:14,420 --> 00:18:16,260 Their story is quite unique. 194 00:18:16,560 --> 00:18:17,560 They were lovers. 195 00:18:17,840 --> 00:18:24,740 Aristogiton was the Erastes of Hermodius, and Hermodius was 196 00:18:24,740 --> 00:18:30,440 his Romanos. The younger one, Hermodius, was offended by one of the rulers of 197 00:18:30,440 --> 00:18:32,740 Athens at the time, Hipparchus. 198 00:18:32,980 --> 00:18:35,040 And they decided to kill. 199 00:18:35,450 --> 00:18:40,190 Hipparchus, and they managed to do so, but they died in the process. 200 00:18:40,530 --> 00:18:46,150 Hipparchus' murder was a political event because that was the end of tyranny and 201 00:18:46,150 --> 00:18:49,570 opened the road to democracy, as it were. 202 00:18:50,770 --> 00:18:54,650 The statues were set in the middle of the area. 203 00:18:55,390 --> 00:19:01,670 Until then, this place has had statues only of the frauds. These are the first 204 00:19:01,670 --> 00:19:04,130 statues of men in public places. 205 00:19:07,879 --> 00:19:12,480 What has always impressed me was the Greeks' ability, both for men and women, 206 00:19:12,540 --> 00:19:19,240 by the way, to fold into the pattern of being human as a perfectly normal 207 00:19:19,240 --> 00:19:22,060 and natural thing, same-sex desires. 208 00:19:23,220 --> 00:19:25,560 And then, of course, famously, there's Sappho. 209 00:19:26,700 --> 00:19:28,820 Would you like me to recite a Sappho poem in Greek? 210 00:19:29,080 --> 00:19:31,160 Do you know one? Oh, yeah. Just like that? Oh, yeah. 211 00:19:45,989 --> 00:19:50,630 Her life is shrouded in mystery. 212 00:19:51,950 --> 00:19:58,410 In the Roman period, 213 00:19:58,630 --> 00:20:01,010 there begins to be 214 00:20:01,750 --> 00:20:08,530 condemnation of her life because of the view that she had relations with women. 215 00:20:08,910 --> 00:20:15,910 Now unfortunately, of her six books, only two short 216 00:20:15,910 --> 00:20:18,030 poems have come down to a complete. 217 00:20:19,590 --> 00:20:20,610 Oh, this. 218 00:20:20,870 --> 00:20:24,610 This only stirs the troubled heart in my breath to tremble. 219 00:20:25,000 --> 00:20:30,160 Sweat runs down in rivers. A tremor seizes all my limbs. And paler than 220 00:20:30,160 --> 00:20:35,980 grass in autumn, caught by pains of menacing death, I falter, lost 221 00:20:35,980 --> 00:20:38,320 in the love trance. 222 00:20:40,680 --> 00:20:41,920 A love circle. 223 00:20:55,280 --> 00:20:57,360 But in Rome, different rules apply. 224 00:20:59,600 --> 00:21:02,760 As a Roman, you can sleep with whoever you want. 225 00:21:03,160 --> 00:21:06,240 It doesn't matter who you sleep with, but how you do it. 226 00:21:07,040 --> 00:21:10,120 And it's all about reinforcing dominance. 227 00:21:15,920 --> 00:21:19,040 So you have to be the active, the penetrating partner. 228 00:21:20,000 --> 00:21:21,540 And you can do it with whoever. 229 00:21:24,300 --> 00:21:30,280 But I found, by looking at the Roman world as a whole, that other people knew 230 00:21:30,280 --> 00:21:32,960 that women had relations with other women. 231 00:21:33,260 --> 00:21:37,200 I think there's very little we know about same-sex relationships between 232 00:21:37,200 --> 00:21:38,200 women. 233 00:21:38,500 --> 00:21:42,940 So people didn't assume that it even existed in ancient times. 234 00:21:46,060 --> 00:21:50,660 So I had to establish that there even was such a phenomenon in the Roman 235 00:21:50,660 --> 00:21:51,660 world. 236 00:21:54,380 --> 00:22:00,160 The examples that to me were the clearest were love spells that women 237 00:22:00,160 --> 00:22:02,520 commissioned to attract other women. 238 00:22:05,880 --> 00:22:12,000 The love spell is actually in the category of what are called binding 239 00:22:12,000 --> 00:22:13,000 spells. 240 00:22:14,560 --> 00:22:18,460 So these are very racy love spells. 241 00:22:19,340 --> 00:22:26,160 So you call upon what we would call the soul of a person who has died to go 242 00:22:26,160 --> 00:22:30,620 forth and grab another person and bind the person to you. 243 00:22:31,080 --> 00:22:36,160 So one woman tries to get the person into the bathhouse, make her love her 244 00:22:36,160 --> 00:22:38,520 day and night and desire nothing but her. 245 00:22:39,100 --> 00:22:43,800 Listen and do everything quickly, in no way opposing me in the performance of 246 00:22:43,800 --> 00:22:44,679 this action. 247 00:22:44,680 --> 00:22:47,220 Burn. Set on fire. 248 00:22:49,360 --> 00:22:54,860 Inflame, inflame her soul, heart, liver, 249 00:22:55,120 --> 00:22:58,120 spirit with love. 250 00:22:59,360 --> 00:23:03,520 Drive her, torment her body, night and day. 251 00:23:04,260 --> 00:23:09,660 She surrenders like a slave because this is the will and command of the great 252 00:23:09,660 --> 00:23:10,660 God. 253 00:23:11,240 --> 00:23:17,420 The ancient world was full of highly charged erotic images like the Bourne 254 00:23:17,420 --> 00:23:22,620 Cup. That's a silver cup that was made perhaps in the time of Augustus. 255 00:23:22,880 --> 00:23:27,560 And this cup was bought by the British Museum in 1999. 256 00:23:27,940 --> 00:23:30,600 It was at the time the most expensive single item they had bought. 257 00:23:30,800 --> 00:23:34,820 They'd been offered it in the 1950s, but they couldn't buy it because the 258 00:23:34,820 --> 00:23:36,160 material was too risqué. 259 00:23:41,000 --> 00:23:46,040 On one side, we have the traditional scene of an older man with a young boy. 260 00:23:46,120 --> 00:23:50,600 The older man has a beard, and the young boy is holding onto a sling, and they're 261 00:23:50,600 --> 00:23:51,900 very obviously having sex. 262 00:23:52,240 --> 00:23:56,800 And peeking around a curtain is another young man who may be a slave. We don't 263 00:23:56,800 --> 00:23:58,340 know who he is. Who's watching them? 264 00:24:00,300 --> 00:24:02,060 And we're still watching. 265 00:24:02,380 --> 00:24:07,760 The Roman emperor Hadrian started it all off with his obsessive love for a slave 266 00:24:07,760 --> 00:24:08,940 named Antoninus. 267 00:24:10,830 --> 00:24:14,410 the cult that developed after Antinous' death. 268 00:24:15,850 --> 00:24:17,230 That was unusual. 269 00:24:18,770 --> 00:24:23,990 And they put up statues of Antinous in their villas and in their cities. 270 00:24:26,350 --> 00:24:31,190 And this cult of Antinous continued into the 21st century. 271 00:24:32,110 --> 00:24:37,990 So Memoirs of Hadrian is a novel by Marguerite Yourcenar. 272 00:24:38,520 --> 00:24:44,140 its conceit is that it is the actual memoir of the roman emperor hadrian 273 00:24:44,140 --> 00:24:49,960 i see a head bending under its dark mass of hair 274 00:24:49,960 --> 00:24:56,740 eyes which seemed slanting so long were the lids a 275 00:24:56,740 --> 00:25:01,820 young face broadly formed as if for repose 276 00:25:07,980 --> 00:25:13,760 Yes, the gay liberation movement creates more interest and you can talk about it. 277 00:25:13,820 --> 00:25:19,220 There's a certain danger in looking back at antiquity and seeing these things as 278 00:25:19,220 --> 00:25:22,240 a sort of model or something to aspire to. 279 00:25:22,480 --> 00:25:29,120 Well, I wanted to show that there were highly developed civilizations 280 00:25:29,120 --> 00:25:32,580 apart from Europe. 281 00:25:35,160 --> 00:25:39,700 China hasn't been good because we have lots of records. 282 00:25:44,480 --> 00:25:47,000 charming boy your face 283 00:25:47,000 --> 00:25:52,920 More beautiful than the dawn clouds with red eyebrows 284 00:25:52,920 --> 00:25:59,840 You can make smoking girls envious 285 00:26:01,800 --> 00:26:06,280 In the Han Dynasty, you have the infatuation of emperors for various 286 00:26:06,280 --> 00:26:09,380 pretty boys, you know, sort of all sort of done in a warning tone. 287 00:26:11,920 --> 00:26:17,220 These are ten Chinese emperors of the Han Dynasty and the names of their 288 00:26:17,220 --> 00:26:18,480 favorite male companions. 