Puer delicatus. But his life, and the messages it reveals, are the things of outlandish drama, as evidenced by his memorable reference in the hit series, Succession. Instead it is assumed that Sporus belongs to a subset known in Rome as a “puer delicatus” - a “delicate boy” who were known for their youthful and effeminate looks and generally groomed for sexual favours by their master. Oct 8, 2024 · Eunuch, ‘empress’ and ultimately victim of abuse: Sporus is a lesser-known character in the story of the brutal Roman emperor Nero. [1] It was designating a male as opposed to a female, the Latin word for ‘boy’, puer, has essentially two meanings: a prepubertal free-born boy or a male slave, who may be a boy, a teenager, or a mature male. The mythological type of the delicatus was represented by Ganymede, the Trojan youth abducted by Jove (Greek Zeus) to be his divine companion and cupbearer. The number of Latin terms for the passive gay men is overwhelmingly huge, indicating the Romans had flourishing gay subculture: This paper seeks to dispel several myths prevalent in the scholarship on Roman sexuality: that a freed slave was still obligated to serve his former master's sexual demands (I. Jul 21, 2022 · Puer delicatus was the result of homosexuality and slave boys in Roman society. Nov 8, 2024 · Literally, “alluring boy”. [122] The puer delicatus was an "exquisite" or "dainty" child-slave chosen by his master for his beauty as a "boy toy", [120] also referred to as deliciae ("sweets" or "delights"). On'g. hn2 nl fpbivtc qdvz l6j2l 0aex3 kh3 0cleo 9g1ok ofre