Are there recorded instances of asexuality in the body of ancient Greek writings?

Question

I've been reading through a fraction of Ancient Greek literature, lately, and an odd thought occurred to me. In nearly every work of Greek literature that is tangentially related to sexuality (which, we've got to admit, is quite nearly most of the well-known ones), sex is treated as universally desirable, and is a locus of control and power. Most of the discussion around women in Greek culture seems to revolve solely around sexuality.

As another example, Eros is often referred to as being one of those omnipresent entities in male interactions in Greek culture. The Symposium goes into some manner of detail on this point about Eros, describing maleness and sexuality as effectively identical concepts with no real distinguishing factors. Still, beyond this, many of the Greek gods are described as sexually promiscuous. No emphasis seems to be placed in any writings on the absence of sexuality in the Greek gods.

Here, I mean asexuality to be the total absence of sexual attraction, with anyone. This is a concept distinct from both celibacy (not having sex for a particular reason) and abstinence (not having sex by choice). For example:

• Dionysius is, based on what I've read, abstinent due to indifference to sexuality. There doesn't seem to be anything to suggest that Dionysius doesn't experience sexual attraction, irrespective of whether he partakes in it.

• Artemis would count as an example of celibacy, because she's a sworn virgin. (Note: "virgin" means "no sexual relations with men" in ancient Greek works. There's some discussion about whether Artemis was lesbian, but either way, not asexual.)

• While there isn't a whole lot of evidence either way, the speculation I've read about whether Athena had sex with anyone seems to have trouble differentiating between Athena as an asexual figure or an abstinent one. (This might make it hard to demonstrate asexuality through the absence of sexual writings.)

The quintessential example, the way "asexuality" is used nowadays, would be if someone in some situation were to turn down a sexual situation - not because they didn't want to have sex with them, but rather because they just didn't feel like having sex, as a whole, with anyone.

Did asexuality as a concept ever appear in Greek writings? If so, is there both asexuality in the Pantheon and asexuality outside of it, or is it just one of the two? I don't expect that the ancient Greeks shared our modern conception of asexuality to a T; however, if it's possible to identify that ancient Greek writings reflect an idea of asexuality comparable to our modern one, that would probably count as an example.

Answer 1

There are a few gods and goddesses in ancient Greek mythology (assuming you count that as part of literature) who lead virgin lifestyles. Athena, Artemis, and Hestia come to mind as examples. Now of course, being a virgin doesn't necessarily imply being asexual - Artemis, for example, seems to recognise the idea of sexuality, and some stories even have it that she was in love with her hunting companion Orion. But I'm going to focus specifically on Athena.

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First of all, even the manner of her creation hints at an unusual distance from sexuality. She wasn't born in the usual way, but sprang fully formed and armoured from the forehead of her father Zeus. Some versions of this myth say that Zeus slept with Metis before swallowing her in fear of her prophesied offspring, and that Metis then gave birth to Athena within Zeus, but this is not universally agreed upon. Justin Martyr's Apology says (emphasis mine):

They said that Athena was the daughter of Zeus not from intercourse, but when the god had in mind the making of a world through a word his first thought was Athena.

Obviously, by itself this doesn't tell us anything about Athena's own sexuality, but symbolically it connects her with the idea of asexuality from the very beginning of her life. A study of Athena by Karl Kerenyi links her virginal nature to her relationship with her father.

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At least one version of the origin story of Erichthonius, born from the earth after Hephaestus's attempted rape of Athena, certainly makes her sound asexual. I don't have an original or 'noteworthy' source for this, but I found it here (emphasis mine):

There is one story in which the god [Hephaestus] was told by Ares that Athena wanted to make love to him, so when she asked him to make her some new weapons, he said that the only payment he would need was her love. Athena didn't catch the innuendo. As far as she was concerned, love didn't equal sex. For her, love was what most people feel for their brothers and their sisters

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Finally, Athena is the goddess of wisdom and strategy. Her whole nature revolves around being calm, rational, and unemotional. Again, of course, this doesn't necessarily correlate with asexuality in the real world, but since we're talking about an idealised or even caricatured figure, from millennia ago to boot, it makes sense that the people writing about her might connect the two concepts.