289 00:26:19,320 --> 00:26:22,440 Many love stories have been written about their affairs. 290 00:26:22,820 --> 00:26:28,320 The most famous of these is based on fashion, and it's called The Story of 291 00:26:28,320 --> 00:26:29,400 the Cut Sleeve. 292 00:26:30,010 --> 00:26:36,130 The emperor Ai of the Han dynasty, which was essentially the first 293 00:26:36,130 --> 00:26:43,050 dynasty to rule China, the emperor was 294 00:26:43,050 --> 00:26:49,850 asleep and he rose to attend a meeting, but his lover was asleep on 295 00:26:49,850 --> 00:26:56,310 his sleeve. So he ordered an attendant to shut the sleeve 296 00:26:56,310 --> 00:27:00,540 so that the other man would not be awakened. 297 00:27:04,600 --> 00:27:09,260 And he appeared in this horse then with this cut sleeve. 298 00:27:11,020 --> 00:27:17,780 Other men there imitated this fashion as a way of celebrating the love 299 00:27:17,780 --> 00:27:24,240 affair. So that love between men was very occasionally referred to as 300 00:27:24,240 --> 00:27:26,980 the love of the cut sleeve. 301 00:27:28,170 --> 00:27:32,610 I think contemporary lesbians, they have an interest in Chinese history. 302 00:27:32,870 --> 00:27:38,310 I have an image of two women having sex using a double dildo. Mm-hmm. 303 00:27:38,910 --> 00:27:45,510 They are both smiling, but it's a very genial, very mild, gentle kind of smile. 304 00:27:47,030 --> 00:27:51,590 So, John, this is the tunnel book based on the poem for the... So I'm going to 305 00:27:51,590 --> 00:27:57,270 read you a poem called... It's like this. 306 00:27:59,370 --> 00:28:04,070 You can see the Chinese writing in the moon. Your slender body, your jade and 307 00:28:04,070 --> 00:28:06,130 coral gurgle ornaments chime. 308 00:28:06,730 --> 00:28:11,350 I want to possess the promised heart of a beautiful woman like you. 309 00:28:11,850 --> 00:28:13,050 It is spring. 310 00:28:13,690 --> 00:28:16,310 Bath mists cover the five lakes. 311 00:28:17,730 --> 00:28:22,850 My dear, let me buy a red painted boat and carry you away. 312 00:28:53,629 --> 00:28:58,640 While women were experiencing thousands of... Small deaths. 313 00:28:59,220 --> 00:29:02,740 Thousands of men were literally dying in each other's arms. 314 00:29:21,660 --> 00:29:26,540 So many of our same-sex stories about men are war stories. 315 00:29:27,850 --> 00:29:33,630 Perhaps the most enticing story of men at war was that of the sacred band of 316 00:29:33,630 --> 00:29:34,630 thieves. 317 00:29:59,879 --> 00:30:04,460 And if there were only some way of contriving that a state or an army 318 00:30:04,460 --> 00:30:09,120 should be made up of lovers and their beloved, they would overcome the world. 319 00:30:30,190 --> 00:30:36,630 To honor these sacred bands, the Thebans raise the statue of a lion 320 00:30:36,630 --> 00:30:37,990 on the battlefield. 321 00:30:44,170 --> 00:30:49,310 There is an educational role and therefore same-sex relationships can be 322 00:30:49,310 --> 00:30:53,870 positive and they can reinforce male bonds, especially among soldiers and 323 00:30:53,870 --> 00:30:54,870 warriors. 324 00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:03,220 And Achilles is the greatest of the Greek warriors. 325 00:31:05,160 --> 00:31:10,080 Patroclus is Achilles' friend, companion. The word Homer uses is 326 00:31:10,080 --> 00:31:14,580 heteros, which means comrade or companion or brother in arms. 327 00:31:16,160 --> 00:31:21,360 So, you know, the Greeks have to put forward a hero to fight Hector, who's 328 00:31:21,360 --> 00:31:22,360 the Trojan prince. 329 00:31:23,840 --> 00:31:29,480 But then Patroclus puts on Achilles' armor and goes out and is killed by 330 00:31:29,480 --> 00:31:30,480 Hector. 331 00:31:31,600 --> 00:31:36,740 And this is an absolute catastrophe for Achilles. His grief is described at 332 00:31:36,740 --> 00:31:42,900 length by Homer. He covers himself in ashes. He touches Patroclus' body. He is 333 00:31:42,900 --> 00:31:44,060 in absolute despair. 334 00:31:44,280 --> 00:31:49,760 And it is his terrible grief at the death of his dear companion that drives 335 00:31:49,760 --> 00:31:50,840 him back into battle. 336 00:31:52,180 --> 00:31:57,320 That was the real example of true love. 337 00:32:02,280 --> 00:32:08,420 for the samurai, and very much like we might think in the case of the ancient 338 00:32:08,420 --> 00:32:14,040 Greeks, certainly it was not an equal relationship in the sense that very 339 00:32:14,040 --> 00:32:16,880 often it was between an older man and a younger man. 340 00:32:20,140 --> 00:32:27,060 The older man would instruct the younger man in not only sexual matters, but also 341 00:32:27,060 --> 00:32:28,580 in the responsibilities of samurai. 342 00:32:32,080 --> 00:32:33,440 What is it about the penis? 343 00:32:36,340 --> 00:32:39,700 Even the Greeks had a demigod named Priapus. 344 00:32:40,620 --> 00:32:43,060 Billy McCoy was a boy who could play you bet. 345 00:32:44,680 --> 00:32:47,180 Oh, how they played when he played on his old cornet. 346 00:32:48,840 --> 00:32:51,980 He's got a smile and a cute little style that's all his own. 347 00:32:52,220 --> 00:32:56,260 He'd mute his old cornet and then he'd make it moan. 348 00:32:56,960 --> 00:32:59,080 Do what I do, what I do, what I do. 349 00:33:00,750 --> 00:33:07,330 Codpiece comes from the Middle English cod or scrotum and is described 350 00:33:07,330 --> 00:33:13,250 as a pocket or a flap that is worn over the male genitals as both protection 351 00:33:13,250 --> 00:33:15,830 and modesty. 352 00:33:17,310 --> 00:33:21,950 And it's still worn today in performance costume and in the leather subculture. 353 00:33:26,050 --> 00:33:30,810 And it was taken to its extreme by soldiers. 354 00:33:32,130 --> 00:33:36,910 It became larger and larger and more and more outrageous. 355 00:33:41,210 --> 00:33:46,170 Dressing like a peacock doesn't always signal your sexual desires. 356 00:33:47,180 --> 00:33:52,720 In most societies, for the longest time, how you played your gender role was more 357 00:33:52,720 --> 00:33:55,660 determinative. Hiding was an option. 358 00:33:56,120 --> 00:34:00,480 But effeminate men and masculine women found that harder to do. 359 00:34:01,080 --> 00:34:06,720 And so new roles were created, especially in indigenous cultures, which 360 00:34:06,720 --> 00:34:11,840 offered some safety. I do think that there was a significant number of Native 361 00:34:11,840 --> 00:34:14,820 American cultures, pre-Columbian times. 362 00:34:15,550 --> 00:34:21,310 in North and South America that did exemplify the expression of same-sex 363 00:34:21,310 --> 00:34:24,650 desires, which today we would refer to as two-spirit. 364 00:34:28,370 --> 00:34:33,290 For example, with the Mojave Indians, which is one of the most important well 365 00:34:33,290 --> 00:34:34,330 -documented cases. 366 00:34:35,630 --> 00:34:40,530 A singing circle is prepared involving the whole community. 367 00:34:41,230 --> 00:34:43,050 Everyone gathers around. 368 00:34:43,600 --> 00:34:46,260 and begins to sing the ritual songs. 369 00:34:46,719 --> 00:34:53,580 And the boy, if he is destined to follow the two-spirit road, starts to dance 370 00:34:53,580 --> 00:34:55,620 in the fashion of a woman. 371 00:34:55,920 --> 00:35:00,360 The boy is then declared to be a two-spirit person. 372 00:35:05,920 --> 00:35:10,800 They were not considered outcasts by any means, and which were generally... 