Gay emperor

Tongues wagged over what exactly he was up to on Capri and the stories got increasingly lurid.

Some of the accusations encompassed what we would now classify as pedophilia.

Although we can’t be sure about the inner workings of every Roman emperor’s bedroom, there are three famous examples of Emperors whose sexuality went beyond the societal norms of the day.

Emperor Trajan’s Love of Boys

Emperor Trajan’s personal life is shrouded in intriguing facets that reveal his homosexual inclinations.

And not just any man: his squeeze was said to have been King Nicomedes IV of Bithynia, an ancient kingdom located in modern-day Turkey.

In later years Constans lost the support of the legions, who were "offended by his homosexuality".^[2]

"This condemnation of homosexuality challenges recent scholarly views of its acceptance in late antiquity.

He wore mascara, powdered his face, and wore women’s clothes.

To the horror of respectable opinion he took several husbands and Cassius Dio claimed that Elagabalus prostituted himself. Despite a lack of concrete evidence, it’s been widely speculated they were lovers, with Paul Cartledge – an eminent historian of Ancient Greece – writing that, ‘rumour had it – and rumour was for once surely correct – that [Hephaestion] and Alexander had once been more than just good friends.’

It's also been speculated that Alexander had been besotted with a Persian eunuch named Bagoas.

Emperor Ai lavished Dong Xian with money and gifts, including a residence so elaborate it was said to rival the imperial palace. Many in the senatorial class engaged in LGBT activity, not just the emperors. Accident, suicide, murder, or ritual sacrifice? But he also had a homosexual relationship with a senator called Valerius Catullus.

Something an elite Roman would find unforgivable. Upon waking to realise Dong was resting on the sleeve of his robe, the emperor chose to cut off the sleeve rather than risk disturbing his lover. Suetonius – who was quite a bitchy writer – referred to Caesar competing against the real Queen of Bithynia for the king’s affections: paelicem reginae, spondam interiorem regiae lecticae.

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Julio-Claudian LGBT Roman Emperors

All the first emperors of the so-called Julio-Claudian dynasty could have been classified as LGBT if contemporary sources and later writers are to be believed:

Emperor Augustus: The first acknowledged emperor of Rome is well-known for his tough laws on adultery and promiscuity.

Suggesting that he had gone ‘native’ while out in the East and succumbed to all that sleaze and corruption.

Thus, the relationship between a higher-class Roman man (the active partner) and a lower-born man, often a slave or an ex-slave (the passive partner), was not uncommon. This annoyed Caesar so much that he swore on oath that there had never been a sexual relationship between him and the King of Bithynia.

Some believe they were most likely brothers. Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum

Living in the 25th century BC, Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum were servants to a Fifth Dynasty pharaoh rather than rulers themselves.

He married four times, including alliances with women and men, blurring the lines of traditional Roman marriages. As a young man, the future dictator of Rome spent time on military campaigns in Asia Minor (modern Turkey).