This article is about lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) history in Italy.
BCE
5th millennium BC - Examples of homosexual eroticism in Upper Paleolithic or Mesolithic European art in Sicily. In Addaura incision is a group of people dancing around two men, both with erections, possibly indicating a homoerotic ritual. 530 BC – One of the earliest examples of Etruscan art on homosexuality, found in 1892 in the Necropolis of Monterozzi near Tarquinia. The painting, situated in what has been called the Tomb of the Bulls (Italian: Tomba dei Tori), depicts on the right a bull with a man's face (Acheloos) and an erect phallus that is aggressively approaching two men having sexual intercourse. On the left, another bull is turned around, as though indifferent, in front of men and women having sexual intercourse. The women are consistently depicted in light tones, while the men are brown. Under the frieze is Achilles (on the left) waylaying Troilus. This representation is the only one in archaic Tarquinian parietal painting representing a scene derived from Greek mythology; it used the legend about the bisexuality of Achilles to demonstrate that, among the Greeks, same-sex love was a common and ordinary fact. This shows how, even then, homosexuality could be a worthwhile topic in the conflict between populations. Below is the tree of life, full of leaves, linked by the sash of life with the skeletal tree of death, with the black festoon of death hanging from a branch. The onomastic inscription in the centre of the upper frieze names he who probably was the owner of the tomb: Aranth Suprianas. 470 BC – An important example is the "Tomb of the Diver" in Paestum, in particular the painted scene of the Symposium.
600 BC – 1 BC
509 BC – The Roman Republic is founded. Homosexuality, as in Greece, is widespread and legalized throughout the Roman heyday, from the Republic to the Empire (see Homosexuality in ancient Rome). 149 BC – The Lex Scantinia, a Roman law, regulates homosexuality for the first time on record. According to the law, homosexuality should be denied between freeborn adult males and for the youth of noble families not to participate in male prostitution. It is also probable that such a law was meant to prevent the possibility of a noble-born man becoming subject to sodomy by a slave.Sergio Musitelli, Maurizio Bossi, Remigio Allegri, Storia dei costumi sessuali in occidente dalla preistoria ai giorni nostri, Rusconi, Milano 1999, pp. 126–127.
1st century BC 100 BC – 100 AD – Found in the Terme suburbane of Pompei is the only representation of a lesbian scene surviving from the Roman era, and also a fresco of triple intercourse between men. 80 BC – Julius Caesar allegedly has a love affair with king Nicomedes IV of Bithynia.Suetonius, Julius 2–3; Plutarch, Caesar 2–3; Cassius Dio, Roman History 43.20 57 BC – 54 BC – Catullus writes the Carmina, including love poems to Giovenzio, boasting of sexual prowess with youth and including violent invective against passive sodomites. 42 BC – 39 BC – Virgil writes the Eclogæ vel Bucolica, with many references to homosexual love and relationship. 27 BC – The Roman Empire begins with the reign of Augustus. The first recorded same-sex marriages occur during this period.Martial attests to same-sex marriages between men during the early Roman Empire, although these had no legal status; see Martial, Epigrams 1.24, 12.42 26, 25, and 18 BC – Tibullus writes the Carmina, with references to homosexuality.
Romans, like Greeks, tolerated love and sex among men. Two Roman Emperors publicly married men, some had gay lovers themselves, and homosexual prostitution was taxed. However, like the Greeks, passivity and effeminacy were not tolerated, and an adult male freeborn Roman could lose his citizen status if caught performing fellatio or being penetrated.(Fone, 2000)
AD 1 – 599
1st century CE
8 – Female same-sex desire is described as something strange and unnatural in Ovid's Metamorphoses, in the tale of Iphis and Ianthe."So, birds mate, and among all animals, not one female is attacked by lust for a female. I wish I were not one!" says Iphis of her desire for Ianthe. 54 – Nero becomes Emperor of Rome. Nero married two men in legal ceremonies, Pythagoras and Sporus.Storia Nerone: quello che non leggi sui libri di storia 86-93 – The Roman poet Martial satirizes lesbians and his own mystification about lesbianism in his Epigrams. "Only the Sphinx could interpret this riddle right: that where there is no man, there is adultery." 98 – Trajan, one of the most beloved of Roman emperors, begins his reign. Trajan was well known for his homosexuality and fondness for young males. This was used to advantage by the king of Edessa, Abgar VII, who, after incurring the anger of Trajan for some misdeed, sent his handsome young son to make his apologies, thereby obtaining pardon.Dio Cassius, Epitome of Book 68.6.4; 68.21.2–6.21.3
2nd century 165 – Christian martyr Giustino writes: "We have learned that is an evil thing to show newborns, since we see that almost everyone, not only the girls but boys too, are forced into prostitution".Apologia I, 27, UTA, RANKE-HEINEMANN, Eunuchi per il regno dei cieli, Rizzoli 1990, p. 66.
3rd century 218 – The emperor Elagabalus's reign begins. At different times, Elagabalus marries five women and a man named Zoticus, an athlete from Smyrna, in a lavish public ceremony at Rome;Augustan History, Life of Elagabalus 10 but the Syrian's most stable relationship is with the chariot driver Hierocles, and Cassius Dio says Elagabalus delighted in being called Hierocles' mistress, wife, and queen. The emperor wears makeup and wigs, prefers to be called a lady and not a lord, and offers vast sums to any physician who can provide him with a vagina; for this reason, the emperor is seen by some writers as an early transgender figure and one of the first on record as seeking sex reassignment surgery.Tess deCarlo, Trans History (), page 32 244–249 – Emperor Philip the Arab tries and fails to outlaw homosexual prostitution.