373 00:35:11,210 --> 00:35:15,550 accepted into the cultural pattern of their tribal group 374 00:35:15,550 --> 00:35:22,530 the hijra culture is one of the oldest ethnic 375 00:35:22,530 --> 00:35:29,270 groups of the transgenders in the world it's more of a 376 00:35:29,270 --> 00:35:33,590 culture and way of living and it is known to be the third gender they had a 377 00:35:33,590 --> 00:35:38,450 position in the society and and they were trusted they were and they were the 378 00:35:38,450 --> 00:35:41,450 loyal they were the keeper of the herons. 379 00:35:43,990 --> 00:35:50,110 It's not only about having sex, but it's the culture, it's the community, 380 00:35:50,430 --> 00:35:54,670 it's what a one human feels from his own soul. 381 00:35:58,070 --> 00:36:02,230 There was this figure of the mannish woman, women who lived their lives 382 00:36:02,230 --> 00:36:06,230 passing as men. There was a kind of a fascination with them because they were 383 00:36:06,230 --> 00:36:08,850 kind of adventurers in some sort. 384 00:36:12,200 --> 00:36:17,080 To have the freedom of movement, to roam the world, practice medicine, fight in a 385 00:36:17,080 --> 00:36:20,620 revolution, the only way you could do it was as a maid. 386 00:36:21,200 --> 00:36:24,580 So in the case of Miranda Stewart, she becomes Dr. 387 00:36:24,780 --> 00:36:25,780 James Berry. 388 00:36:26,380 --> 00:36:32,000 She's traveling around the empire, has her eye on the ladies, and is getting 389 00:36:32,000 --> 00:36:33,580 involved in brawls over this. 390 00:36:46,700 --> 00:36:53,340 And then you, of course, have Catalina de Arauza, the Basque nun who ran away 391 00:36:53,340 --> 00:36:54,340 from the combat. 392 00:36:54,920 --> 00:37:01,540 Catalina goes into male dress, goes to South America, becomes a muleteer, 393 00:37:01,580 --> 00:37:06,760 a soldier, a soldier of fortune, really, taking female lovers. 394 00:37:07,020 --> 00:37:08,520 She was a real firebrand. 395 00:37:09,060 --> 00:37:12,260 And at one point she was sentenced to death and they were going to execute 396 00:37:12,260 --> 00:37:15,700 her. And then she goes, but I am a virgin. 397 00:37:16,200 --> 00:37:17,200 And a nun. 398 00:37:17,280 --> 00:37:19,180 And she got away with it. 399 00:37:19,400 --> 00:37:23,240 And so the Pope gives her permission to wear male dress. 400 00:37:23,760 --> 00:37:26,100 And so she becomes somewhat of a phenomenon. 401 00:37:37,320 --> 00:37:41,860 So much of our history seems to spotlight the lives and actions of kings 402 00:37:41,860 --> 00:37:42,860 and queens. 403 00:37:49,100 --> 00:37:53,480 However, many of these stories are being reinterpreted by gay historians. 404 00:37:56,820 --> 00:38:01,760 Without the heterosexual mantle, it was always presumed to be present. 405 00:38:02,100 --> 00:38:03,320 I think that's great. 406 00:38:06,340 --> 00:38:10,040 These are stories I missed hearing about in my history class. 407 00:38:17,960 --> 00:38:20,540 Aujourd'hui, nous allons parler d'amour. 408 00:38:21,000 --> 00:38:23,920 Of king, queen and prince. 409 00:38:26,600 --> 00:38:29,620 A long time ago there lived a king. 410 00:38:29,820 --> 00:38:34,240 The king of Egypt, Sennousret I, who really liked kisses. 411 00:38:36,240 --> 00:38:42,160 He particularly liked making kisses to the god Ptah, patron of 412 00:38:42,160 --> 00:38:43,800 construction and carpenters. 413 00:38:49,000 --> 00:38:55,420 Kingston Walter I, from around 1900 BC, is shown embracing the god Par. 414 00:38:56,180 --> 00:38:58,640 The king is kissing the god. 415 00:38:59,120 --> 00:39:04,180 All of us, it's easy to read a sort of erotic aspect into these scenes. 416 00:39:05,580 --> 00:39:09,280 But I think all it is is a celebration of male intimacy. 417 00:39:09,900 --> 00:39:11,220 Ah, a queen. 418 00:39:12,080 --> 00:39:13,420 Christina from Sweden. 419 00:39:13,980 --> 00:39:16,320 Elle adorerait s'habiller. 420 00:39:28,870 --> 00:39:32,730 With women, occasionally you'll get a Christina of Sweden. 421 00:39:33,390 --> 00:39:35,190 She was cross-dressing. 422 00:39:35,790 --> 00:39:41,970 There's reference to her wallowing in bed with other women. You know, very 423 00:39:41,970 --> 00:39:44,390 disapproving records from male observers. 424 00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:46,920 about her sexual life. 425 00:39:47,320 --> 00:39:53,380 And so, you know, she was a real case of a recorded historical lesbian. 426 00:39:53,700 --> 00:39:59,140 My theory is that she had fallen in love with various women and 427 00:39:59,140 --> 00:40:03,720 simply wanted to escape the spotlight, so to speak. 428 00:40:04,820 --> 00:40:08,900 And outside of Sweden, she could live, actually, life. 429 00:40:25,750 --> 00:40:32,490 The two of them decided to try to escape the country when his 430 00:40:32,490 --> 00:40:35,170 father's treatment became too brutal. 431 00:40:43,390 --> 00:40:47,770 Frederick's father wanted them tried and executed. 432 00:40:49,390 --> 00:40:55,910 But there was so much outrage in Europe that he did 433 00:40:55,910 --> 00:40:58,330 not execute his son. 434 00:41:13,770 --> 00:41:16,530 La mort est douce pour un prince si aimable. 435 00:41:22,050 --> 00:41:28,190 Frederick looked out the window and witnessed the execution of his lover. 436 00:41:44,650 --> 00:41:48,410 The idea of gay marriage is not a 21st century concept. 437 00:41:49,350 --> 00:41:52,750 History is full of extraordinary marriages before Thelma. 438 00:41:59,810 --> 00:42:04,270 Nero is said in the sources to have been married to one of his slaves, 439 00:42:05,090 --> 00:42:10,050 a chap called Dory Forrest, and Nero in that ceremony is said took the role of 440 00:42:10,050 --> 00:42:11,050 the bride. 441 00:42:11,760 --> 00:42:16,740 According to the Jewish Bible, the book of Leviticus, sexual relations between 442 00:42:16,740 --> 00:42:18,220 females are not prohibited. 443 00:42:18,640 --> 00:42:21,100 Well, this was somewhat disturbing to the rabbis. 444 00:42:21,600 --> 00:42:27,960 And they found a prohibition for women marrying other women in the 445 00:42:27,960 --> 00:42:32,920 biblical verse, you shall not do as they do in the land of Canaan, you shall not 446 00:42:32,920 --> 00:42:34,460 do as they do in the land of Egypt. 447 00:42:34,780 --> 00:42:38,840 That may seem a little far-fetched. And so the rabbis said, and what did they 448 00:42:38,840 --> 00:42:39,840 do? 449 00:42:40,330 --> 00:42:43,410 The men married other men, and the women married other women. That's what they 450 00:42:43,410 --> 00:42:44,410 did. 451 00:42:44,470 --> 00:42:48,030 What's interesting is that now we understand that they were also sirees, 452 00:42:48,090 --> 00:42:49,090 same-sex sirees. 453 00:42:49,410 --> 00:42:52,950 These were called brotherhood sirees and sisterhood sirees. 454 00:42:53,270 --> 00:42:59,330 The woman who was interested would send a tray with the broker, with sweets to 455 00:42:59,330 --> 00:43:00,350 the beloved, I guess. 456 00:43:00,630 --> 00:43:05,590 Usually there was a dildo in the middle. And the other woman would, if she 457 00:43:05,590 --> 00:43:10,200 accepted the offer, She would take the sweets and then she would throw a white 458 00:43:10,200 --> 00:43:14,860 scarf, the sign of marriage, on the tray and returned it back. 459 00:43:17,660 --> 00:43:21,720 There was an institution in China of female marriage resistors. 460 00:43:22,360 --> 00:43:26,500 And the marriage resistors, some of them actually became deified. 461 00:43:29,610 --> 00:43:35,990 A Chinese sociologist, Pan Guangben, he speculated that the reason for these 462 00:43:35,990 --> 00:43:37,950 marriage customs is same-sex attraction. 463 00:43:38,490 --> 00:43:41,510 They vowed never to marry, to live and die together. 464 00:43:43,090 --> 00:43:48,930 They would go through this ritual of putting up their hair in a bun, okay, 465 00:43:49,030 --> 00:43:51,950 and this ritual was called zi shu, self-calming. 