{"id":1738,"date":"2023-01-26T02:26:59","date_gmt":"2023-01-26T02:26:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mpelembe.net\/?p=1738"},"modified":"2023-01-26T02:26:59","modified_gmt":"2023-01-26T02:26:59","slug":"pompeiis-house-of-the-vettii-reopens-a-reminder-that-roman-sexuality-was-far-more-complex-than-simply-gay-or-straight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mpelembe.net\/index.php\/pompeiis-house-of-the-vettii-reopens-a-reminder-that-roman-sexuality-was-far-more-complex-than-simply-gay-or-straight\/","title":{"rendered":"Pompeii\u2019s House of the Vettii reopens: a reminder that Roman sexuality was far more complex than simply gay or\u00a0straight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jo\u00e3o Flor\u00eancio<\/a>, University of Exeter<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

As Pompeii\u2019s House of the Vettii finally reopens<\/a> after a long process of restoration, news outlets appear to be struggling with how to report on the Roman sex cultures so well recorded in the ruins of the city.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The Metro<\/a> opened with the headline \u201cLavish Pompeii home that doubled as a brothel has some interesting wall art\u201d, while the Guardian<\/a> highlighted the fresco of Priapus, the god of fertility (depicted weighing his oversized penis on a scale with bags of coins) as well as the erotic frescoes found next to the kitchen.<\/p>\n

The Daily Mail, on the other hand \u2013 and arguably surprisingly \u2013 said nothing about the explicit frescoes and instead centred its story on the house\u2019s \u201chistoric hallmarks of interior design<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n

As a scholar who researches modern and contemporary visual cultures of sexuality, I was struck by how the heavy presence of sexual imagery in the ruins of Pompeii seems to confound those writing about it for a general audience.<\/p>\n

Rethinking Roman sexuality<\/h2>\n

As a gay man and a researcher on sexuality, I am all too familiar with the ways modern gay men look to ancient Rome in search of evidence that there have always been people like us.<\/p>\n

It is now clear among the research community that such straightforward readings of homosexuality in classical history are flawed. That is because same-sex relations among Romans were lived and thought about in very different ways from our own<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Roman sexuality was not framed in terms of the gender of partners but in terms of power. The gender of a free man\u2019s sexual partner was less relevant than their social position.<\/p>\n

Socially acceptable Roman sexuality was about power, power was about masculinity \u2013 and Roman patriarchal sex cultures were assertions of both. An adult free man could have sex as the penetrating partner with anyone of a lower social status \u2013 including women or slaves and sex workers of both genders.<\/p>\n

Despite this, I understand how politically important and strategic it was for the early homosexual movement to invent its own myth of origin and to populate history with figures that had been \u2013 they thought \u2013 just like us.<\/p>\n

The flip side of modern notions of homosexuality being read into Roman history, is the way in which the widespread presence of sex in ancient Roman (including in the graffiti and visual culture preserved in Pompeii) has been disavowed or \u2013 at least \u2013 purified by mainstream modern culture.<\/p>\n

Pornography in Pompeii<\/h2>\n

This phenomenon started when sexually explicit artefacts were first discovered in Pompeii, propelling archaeologists to preserve them due to their historical value, but to keep them hidden from the general public in \u201csecret museums<\/a>\u201d on account of their obscene content.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the coinage of the word \u201cpornography\u201d was a result of the archival need to classify those Roman artefacts. The term \u201cpornographers\u201d was first used to designate the creators of such Roman images in Karl Otfried M\u00fcller\u2019s Handbook of Archaeology of Art (Handbuch der Arch\u00e4ologie der Kunst<\/em>)<\/a>, from 1830.<\/p>\n

The news coverage around the reopening of the House of the Vettii is one such example of mainstream modern culture sanitising Roman history. <\/p>\n

When focusing on the fresco of Priapus, for instance, news outlets are quick to claim that the god\u2019s oversized penis was merely a metaphor for the wealth accumulated by the men who owned the house. The pair had made their fortune selling wine after being freed from slavery.<\/p>\n

This reading of the fresco, while not necessarily incorrect, overlooks the more complex \u2013 and for that reason, more interesting \u2013 role of phallic imagery in Roman culture.<\/p>\n

As classicist Craig Williams<\/a> writes, the images of a hyper-endowed, hyper-masculine Priapus that were widespread in Roman culture functioned not only as a source of identification but also as an object of desire for Roman men \u2013 if not to be penetrated by the large phallus, then at least to wish it was their own.<\/p>\n

Priapus, with his large manhood and unquenchable desire to dominate others through penetration was, Williams tells us: \u201cSomething like the patron saint or mascot of Roman machismo.\u201d <\/p>\n

What\u2019s missing from the story?<\/h2>\n

News coverage of the erotic frescoes found in a smaller room of the house has been similarly too straight forward in claiming them as evidence that that room was used for sex work.<\/p>\n

While some scholars have certainly argued that perspective<\/a>, others believe it unlikely. Some academics suggest that the erotic frescoes in that room (which probably belonged to the house\u2019s cook) had more likely been commissioned as a gift to the Vettii\u2019s favourite slave<\/a> and very much fit the wider aesthetic of quirky excess that marks the house as a whole.<\/p>\n

In a culture where sex was not taboo but instead promoted as a sign of power, wealth and culture, it is fair to suggest that erotic images wouldn\u2019t just belong in brothels. Sex was everywhere in Rome, including in literary and visual arts.<\/p>\n

When reading the recent news stories, I could not help but think that their interpretations, while not wholly wrong, were too skewed into presenting the explicit frescoes as either metaphors for something more noble, or as something that was restricted to a specific site of Roman life \u2013 the brothel.<\/p>\n

Perhaps these readings are privileged over others because we\u2019re reluctant to accept that sex in ancient Roman culture \u2013 a culture we so often mythologise as our \u201corigin\u201d \u2013 was performed in ways that we are uncomfortable with.\"The<\/p>\n

Jo\u00e3o Flor\u00eancio<\/a>, Senior Lecturer in History of Modern and Contemporary Art and Visual Culture, University of Exeter<\/a><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jo\u00e3o Flor\u00eancio, University of Exeter As Pompeii\u2019s House of the Vettii finally reopens after a long process of restoration, news outlets appear to beRead More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1739,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"googlesitekit_rrm_CAowu7GVCw:productID":"","_crdt_document":"","activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[4252,4260,722,416,4249,4255,1285,4256,4259,4258,4257,4254,4250,4251,2981,4253,4248],"class_list":["post-1738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-human-interest","tag-ancient-roman-art","tag-craig-williams","tag-creative-commons","tag-culture","tag-deities","tag-house-of-the-vettii","tag-human-sexuality","tag-i-modi","tag-joao-florencio","tag-karl-otfried-muller","tag-phallus","tag-pompeii","tag-priapists","tag-priapus","tag-rome","tag-secret-museum-naples","tag-sexuality-in-ancient-rome"],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/mpelembe.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/file-20230117-15-oi967g-1024x682.jpg","blog_images":{"medium":"https:\/\/mpelembe.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/file-20230117-15-oi967g-300x200.jpg","large":"https:\/\/mpelembe.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/file-20230117-15-oi967g-1024x682.jpg"},"ams_acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nPompeii\u2019s House of the Vettii reopens: a reminder that Roman sexuality was far more complex than simply gay or\u00a0straight - 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