PINDAR (514-438 B.C.), Greek poet
His beloved was a beautiful young boy, Theoxenus of Tenedos, in whosearms he is said to have died in the theater at Argos. He once wrote ofhimself, "I, like wax of the sacred bees when smitten by the sun, ammelted when I look at the young limbs of boys."
ALEXANDER THE GREAT (356-323 B.C.), Macedonianruler
Among the peace offerings sent to him by the Persians after the deathof King Darius III was an uncommonly beautiful boy, Bagoas, who hadbeen castrated at an early age to preserve his tender young looks.According to one ancient source, Bagoas "had been loved by Darius andwas afterwards to be loved by Alexander."
CATULLUS (84-54 B.C.), Roman poet
In his poems, he liked to boast of his conquests of young boys, andbragged that once, after surprising a boy and girl in the act of makinglove, he mounted the boy "to please Venus;" Catullus, barely thirtywhen he died, expressed disgust for most hom*osexuals, except those whowere active lovers of young boys.
HADRIAN (76-138 A.D.), Roman emperor
His great love was Antinous, a 15-year-old boy he discovered on ajourney through Bithynia. When Antinous died by drowning at the age of21, Hadrian was grief-stricken. He had the dead boy deified, founded acity in Egypt to honor him, erected statues in honor of him through-outthe empire, and commissioned sculptures, paintings and coins to be madebearing his likeness. The resulting cult of Antinous excited such aweand admiration that it threatened to overshadow the growing cult ofJesus of Nazareth; accordingly, early Christian sects went to greatlengths to villify both Hadrian and his boy lover.
STRATO (2nd Century), Greek poet
One of the most cheerfully gluttonous boy chasers of the ancient world,Strato was the editor and primary author of the Musa Puerilis, ananthology of over two hundred epigrams devoted to the subject ofboy-love. He blithely confessed that he liked "a boy's body hot fromthe park, all grimy and the sight of his flesh rubbed down with oil.Nice, and artless; none of the pretty 'enchantment' laid on by yourmerchants of the romantic."
LEONARDO DA VINCI (1452-1519), Italian painter,inventor, scientist
At the age of 38, Leonardo "adopted" a beautiful but roguish 10-year-old boy, nicknamed Salai ("Little Devil"). His presence in Leonardo'shome has perplexed scholars for several centuries, since Salai wasneither servant nor apprentice, and since Leonardo himself describedthe boy as a "thieving, lying, obstinate" glutton. The two wereinseparable companions for nearly twenty-six years.
MICHELANGELO (1475-1564), Italian sculptor andpainter
Michelangelo was in his late sixties when he met Cecchino dei Bracci,the charming and beautiful 15-year-old nephew of one of his friends. Ofthe boy's beauty, he wrote: "With his face God wished to correctnature." Bracci died in 1544, at the age of 16. Michelangelo designedthe boy's tomb and composed no fewer than fifty epitaphic poemsmourning his death. Other boys thought to have been Michelangelo'slovers were: Gherardo Perini, a strikingly beautiful young male modelwhose relation- ship with Michelangelo was the subject of much gossipat the time; Tommaso Cavalieri, an intelligent and handsome youngnobleman who remained one of Michelangelo's lifelong friends; and Febodi Poggio, a luckless young male prostitute, of whom Michelangelowrote: "Up from the earth I rose with his wings, and death itself Icould have found sweet."
CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE (1564-1593), English dramatist
Marlowe's tastes are best characterized by his famous epigram, "Allthey that love not tobacco and boys are fools."
HORATIO ALGER (1834-1899), U.S. novelist
As pastor of the Unitarian Church in Brewster, Massachusetts, hebefriended many of the local boys and took them on afternoon seasidepicnics, which, to the outrage of the community, turned out to bemini-orgies in the dunes. When the truth came out, Alger was arrestedand run out of town.
JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS (1840-1893), English authorand historian
He believed that "beauty came first, before virtue" and as a fellow atMagdalen College, he became infatuated with one choirboy after another.Suffering a nervous breakdown at 23 (probably due in large part tosexual conflicts), he went to Switzerland to recover his health, andthere apparently had an affair with a beautiful 19-year-old: "It is asplendid sight to see him asleep with the folded arms and the vastchest of a young Hercules, innocent of clothing." Later, doinghistorical research in Italy, he had affairs with various younggondoliers and the like.
OSCAR WILDE (1854-1900), Irish dramatist and wit
He once bragged to a friend of having had love affairs with fivedifferent boys in a single night. "I kissed each one of them in everypart of their bodies," he said. "They were all dirty and appealed to mejust for that reason." Wilde claimed to prefer lower-class boys because"their passion was all body and no soul."
FRIEDRICH ALFRED KRUPP (1854-1902), Germanindustrialist
Described by one writer as "a devious and disingenuous character,"Krupp set up a lavish private pleasure palace in a grotto on Capri,where he entertained under-age Italian boys, mostly the sons of localfishermen. Sex was performed to the accompaniment of a live stringquartet, and org*sms were celebrated with bursts of fireworks. WhenKrupp's wife, back home in Germany, got wind of what was going on, shewent straight to the Kaiser who promptly had her committed to an insaneasylum; the Krupp empire was too vital to German national security tobe compromised by such stories. However, the German press eventuallyfound out about Krupp's private sex parties and printed the whole messystory, complete with photographs taken by Krupp himself in the grotto.Rather than face the inevitable disgrace, Krupp committed suicide inItaly.
CONSTANTINE CAVAFY (1863-1933), Greek poet
Living in Alexandria, he frequented the houses of prostitution wherestrong, well-built Greek boys (most of them poor and with wretched jobsduring the day) earned extra money by having sex with hom*osexuals. Hebribed his servants to ruffle up his bed at night, so that his motherwouldn't suspect he had been out all night long.
ANDRE GIDE (1869-1951), French author
He had his first hom*osexual experience when he was 23, with a14-year-old Arab boy in Tunisia. In Algeria, he fell in love with his15-year-old servant boy; Gide wanted to take him back to France, butGide's mother objected to the idea of a "Negro" in the house. When hewas 47, Gide fell in love and had a long-lasting affair with a16-year-old boy, Marc Allegret, who later became a well-known filmproducer.