466 00:43:54,210 --> 00:43:58,670 Ironically, monasteries and nunneries seem to be the place. 467 00:43:59,130 --> 00:44:01,110 for sanctuary, and more. 468 00:44:02,210 --> 00:44:05,610 There were groups of lay sisterhoods called the Bagines. 469 00:44:05,950 --> 00:44:11,010 These women freely acknowledged to the inquisitors that they did not regard any 470 00:44:11,010 --> 00:44:14,790 kind of sexual relationships as sinful, including women with women. 471 00:44:15,510 --> 00:44:19,530 Well, they burned 50 of them at the stake, but here's the juicy part. 472 00:44:19,790 --> 00:44:24,110 Not infrequently, some of them prostrated themselves by the exit to the 473 00:44:24,110 --> 00:44:26,130 bathhouse. Naked, right? 474 00:44:27,310 --> 00:44:32,890 one falling over another, where they lay inflaming themselves until they were 475 00:44:32,890 --> 00:44:33,890 exhausted. 476 00:44:37,730 --> 00:44:42,810 And so within the monasteries, of course, it was acceptable to fall in 477 00:44:42,810 --> 00:44:43,810 love with a boy. 478 00:44:43,990 --> 00:44:45,590 This one is really interesting. 479 00:44:45,810 --> 00:44:47,610 This is about a brotherhood vow. 480 00:44:49,050 --> 00:44:54,750 And this caption says, now they perform brotherhood vows, better say they get 481 00:44:54,750 --> 00:44:55,750 married. 482 00:44:58,120 --> 00:44:59,980 It happens all the time in heaven. 483 00:45:01,260 --> 00:45:04,000 Someday it will begin to happen again on earth. 484 00:45:05,620 --> 00:45:11,840 The men and women who are married and the men and men who are lovers 485 00:45:11,840 --> 00:45:16,760 and the women and women who give each other light 486 00:45:16,760 --> 00:45:23,460 often will get down on their knees and while so tenderly holding their 487 00:45:23,460 --> 00:45:24,460 lover's hand 488 00:45:27,400 --> 00:45:33,780 tears in your eyes, listen to Julie speak, saying, my dear, how can I be 489 00:45:33,780 --> 00:45:34,780 more loving to you? 490 00:45:35,260 --> 00:45:36,800 How can I be more kind? 491 00:45:50,960 --> 00:45:54,680 How did the world end up going from a pagan... 492 00:45:55,470 --> 00:46:02,290 sexually fluid one, to Leviticus's, let's put them to death by 493 00:46:02,290 --> 00:46:08,050 torture, beheading, burning up a stake, and hanging. 494 00:46:11,350 --> 00:46:17,950 James Pratt and John Smith were tried and convicted and sentenced to be hanged 495 00:46:17,950 --> 00:46:19,070 here at Old Bailey. 496 00:46:21,010 --> 00:46:24,410 Newgate, November 25th. 497 00:46:24,730 --> 00:46:25,730 1835. 498 00:46:26,670 --> 00:46:33,510 Dear William, the awful period is nearly arrived when the offended laws of 499 00:46:33,510 --> 00:46:39,070 my country demand the forfeit of my life for the crime I have committed. 500 00:46:39,670 --> 00:46:45,050 The grave will soon close over me and my name entirely forgotten. 501 00:46:45,950 --> 00:46:49,890 Your lost friend, John Smith. 502 00:46:52,360 --> 00:46:58,200 A very long time ago, a small sect of Semites formulated what would become the 503 00:46:58,200 --> 00:47:04,380 Old Testament, on which so many religions would justify their horrible 504 00:47:04,380 --> 00:47:06,940 acts toward so-called sodomites. 505 00:47:11,680 --> 00:47:17,080 Thou shalt not lay with mankind as with womankind. It is abomination. 506 00:47:17,600 --> 00:47:21,140 Book of Leviticus, chapter 18, verse 22. 507 00:47:21,880 --> 00:47:26,980 Unfortunately, the Leviticus statute is a simple line. 508 00:47:27,260 --> 00:47:33,940 There's no rationale, no preamble. It stands by itself. In big biblical 509 00:47:33,940 --> 00:47:40,020 times, when the Jews talked about somebody being in the manner of Sodom, 510 00:47:40,020 --> 00:47:45,300 meant what we would call somebody who was unwilling to share, you know, 511 00:47:45,380 --> 00:47:47,140 nothing to do with sexuality. 512 00:47:49,480 --> 00:47:55,020 We do not get a real sense of homosexuality until 513 00:47:55,020 --> 00:47:58,880 about the time of Jesus and St. Paul. 514 00:48:03,760 --> 00:48:09,180 So the Apostle Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, to the Christian 515 00:48:09,180 --> 00:48:10,340 community in Rome. 516 00:48:10,910 --> 00:48:15,710 Therefore God gave them up in the lust of their hearts to impurity, to the 517 00:48:15,710 --> 00:48:17,570 degrading of their bodies among themselves. 518 00:48:17,810 --> 00:48:22,230 Their women exchanged natural intercourse for unnatural, and in the 519 00:48:22,230 --> 00:48:27,230 same way also the men, giving up natural intercourse with women, were consumed 520 00:48:27,230 --> 00:48:28,730 with passion for one another. 521 00:48:29,250 --> 00:48:33,330 Book of Romans, chapter 1, verses 24 through 26. 522 00:48:33,630 --> 00:48:38,590 Well, that passage in Paul was a test of lesbianism. 523 00:48:39,260 --> 00:48:44,040 First mention of this and male homosexuality is unnatural. 524 00:48:47,300 --> 00:48:49,940 It is a whole new train of thought. 525 00:48:53,740 --> 00:48:59,920 Because the idea of unnatural does not appear in the Old Testament. 526 00:49:05,840 --> 00:49:11,720 So that was really, unfortunately, a disaster for men and women who loved 527 00:49:11,720 --> 00:49:12,720 their own. 528 00:49:18,220 --> 00:49:22,320 And those Christian missionaries, they took their show on the road. 529 00:49:40,100 --> 00:49:45,760 In ancient Hawaii and many other places, the missionaries were particularly 530 00:49:45,760 --> 00:49:49,680 outraged by the same-sex practices. 531 00:49:51,100 --> 00:49:56,780 Colonial authorities and missionaries in particular began to try to stamp out 532 00:49:56,780 --> 00:50:00,180 these ritual practices. They regarded them as heathen. 533 00:50:00,670 --> 00:50:05,310 as pagan as anti-christian and even abhorrently as monsters 534 00:50:05,310 --> 00:50:11,430 before the coming of the british 535 00:50:11,430 --> 00:50:13,210 in in africa 536 00:50:38,630 --> 00:50:45,210 And so they made the people feel that there is something wrong. 537 00:50:46,550 --> 00:50:50,270 And when they left, they forgot to erase that. 538 00:51:17,360 --> 00:51:23,180 The Jesuits come to Japan and they are shocked, simply shocked. 539 00:51:25,770 --> 00:51:32,010 They would be preaching to the daimyo, to the feudal lords of Kyushu, and 540 00:51:32,010 --> 00:51:35,850 saying that sodomy is an abomination, it's a terrible sin. 541 00:51:36,070 --> 00:51:42,290 And they didn't realize that the very men that they were preaching to 542 00:51:42,290 --> 00:51:46,710 were great practitioners of male-male love. 543 00:51:52,780 --> 00:51:56,820 With the spread of Catholicism throughout Europe, the church became 544 00:51:56,820 --> 00:52:02,260 preoccupied with stamping out all heretics. In the 13th century, the Pope 545 00:52:02,260 --> 00:52:03,640 declared a crusade. 546 00:52:08,500 --> 00:52:14,860 There were bodies organized by kinds of fraternities who 547 00:52:14,860 --> 00:52:19,800 devoted themselves to this cause of... 548 00:52:26,980 --> 00:52:33,600 Around this period, sodomites became a favorite scapegoat among many 549 00:52:33,600 --> 00:52:35,140 religious fundamentalists. 550 00:52:36,860 --> 00:52:43,720 Bernardino Siena was a very popular and charismatic Franciscan 551 00:52:43,720 --> 00:52:47,560 preacher. It started with the great plague, the Black Death. 552 00:52:47,960 --> 00:52:54,500 Bernardino certainly blamed the population decline of Florence and 553 00:52:54,500 --> 00:52:57,120 Tuscany and all of Italy on sodomy. 554 00:52:57,580 --> 00:53:00,520 And it was a kind of easy scapegoat. 555 00:53:00,800 --> 00:53:07,560 This blaming the gays for everything bad that happens seems to be a strategy no 556 00:53:07,560 --> 00:53:09,500 matter what century you are in. 557 00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:19,200 Yes, absolutely. 