Elithabethan view of passion Gay Millennium The Renaissance in England: 1500-1600 ·Michelangelo's David (https://pharaohs.addr.com/david.jpg) is the most popular symbol of homoeroticism in the Western world ·Artists and philosophers in Italy were influenced by the classical greek attitude in which homosexuality was accepted ·Sodomy was officially forbidden in Italy, in the mid-15th. century ·Leonardo da Vinci was accused with sodomy but the chase was dropped because of the want of evidences ·Also Leonardo went on to have a series of favoured assistants ·In this time the kinds of sex and the performance of sex flourished in many ways. Therefore the sodomy laws of 1533 were written by Henry the VIII and the Church. (The Buggery Act 1533 'Forasmuch as there is not yet sufficient and condign punishment appointed and limited by the due course of the Laws of this Realm, for the detestable and abominable Vice of Buggery committed with mankind or beast [.]', and goes on to define it as punishable by hanging until dead.) · In fact the law was rarely used. There were six recorded cases in the counties around London between 1533 and 1602. · Nevertheless, much may have happened behind closed doors. It was common for friends to share a bed. It was no one's business to interfere between a master and his servants, and a client was expected to show devotion to his patron. · Renaissance ideas reached England late, but with their arrival came the classical greek and roman writings on sex, including those of Aristotle, Virgil, and Cicero who described the loveliness of friendly love between men, and between men and boys. · Christopher Marlowe wrote erotic poetry about Edward II's( mongolian conqueror) liaison with Piers Gaveston (Earl of Cornwall). In Christopher Marlowe's written work are such erotic elements no uniqueness, for example in the narration 'Hero and Leander' · Much has been written in the attempt to deny that Shakespeare's 126 sonnets describe the relationship of an old man for a young man. · Also commentators have been discreet about the young male actors playing the parts of women on Shakespeare's stage. · Shakespeare and his contemporaries would not have had the concept of 'gay' any more than they had the concept of 'straight', and their work is of legitimate interest to modern gays.