4th century 342 – The first law against pretended same-sex marriage was promulgated by the Christian emperors Constantius II and Constans.Theodosian Code 9.7.3: "When a man 'marries' in the manner of woman, a 'woman' about to offer himself to men what does he wish (), when sex has lost all its significance; when the crime is one which it is not profitable to know; when Venus is changed to another form; when love is sought and not found? We order the statutes to arise, the laws to be armed with an avenging sword, that those infamous persons who are now, or who hereafter may be, guilty may be subjected to exquisite punishment." This is denunciation of these pretended marriages which had no legal force 390 – In the year 390, the Christian emperors Valentinian II, Theodosius I and Arcadius declared homosexual sex to be illegal and those who were guilty of it were condemned to be burned alive in front of the public.(Theodosian Code 9.7.6): All persons who have the shameful custom of condemning a man's body, acting the part of a woman's to the sufferance of alien sex (for they appear not to be different from women), shall expiate a crime of this kind in avenging flames in the sight of the people.
5th century 498 – In spite of the laws against gay sex, the Christian emperors continued to collect taxes on male prostitutes until the reign of Anastasius I, who finally abolishes the tax in favor of sampling of the best men.Evagrius Ecclesiastical History 3.39
6th century 529 – The Christian emperor Justinian I (527–565) makes homosexuals a scapegoat for problems such as "famines, earthquakes, and pestilences."Justinian Novels 77, 144 The Justinian code is the first time active as well as passive homosexuals are punished; prominent religious leaders are castrated, tortured, dragged through the streets, and executed. This code shapes the status of homosexuals in Europe for the next several hundred years, until the Napoleonic Era.
1000–1599 1051 – Peter Damian writes the treatise , in which he argues for stricter punishments for clerics failing their duty against "vices of nature."PETRI DAMIANI Liber gomorrhianus, ad Leonem IX Rom. Pon. in Patrologiae Cursus completus...accurante J.P., MIGNE, series secunda, tomus CXLV, col. 161; CANOSA, Romano, Storia di una grande paura La sodomia a Firenze e a Venezia nel quattrocento, Feltrinelli, Milano 1991, pp.13–14 1140 – The Italian Monk Gratian compiles his work , in which he argues that male homosexual acts are the worst of all the sexual sins because they involve using the male member in an unnatural way. 1179 – The Third Lateran Council of Rome issues a decree for the excommunication of male homosexuals.
13th century 1232 – Pope Gregory IX starts the Inquisition in the Italian city-states. Some cities called for banishment and/or amputation as punishments for 1st- and 2nd-offending sodomites and burning for the 3rd or habitual offenders. 1250–1300 – Homosexual activity radically passes from being completely legal in the most of Europe to incurring the death penalty in most European states.John Boswell, Christianity, Social Tolerance, and Homosexuality (1980) p. 293. 1265 – Thomas Aquinas argues that sodomy is second only to murder in the ranking of sins. 1287 – Niger de Pulis is burned at the stake in Parma (then part of the Holy Roman Empire), becoming the first person in modern-day Italy to be executed for sodomy.
14th century
1321 – Dante's Inferno places male homosexuals in the Seventh Circle. 1345 – Guido da Pisa writes a commentary on , in which an illustration depicts Dante, Virgil, and homosexuals. 1347 – Rolandino Roncaglia is put on trial for homosexuality, an event that caused a sensation in Italy. He confessed he "had not ever had sexual intercourses neither with his wife nor with any other woman because he didn't ever feel any carnal appetite, nor could he ever have an erection of his virile member". After his wife died of plague, Rolandino started to prostitute himself, wearing female dresses because "since he has a female look, voice and movements – although he hasn't the female orifice but has a male member and testicles – many persons considered him to be a woman because of his appearance".storia completa qui
15th century 1476 – Florentine court records of 1476 show that Leonardo da Vinci and three other young men were charged with sodomy, and acquitted. During the 15th century, Florence has a reputation abroad as "the capital of the sodomites" and the majority of men in the city are "at least once during their lifetimes officially incriminated for engaging in homosexual relations", according to historian Michael Rocke.
16th century
16th century – Male prostitutes in the Republic of Venice develop the gnaga mask in order to practice homosexual prostitution without fear of punishment. 1512 – Renowned Sienese painter Giovanni Antonio Bazzi is nicknamed ('The Sodomite') because of his homosexual activities. Bacci embraces the name and writes verses about it.. 1532 – Holy Roman Empire makes sodomy punishable by death. 1541 – Writer and noblewoman Laudomia Forteguerri publishes a series of love poems dedicated to her friend Margaret of Austria.Eisenbichler, Konrad. "Laudomia Forteguerri: Constructions of a Woman." The Sword and the Pen: Women, Politics, and Poetry in Sixteenth-century Siena. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2012. 101-64. Maddelena Campiglia is another 16th century female poet who explores the love between women in the 1580s.