558 00:53:19,400 --> 00:53:22,400 They're saying exactly the same kinds of things that you heard in the Middle 559 00:53:22,400 --> 00:53:23,400 Ages. 560 00:54:06,059 --> 00:54:12,340 The 1730 trial started with custodian of the tower of the cathedral of Jutberg. 561 00:54:13,000 --> 00:54:18,520 He started to tell indeed about all the sodomites actually that came into the 562 00:54:18,520 --> 00:54:20,080 tower and in the area. 563 00:54:20,700 --> 00:54:26,300 Just from his confessions alone, I think they got more than 100 names. All the 564 00:54:26,300 --> 00:54:30,020 other people, when they were found guilty of actual autonomy, actually 565 00:54:30,020 --> 00:54:34,060 found guilty of anal intercourse, they would be executed. 566 00:54:34,600 --> 00:54:37,500 That was the highest number of deaths. 567 00:54:38,250 --> 00:54:41,490 at one time that I'm aware of before his life. 568 00:54:41,690 --> 00:54:46,070 There's all kinds of wood blocks that were being reproduced and reproduced of 569 00:54:46,070 --> 00:54:50,190 the executions of the men, and they had songs that were also printed with the 570 00:54:50,190 --> 00:54:56,250 imagery. And one show had a series of six little paintings that go from had 571 00:54:56,250 --> 00:55:01,150 the gay men meeting, had the gay men leaving their women, being arrested by 572 00:55:01,150 --> 00:55:03,850 the police, put in prison, and then being executed. 573 00:55:05,420 --> 00:55:08,660 So it's a very nice picture of why sodomites should be murdered. 574 00:55:13,400 --> 00:55:19,580 The executions generally in Holland for sodomites were 575 00:55:19,580 --> 00:55:26,560 strangling at a stake, which was typically the kind of death penalty 576 00:55:26,560 --> 00:55:27,560 for women. 577 00:55:28,680 --> 00:55:30,240 It was a pole. 578 00:55:31,660 --> 00:55:37,820 And they put you against the pole and then from behind they strangled you with 579 00:55:37,820 --> 00:55:38,820 a cord. 580 00:55:40,520 --> 00:55:44,120 The authorities gave a message to the public. 581 00:55:45,440 --> 00:55:49,440 You know, these sodomites are like women. We kill them like women. 582 00:55:50,380 --> 00:55:56,760 Near the end of the 16th century, there were more sodomites burned than 583 00:55:56,760 --> 00:55:57,760 heretics. 584 00:55:58,400 --> 00:56:01,040 The reason being, they were running out of heretics. 585 00:56:01,580 --> 00:56:07,020 But there would always be a supply of men who were involved with other men. 586 00:56:11,520 --> 00:56:14,180 Obviously, same-sex didn't end with a garage. 587 00:56:14,640 --> 00:56:19,080 We practitioners of same-sex had to adapt, had to be more creative. 588 00:56:19,360 --> 00:56:25,360 In the Renaissance, ancient Greek myths became a way to portray same-sex 589 00:56:25,360 --> 00:56:26,360 sensibilities. 590 00:56:31,180 --> 00:56:35,300 In the Renaissance, there was a great rediscovery of Greek antiquity, the art, 591 00:56:35,400 --> 00:56:39,080 the literature, the poetry, and a tremendous enthusiasm for everything 592 00:56:39,080 --> 00:56:45,580 Greek. But I think for a lot of people who were homosexual or bisexual in the 593 00:56:45,580 --> 00:56:49,640 Renaissance, they wanted to make images of this. 594 00:56:50,190 --> 00:56:52,450 world from ancient times. 595 00:56:52,690 --> 00:56:55,590 And that included the myths about same-sex love. 596 00:56:55,810 --> 00:57:01,030 So, for instance, we have the story of Zeus, who fell in love with a young man 597 00:57:01,030 --> 00:57:07,910 called Ganymede, or Apollo and the boy Hyacinth, or indeed Alexander 598 00:57:07,910 --> 00:57:12,870 and his companion Hephaestion, which is not mythology, but more like history. 599 00:57:13,650 --> 00:57:18,410 A good example would be the artist Sodoma. 600 00:57:19,440 --> 00:57:26,000 He did a series of frescoes in a villa in Rome for the Pope's banker, a very 601 00:57:26,000 --> 00:57:32,200 high-level member of society. And in the bedroom, there is a fresco of the 602 00:57:32,200 --> 00:57:36,800 marriage of Alexander the Great. And there he is handing over the marriage 603 00:57:36,800 --> 00:57:41,400 crown to this princess. But right next to him on the other side is his male 604 00:57:41,400 --> 00:57:48,140 lover, Hephaestion, who is shown very handsome and idealized like a Greek god. 605 00:57:49,150 --> 00:57:53,390 The 15th century Tuscan poet Poliziano wrote a poem, for instance, enjoining 606 00:57:53,390 --> 00:57:57,070 men to leave their wives and find happiness with young men as the Greeks 607 00:57:57,070 --> 00:57:58,070 did. 608 00:58:00,810 --> 00:58:07,030 Hi, Jove, confirms the truth of what I said, who caught and bound in love's 609 00:58:07,030 --> 00:58:11,970 delightful snare, enjoys in heaven his own bright Ganymede. 610 00:58:12,770 --> 00:58:16,450 Phoebus on earth had Hyacinth the fair. 611 00:58:17,470 --> 00:58:24,120 Hercules! conqueror of the world, was led captive to Hylus by this love so 612 00:58:24,120 --> 00:58:25,120 rare. 613 00:58:25,820 --> 00:58:26,920 Advice for husbands. 614 00:58:27,540 --> 00:58:31,900 Seek divorce and fly far, far away from female company. 615 00:58:32,780 --> 00:58:35,120 Maria, tell me about Ganymede. 616 00:58:36,600 --> 00:58:41,460 Zeus, the king of the Greek Olympian gods, was very prone to falling in love, 617 00:58:41,480 --> 00:58:44,660 which drove his wife here crazy, but he usually fell in love with... 618 00:58:45,000 --> 00:58:48,820 nymphs and mortal maidens. And there's one story we have where Zeus turns 619 00:58:48,820 --> 00:58:53,980 himself into an animal for a boy. And that boy was Ganymede. And he was the 620 00:58:53,980 --> 00:58:55,560 most beautiful boy of his generation. 621 00:58:57,020 --> 00:59:01,900 So Zeus turned himself into a huge golden eagle and came down and swept 622 00:59:01,900 --> 00:59:06,020 Ganymede up in his claws and carried him up to Mount Olympus and made him his 623 00:59:06,020 --> 00:59:08,400 personal cupbearer to pour his wine for him. 624 00:59:08,640 --> 00:59:12,140 It's very clear that that kind of intimacy is also 625 00:59:13,120 --> 00:59:19,160 erotic and that this is a bedfellow and a playmate as well as a servant. 626 00:59:29,700 --> 00:59:35,180 A number of the Isaacs themselves were undoubtedly homosexual. 627 00:59:41,100 --> 00:59:46,380 I wrote, you know, about Michelangelo and the discovery of the letters of 628 00:59:46,380 --> 00:59:51,320 Michelangelo, that they had been deliberately changed from the male 629 00:59:51,320 --> 00:59:52,680 pronoun to the female pronoun. 630 00:59:52,960 --> 00:59:58,760 So the nephew thought he was doing his uncle a favor by rewriting some of these 631 00:59:58,760 --> 01:00:04,100 poems to make them heterosexual, and that was the only form in which the 632 01:00:04,100 --> 01:00:09,120 poems were known for the next 240 years. 633 01:00:15,980 --> 01:00:21,360 And most of what we read in the 15th, 16th, 17th century is men like 634 01:00:21,360 --> 01:00:25,540 Michelangelo, for example, who was in his 50s when he met Tommaso de 635 01:00:25,540 --> 01:00:27,780 Cavalieri, who was in his 20s. 636 01:00:28,300 --> 01:00:33,160 It's no wonder that Michelangelo made a drawing of Ganymede to give to Cavalieri 637 01:00:33,160 --> 01:00:38,280 because it fit their circumstances. The older, mature, established figure 638 01:00:38,280 --> 01:00:43,640 passionately embracing the younger, beautiful figure. 639 01:00:46,370 --> 01:00:52,950 Michelangelo's poetry is the earliest surviving significant group of poems 640 01:00:52,950 --> 01:00:57,550 that are written by one man to other men in the West. 641 01:00:59,130 --> 01:01:03,590 229, new numbering, and it's to Victoria Colonna. 