Sexual Culture in Ancient Greece (Oklahoma Series in Classical Culture)

Erotic sensibility pervaded the art, literature, and social mores of the ancient Greeks. Early religious figurines emphasize sexual features, and written documents confirm that the people worshiped deities with strong sexual characteristics. Out of this background came a distinctively Greek sexual culture -- guilt-free, graphically frank, and uninhibited by taboos that became entrenched in the Middle Ages. Illustrated with art from the earliest agricultural periods as well as from the Archaic, Classical, Hellenistic, and Roman eras, Sexual Culture in Ancient Greece presents nine successive stages of Greek sexual culture. Daniel H. Garrison uses well-known passages from Biblical, Near Eastern, and Greek literature to show the centrality of sexual culture in the civilizations of the area, particularly as they reflect the traditions passed on to the Western world. The only comprehensive overview of Greek sexual culture, this book is a valuable guide to the origins of our complex attitudes regarding marriage, the rights of women, homosexuality, and the role of eroticism in art, religion, ethics, and literature.