642 01:01:04,470 --> 01:01:06,530 Here's Michelangelo's handwriting. 643 01:01:07,170 --> 01:01:11,730 This is one of my favorite poems by Michelangelo because it's one of the 644 01:01:11,730 --> 01:01:14,250 ones written to Tommaso de Caligari. 645 01:01:14,670 --> 01:01:19,250 He wanted to write a sonnet to his beloved Tommaso Cavalieri. 646 01:01:19,490 --> 01:01:26,070 Where Michelangelo really lets out in the least guarded 647 01:01:26,070 --> 01:01:31,190 way. So this is the poem that you've been obsessed with for so long. 648 01:01:31,590 --> 01:01:35,670 Here's Michelangelo. The kind of fantasies that he's having and the 649 01:01:35,670 --> 01:01:39,570 desires that he has toward Cavalieri. 650 01:01:43,930 --> 01:01:46,210 You can't be there. 651 01:01:46,630 --> 01:01:50,770 So if in the eyes you see one's heart. 652 01:01:51,790 --> 01:01:52,910 Again, the eyes. 653 01:01:53,130 --> 01:01:54,130 The eyes. 654 01:01:57,930 --> 01:02:03,770 If the heart can be seen in the face through the eyes, I have no other more 655 01:02:03,770 --> 01:02:05,770 apparent sign of my flame. 656 01:02:08,590 --> 01:02:13,170 So let these be enough, my dear Lord, to petition for your mercy. 657 01:02:15,030 --> 01:02:19,530 Perhaps your spirit, which sees with greater credence than I dare to believe 658 01:02:19,530 --> 01:02:24,110 the virtuous fire that burns me, will be quick to pity me. 659 01:02:25,210 --> 01:02:30,990 Oh, happy that day when this be sure to happen, so that I might have my sweet 660 01:02:30,990 --> 01:02:36,270 and longed-for Lord in my unworthy yet ready arms forever. 661 01:02:43,370 --> 01:02:48,870 the Greek loophole propagated same-sex sensibilities well into the 20th 662 01:02:48,870 --> 01:02:49,870 century. 663 01:02:51,710 --> 01:02:57,590 With photographers like Van Gluden and Puchow, who in Italy produced thousands 664 01:02:57,590 --> 01:02:59,190 of classical photographs. 665 01:02:59,750 --> 01:03:05,910 The Battle of the Greeks even went to the U.S. Post Office when in the 1950s 666 01:03:05,910 --> 01:03:11,750 it lifted its ban on Bob Meiser's photographs, calling them art. 667 01:03:24,240 --> 01:03:28,860 So there was a lot more knowledge about sodomy. The Florentines just chattered 668 01:03:28,860 --> 01:03:32,600 constantly about sodomy, and this is one of the reasons why they had such a bad 669 01:03:32,600 --> 01:03:37,400 reputation. And it was so prevalent that the Germans invented a verb for 670 01:03:37,400 --> 01:03:41,900 committing homosexuality, which was Florenze, to Florence. 671 01:03:42,800 --> 01:03:43,360 In 672 01:03:43,360 --> 01:03:50,260 Renaissance 673 01:03:50,260 --> 01:03:52,600 Florence, you might have found me here. 674 01:03:53,200 --> 01:03:55,600 under the statue of Donatello St. 675 01:03:55,800 --> 01:03:56,800 George. 676 01:03:57,140 --> 01:04:00,320 It was a notorious sodomite pickup spot. 677 01:04:00,560 --> 01:04:03,340 In fact, that's what they called us back then, sodomites. 678 01:04:03,820 --> 01:04:07,280 And they even wrote poetry about this little place. 679 01:04:10,160 --> 01:04:16,700 So he says, essentially, in this wonderful Italian, 680 01:04:16,980 --> 01:04:21,660 that this boy he knows, which is the statue, will never change. 681 01:04:22,350 --> 01:04:26,630 He will never change his clothes. He'll never change his face. He'll never grow 682 01:04:26,630 --> 01:04:31,770 a beard. And nothing will ever change. In fact, as we see, he's the same as he 683 01:04:31,770 --> 01:04:33,190 was 500 years ago. 684 01:04:36,130 --> 01:04:41,710 And down the street, they kept record of all the sodomites they arrested here in 685 01:04:41,710 --> 01:04:43,510 Florence, thousands of them. 686 01:04:44,090 --> 01:04:47,710 Court records are a good way to reconstruct same-sex history. 687 01:04:49,030 --> 01:04:54,470 One talent for me was just... To sift through all of these thousands of pages 688 01:04:54,470 --> 01:05:01,010 of documents, no one could have dreamed that there were so many people 689 01:05:01,010 --> 01:05:02,670 prosecuted for sodomy. 690 01:05:03,070 --> 01:05:09,430 Something like 17,000 men and boys appeared in the court records 691 01:05:09,430 --> 01:05:11,590 over those 70 years. 692 01:05:12,390 --> 01:05:17,470 There was an immense amount of sexual activity that these records were 693 01:05:17,470 --> 01:05:18,470 documenting. 694 01:05:21,610 --> 01:05:27,850 Among the names appeared Leonardo and also 695 01:05:27,850 --> 01:05:29,050 Botticelli. 696 01:05:30,350 --> 01:05:32,970 Cellini is an interesting case. 697 01:05:33,810 --> 01:05:37,430 He was arrested and placed under house arrest. 698 01:05:40,330 --> 01:05:46,490 So, Bazzi is known as Il Sodoma and at one point he entered a horse race 699 01:05:46,490 --> 01:05:48,670 and he won. 700 01:05:50,910 --> 01:05:54,470 Heralds come over and they say, well, you know, congratulations, Mr. Bazzi, 701 01:05:54,530 --> 01:05:57,510 you won the race. How do you want us to call out your name? 702 01:05:57,770 --> 01:05:59,930 And he says, oh, just say Sodoma. 703 01:06:00,750 --> 01:06:04,850 So the heralds start going to the street saying, this is the horse of the 704 01:06:04,850 --> 01:06:06,330 Sodomite who won the race. 705 01:06:08,990 --> 01:06:13,930 As everyone knows what the Ponte Vecchio is, I believe there were around 50. 706 01:06:14,750 --> 01:06:18,930 different individuals who were working on the bridge and were implicated in 707 01:06:18,930 --> 01:06:23,210 sodomy. There are only a couple of dozen shops there, so they all must have known 708 01:06:23,210 --> 01:06:28,870 who was being arrested, who had recently paid their fine, who was going out with 709 01:06:28,870 --> 01:06:32,750 whom. There was a lot of talk and knowledge. 710 01:06:33,130 --> 01:06:37,790 The core of homosexual networks, and you could call it an embryonic community, 711 01:06:38,230 --> 01:06:39,230 was there. 712 01:06:43,210 --> 01:06:49,850 You could see networks of same-sex people, mainly men, meeting, conversing, 713 01:06:49,970 --> 01:06:53,790 picking each other up, having sex. 714 01:06:54,170 --> 01:07:01,110 And that urban culture of people with sexual minority tastes, shall we 715 01:07:01,110 --> 01:07:02,430 say, kept growing. 716 01:07:03,290 --> 01:07:08,590 Male homosexuality was carved into the fabric of London. 717 01:07:08,870 --> 01:07:11,150 It was on the pavement, it was in the brickwork. 718 01:07:13,130 --> 01:07:17,010 In the 18th century, there was a phenomenon known as the mollyhouses, 719 01:07:17,150 --> 01:07:19,750 which were sort of gay bars. 720 01:07:20,210 --> 01:07:26,450 And we do have historical records of 30 mollyhouses in a relatively short space 721 01:07:26,450 --> 01:07:31,950 of time, where men who wanted to have sex with other men would congregate, and 722 01:07:31,950 --> 01:07:37,870 they'd have rituals, they'd talk in the female dialect, which was a kind of 723 01:07:37,870 --> 01:07:39,870 camp. Polari language. 724 01:07:40,310 --> 01:07:41,470 They'd call each other she. 725 01:07:41,670 --> 01:07:45,910 They'd have names like Black Eyed Susan or Betsy. 726 01:07:46,150 --> 01:07:52,910 You find homosexuality in parks, in public laboratories, in men's clubs, 727 01:07:53,210 --> 01:07:56,770 in the theatre, on the street. 728 01:07:58,990 --> 01:08:01,410 Homosexuality was everywhere in London. 729 01:08:01,670 --> 01:08:06,470 So often we're accustomed to thinking that the history of homosexuality is the 730 01:08:06,470 --> 01:08:07,470 history of... 731 01:08:07,550 --> 01:08:10,650 men hiding in corners and feeling guilty. 732 01:08:11,130 --> 01:08:16,510 And yet these men in early 18th century London were having as much fun amongst 733 01:08:16,510 --> 01:08:20,729 themselves as any drunkard in a female of the prostitution. 734 01:08:21,010 --> 01:08:24,590 But coming out would prove to be much more difficult. 735 01:08:24,890 --> 01:08:31,029 In our film After Stonewall, Reverend Troy Perry actually called coming out 736 01:08:31,029 --> 01:08:36,450 the most important action that gays and lesbians had done in the 20th century. 737 01:08:36,800 --> 01:08:40,420 That revolutionary act for me is the most important thing. 738 01:08:40,680 --> 01:08:45,620 But that revolutionary act actually began in the 19th century. 739 01:08:52,660 --> 01:08:59,279 August 29th, 1867, a very important date here in Munich 740 01:08:59,279 --> 01:09:00,740 at the Odeon Plot. 741 01:09:02,019 --> 01:09:06,620 Before an audience of fellow German jurists, Karl Heinrich Ulrichs made 742 01:09:06,620 --> 01:09:11,620 history when he became the first person to publicly declare his homosexuality. 743 01:09:11,700 --> 01:09:15,779 For the first time in modern history, he came out as a homosexual. 744 01:09:17,220 --> 01:09:23,720 Until my dying day, I will look back with pride when on August 29, 1867, I 745 01:09:23,720 --> 01:09:28,180 found the courage to come face to face in battle with an age-old, wrathful 746 01:09:28,180 --> 01:09:29,180 Hydra. 747 01:09:30,200 --> 01:09:34,580 What gave me strength at the last moment finally to mount the speaker's box was 748 01:09:34,580 --> 01:09:37,720 the distant gaze of comrades of my nature fixed on me. 749 01:09:44,540 --> 01:09:48,060 Ulrichs would later flee in exile to Italy. 750 01:09:48,439 --> 01:09:55,400 In 2001, his grave was found in L'Aquila by gay Italian activists, who each 751 01:09:55,400 --> 01:09:57,140 year celebrate his birthday. 752 01:10:03,450 --> 01:10:09,210 Ulrichs was perhaps one of the most important homosexuals to be rediscovered 753 01:10:09,210 --> 01:10:12,230 by 20th century gay liberationists. 754 01:10:16,210 --> 01:10:22,670 Before his exile, Ulrichs was part of a group of intellectuals looking for new 755 01:10:22,670 --> 01:10:23,990 names to call herself. 756 01:10:25,330 --> 01:10:31,510 Ulrichs looked to Plato's Symposium to find a word for homosexuality. 757 01:10:31,920 --> 01:10:38,560 So he turned the Venus Urania into earning, and that was his word for gay 758 01:10:38,560 --> 01:10:44,060 people. And it was these things that Edward Carpenter and John Isington 759 01:10:44,060 --> 01:10:48,780 Simmons later picked up and disseminated into the English world. 760 01:10:49,180 --> 01:10:54,720 The first time the word homosexual was used was by Austrian novelist Karl Maria 761 01:10:54,720 --> 01:10:57,120 Bankert in 1867. 762 01:10:57,950 --> 01:11:02,330 So it's not surprising that it's in Europe, in Germany and in England in 763 01:11:02,330 --> 01:11:08,530 particular, that you first start having intellectuals like Ulrich or Edward 764 01:11:08,530 --> 01:11:14,910 Carpenter or Magnus Hirschfeld describing same-sex desire, describing a 765 01:11:14,910 --> 01:11:18,250 people, an intermediate type, for example, Carpenter used. 766 01:11:18,490 --> 01:11:24,230 Edward Carpenter was called the gay godfather of the British left and he was 767 01:11:24,230 --> 01:11:25,270 determined to talk. 768 01:11:25,710 --> 01:11:32,490 about homosexuality in the 1890s when it was extremely difficult to do so because 769 01:11:32,490 --> 01:11:33,890 it was illegal. 770 01:11:34,390 --> 01:11:41,350 And so Carpenter becomes a very well-known advocate for same-sex love. 771 01:11:41,630 --> 01:11:46,810 David Carpenter, who certainly as a pioneer socialist, as well as pioneer 772 01:11:46,810 --> 01:11:52,430 feminist and sexual liberationist, spent a large part of his life living with, 773 01:11:52,510 --> 01:11:55,830 working with... politicising working-class men. 774 01:11:56,290 --> 01:12:02,770 Dear Ted, I shall be glad to see thy dear face again, as I have such longings 775 01:12:02,770 --> 01:12:04,830 to kiss those sweet lips of thine. 776 01:12:05,490 --> 01:12:08,010 Fondest love from your dear boy. 777 01:12:08,530 --> 01:12:15,270 Carpenter met Meryl actually on a train coming from Sheffield to the 778 01:12:15,270 --> 01:12:16,590 little village of Totley. 779 01:12:17,890 --> 01:12:20,110 Their eyes met on the train. 780 01:12:20,640 --> 01:12:24,760 And from that time, 1891, they are seeing each other. 781 01:12:25,640 --> 01:12:30,140 New, proud, curved-lipped youth with brown, sensitive face. 782 01:12:30,980 --> 01:12:35,580 Why suddenly did you turn full upon me, those twin black eyes of yours, with 783 01:12:35,580 --> 01:12:37,460 gaze so absorbing, so intense? 784 01:12:38,280 --> 01:12:41,540 I, a strong man, trembled and was faint. 785 01:12:42,160 --> 01:12:44,580 I think that it was this. 786 01:12:44,970 --> 01:12:49,170 sensuous confidence that comes from the contact with Meryl that enabled 787 01:12:49,170 --> 01:12:55,750 Carpenter to really write about sexuality for the first time explicitly. 788 01:12:56,310 --> 01:13:01,410 The records of chivalric love, the feats of an abbot knight for the lady's sake, 789 01:13:01,610 --> 01:13:07,270 are easily paralleled, if not surpassed, by the stories of Greek comrades in 790 01:13:07,270 --> 01:13:08,270 arms. 791 01:13:10,370 --> 01:13:12,750 I falter. Lost! 792 01:13:13,640 --> 01:13:15,100 in the love trance. 793 01:13:15,760 --> 01:13:18,760 You know, what we have is this. 794 01:13:21,700 --> 01:13:27,060 Lesbians at this time also found historical roots in the classical world. 795 01:13:27,440 --> 01:13:33,420 Natalie Clifford Barney, an American expatriate, reinterpreted Sappho's words 796 01:13:33,420 --> 01:13:36,800 for plays performed at her salon in Paris. 797 01:13:57,230 --> 01:14:04,150 And in the late 19th century, with the invention of the photograph, hundreds of 798 01:14:04,150 --> 01:14:09,330 homoerotic and male-male pornographic pictures flooded the homosexual 799 01:14:09,330 --> 01:14:12,410 undergrounds of Paris, Berlin, London. 800 01:14:12,940 --> 01:14:13,940 and Italy. 801 01:14:16,140 --> 01:14:22,400 One of the important contributions of homosexual people themselves at the end 802 01:14:22,400 --> 01:14:26,840 of the 19th century was their contribution to the development of what 803 01:14:26,840 --> 01:14:30,180 we now call sexology, the science of sex. 804 01:14:30,540 --> 01:14:35,420 And what you see through this is gay people themselves entering into a 805 01:14:35,420 --> 01:14:37,600 dialogue with scientists. 806 01:14:39,920 --> 01:14:44,360 Scientific Humanitarian Committee, which is really the first gay rights 807 01:14:44,360 --> 01:14:46,260 organization as we would think of them. 808 01:14:49,280 --> 01:14:55,860 This liberating spirit set forth a wave from Germany to England and 809 01:14:55,860 --> 01:15:01,720 further across the Atlantic to... Here in the United States of America. 810 01:15:05,020 --> 01:15:06,020 America. 811 01:15:12,700 --> 01:15:18,920 Whitman burst out of the closet in 1855, and he just sucked in a lot of fresh 812 01:15:18,920 --> 01:15:19,920 air. 813 01:15:24,020 --> 01:15:30,400 Colonial with the earth, with freedom, law, and 814 01:15:30,400 --> 01:15:31,580 love. 815 01:15:32,320 --> 01:15:36,840 And then in the 1860 edition, in one of the Calamus poems, he says, Oh, 816 01:15:36,860 --> 01:15:42,280 adhesiveness, oh, pulse of my life. Well, adhesiveness was the word that 817 01:15:42,280 --> 01:15:48,360 phrenologists used for a strong affection between members of the same 818 01:15:48,360 --> 01:15:49,360 sex. 819 01:15:50,360 --> 01:15:51,360 Adhesiveness. 820 01:15:54,600 --> 01:16:00,620 I really look upon Leaves of Grass as the opening shot 821 01:16:02,000 --> 01:16:08,340 the call for gay liberation, freedom from homophobia, freedom to do as one 822 01:16:08,340 --> 01:16:13,160 wishes. This poem to me is one of my favorites because in a way it's a call 823 01:16:13,160 --> 01:16:14,039 to arms. 824 01:16:14,040 --> 01:16:19,880 One flitting glimpse caught through an interstice of a crowd of workmen and 825 01:16:19,880 --> 01:16:26,580 drivers in a bar room around the stove late of a winter night and I unremarked 826 01:16:26,580 --> 01:16:30,660 seated in a corner of a youth who loves me. 827 01:16:31,080 --> 01:16:36,480 and whom I love, silently approaching and seating himself near, that he may 828 01:16:36,480 --> 01:16:37,980 hold me by the hand. 829 01:16:39,080 --> 01:16:44,680 It's a gift. The sequence, in effect, is a gift to his gay comrades. 830 01:16:45,540 --> 01:16:52,080 We two boys together clinging, one the other never leaving, air breathing, 831 01:16:52,360 --> 01:16:58,620 water drinking, on the turf or the sea beach dancing, armed and fearless, 832 01:16:58,920 --> 01:17:02,280 eating, drinking, sleeping, loving. 833 01:17:03,560 --> 01:17:07,600 I love this poem, particularly that phrase, armed and fearless. 834 01:17:08,080 --> 01:17:12,680 It's very clear from the context of all the columnist poems that they have their 835 01:17:12,680 --> 01:17:13,900 arms around each other. 836 01:17:14,140 --> 01:17:19,960 So it's a great evocation of gay fraternity, homosexual fraternity. 837 01:17:22,240 --> 01:17:27,020 Whitman had this vision of the manly love, he uses those terms, the manly 838 01:17:27,020 --> 01:17:28,020 love of comrades. 839 01:17:30,250 --> 01:17:34,350 And that appealed to a lot of men who didn't see themselves in the figure of 840 01:17:34,350 --> 01:17:40,730 the fairy, who saw themselves more in this Whitman-esque vision of 841 01:17:40,730 --> 01:17:44,910 a shared love of equals. 842 01:17:45,390 --> 01:17:51,650 In 1893, a wealthy young man called George Ives, who was illegitimate, the 843 01:17:51,650 --> 01:17:57,590 son of a general, set up the Order of Chaeronea. 844 01:17:58,320 --> 01:18:04,920 It was a secret society and its aim was to promote social 845 01:18:04,920 --> 01:18:09,200 and sexual emancipation for Uranian men. 846 01:18:10,620 --> 01:18:16,280 And it's quite likely that Oscar Wilde and Rosie Douglas were in the order. 847 01:18:17,820 --> 01:18:24,160 In the 1890s, Oscar Wilde becomes one of the most successful playwrights of late 848 01:18:24,160 --> 01:18:25,180 Victorian London. 849 01:18:27,850 --> 01:18:34,630 In part, he owed his international success to his outrageous banter and 850 01:18:34,630 --> 01:18:36,870 fabulous camp sensibility. 851 01:18:38,810 --> 01:18:42,590 We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars. 852 01:18:44,730 --> 01:18:50,190 Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask and he 853 01:18:50,190 --> 01:18:51,190 will tell you the truth. 854 01:18:53,210 --> 01:18:56,230 Either this wallpaper goes or I do. 855 01:18:57,320 --> 01:19:03,760 I think that sex between men was extremely prevalent in the 19th century, 856 01:19:03,920 --> 01:19:08,940 and many men, particularly from the labouring class, from the working class, 857 01:19:09,200 --> 01:19:12,460 were not even aware that it was a crime. 858 01:19:12,860 --> 01:19:17,500 There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that 859 01:19:17,500 --> 01:19:18,900 is not being talked about. 860 01:19:19,720 --> 01:19:25,220 This is a letter Oscar Wilde wrote to Bosie Douglas, the knight. 861 01:19:25,740 --> 01:19:32,560 before he was going to go back to court and almost certainly be found guilty and 862 01:19:32,560 --> 01:19:35,580 sent to prison with hard labour for at least two years. 863 01:19:37,540 --> 01:19:44,440 My sweet rose, my delicate flower, my lily of lilies, it is perhaps in 864 01:19:44,440 --> 01:19:47,080 prison that I am going to test the power of love. 865 01:19:47,940 --> 01:19:54,640 O sweetest of all boys, most loved of all loves, my soul clings to your soul. 866 01:19:55,160 --> 01:20:00,880 My life is your life, and in all the worlds of pain and pleasure, you are my 867 01:20:00,880 --> 01:20:03,120 ideal of admiration and joy. 868 01:20:05,100 --> 01:20:08,020 In 1895, Oscar Wilde is convicted. 869 01:20:09,080 --> 01:20:10,660 It's an enormous scandal. 870 01:20:10,980 --> 01:20:14,500 There was nothing quite as dramatic as Wilde's case. 871 01:20:14,900 --> 01:20:19,540 The first transatlantic sexual scandal involving same-sex relations. 872 01:20:20,490 --> 01:20:22,130 He was an undoubted genius. 873 01:20:22,350 --> 01:20:27,250 But when he was arrested, the popularity disappeared overnight and the underlying 874 01:20:27,250 --> 01:20:33,370 homophobia, if you like, came straight up and remained 875 01:20:33,370 --> 01:20:39,070 potent for 50 or 60 or 70 years. 876 01:20:40,030 --> 01:20:43,970 He's really become a martyr to the kind of excesses of state power. 877 01:20:44,730 --> 01:20:49,650 Weil said at his trial, quote, the love that dare not speak its name. 878 01:20:50,320 --> 01:20:56,020 It is that deep spiritual affection that is as pure as it is perfect. 879 01:20:56,240 --> 01:20:59,100 It is the noblest form of affection. 880 01:20:59,460 --> 01:21:02,960 There is nothing unnatural about it. 881 01:21:03,520 --> 01:21:08,960 And Wilde was that great turning point in gay history. 882 01:21:14,820 --> 01:21:21,420 I think the importance of Oscar Wilde... is that he was the 883 01:21:21,420 --> 01:21:25,580 first great gay martyr of the modern age. 884 01:21:27,820 --> 01:21:33,980 Oscar Wilde wrote to George I, yet I have no doubt that we will win, 885 01:21:34,100 --> 01:21:39,600 but the road is long and red with monstrous 886 01:21:39,600 --> 01:21:41,380 martyrdoms. 887 01:22:29,870 --> 01:22:34,590 was vilified, and his works were swept from libraries. The plays of his that 888 01:22:34,590 --> 01:22:35,830 were in production were closed. 889 01:22:36,430 --> 01:22:40,550 Yes, history repeats itself. The circles get bigger and bigger and bigger. 890 01:22:40,930 --> 01:22:45,450 Will the film you've just watched be burned, like Different from the Others? 891 01:22:45,910 --> 01:22:51,170 Will the few remaining lines of the great poet Sappho be preserved for 892 01:22:51,170 --> 01:22:52,430 future generations? 893 01:22:52,950 --> 01:22:56,950 I say someone in another time will remember us. 894 01:22:58,160 --> 01:23:01,820 Will Whitman's call to arms be forever cherished? 895 01:23:02,360 --> 01:23:04,340 I sing the body electric. 896 01:23:04,680 --> 01:23:09,420 The armies of those I love invert me, and I invert them. 897 01:23:14,580 --> 01:23:20,740 Will Qafafi's radical vision of a brigade of pleasure be fully realized 898 01:23:20,740 --> 01:23:21,740 one day? 899 01:23:22,320 --> 01:23:23,740 Don't speak about guilt. 900 01:23:24,560 --> 01:23:26,200 Don't speak about responsibility. 901 01:23:27,850 --> 01:23:33,210 When the brigade of pleasure passes with music and with flags, when the senses 902 01:23:33,210 --> 01:23:40,130 shiver and tremble, it's wrong and disrespectful to stay distant. 903 01:23:40,490 --> 01:23:46,950 All the laws of morality, badly thought out, badly applied, are nothing and 904 01:23:46,950 --> 01:23:52,870 can't stand, even for a second, when the brigade of pleasure passes with music 905 01:23:52,870 --> 01:23:53,870 and with flags. 906 01:24:01,130 --> 01:24:05,930 If history is our guide, then these ups and downs of repression and freedom 907 01:24:05,930 --> 01:24:11,410 shows us that there will be many valleys to cross before we see an end to this 908 01:24:11,410 --> 01:24:12,410 story. 909 01:24:16,150 --> 01:24:17,150 Later, 910 01:24:23,090 --> 01:24:28,910 in a more perfect society, someone else made just like me is certain to appear 911 01:24:28,910 --> 01:24:30,030 and act. 912 01:24:30,590 --> 01:24:31,590 freely.