Either romantic love or sexual desire would be, in some sense, a departure from the pure reason which characterises Athena. She is always an advocate of rationality, and neither love nor sexuality are entirely rational impulses. While Artemis, for example, could have sexual desires without contradicting her status as the goddess of the hunt (or even the goddess of virginity - she was abstinent, not necessarily asexual), the whole concept seems to go against Athena's essential nature.

Answer 2

Perhaps a case can be made for Hermaphroditus. The son of Hermes and Aphrodite, he was a remarkably beautiful youth, but uninterested in sex. Or at least, the way Ovid tells it, "he did not know what love was"; and when the water nymph Salmacis offers herself to him, he spurns her. Salmacis hides until he strips to bathe in her lake. She then jumps in. Despite his strong protests and attempts to throw her off, she forcibly entwines herself around him. She prays that the two of them will never be separated, and as a result, Hermaphroditus becomes a hermaphrodite. He prays to his parents in turn:

O my father, and my mother, grant this prayer to your son, who owes his name to you both: if any man enter this pool, may he depart hence no more than half a man, may he suddenly grow weak and effeminate at the touch of these waters.

His prayer too is granted, and the pool of Salmacis was reputed to take away the virility of men. (From Ovid, Metamorphoses, trans. Mary M. Innes; Penguin Books, 1955, p. 101–104)

Ovid is Roman, not Greek, of course. But the story is of Greek origin. I am not familiar with the Greek sources enough to know whether the detail of Hermaphroditus being uninterested in sex with Salmacis is them. Online retellings of the myth (such as this one) don't cite sources, and might well be taking that detail from Ovid. So this is more an avenue for research than a definitive answer.

Answer 3

There is a case to be made about the humanity itself (or some of it) being asexual at first. In some myths, Pandora is the first woman, created by Hephaestus for Zeus to punish humanity. Pandora's arrival and the subsequent disasters mark the end of the Golden Age of Man.

What exactly were all those men doing before she came? While homosexual love was definitely not news to the ancient Greeks, would all of humanity be involved in homosexual love until the first human woman came? It is possible that some might have been asexual.

Answer 4

The Greek myths are seldom consistent.

However in the Homeric Hymn to Aphrodite, we read

Muse, tell me the deeds of golden Aphrodite the Cyprian, who stirs up sweet passion in the gods and subdues the tribes of mortal men and birds that fly in air and all the many creatures that the dry land rears, and all that the sea: all these love the deeds of rich-crowned Cytherea. Yet there are three hearts that she cannot bend nor yet ensnare. First is the daughter of Zeus who holds the aegis, bright-eyed Athena; for she has no pleasure in the deeds of golden Aphrodite, but delights in wars and in the work of Ares, in strifes and battles and in preparing famous crafts. She first taught earthly craftsmen to make chariots of war and cars variously wrought with bronze, and she, too, teaches tender maidens in the house and puts knowledge of goodly arts in each one's mind. Nor does laughter-loving Aphrodite ever tame in love Artemis, the huntress with shafts of gold; for she loves archery and the slaying of wild beasts in the mountains, the lyre also and dancing and thrilling cries and shady woods and the cities of upright men. Nor yet does the pure maiden Hestia love Aphrodite's works. She was the first-born child of wily Cronos and youngest too, by will of Zeus who holds the aegis, —a queenly maid whom both Poseidon and Apollo sought to wed. But she was wholly unwilling, nay, stubbornly refused; and touching the head of father Zeus who holds the aegis, she, that fair goddess, swear a great oath which has in truth been fulfilled, that she would be a maiden all her days. So Zeus the Father gave her an high honor instead of marriage, and she has her place in the midst of the house and has the richest portion. In all the temples of the gods she has a share of honor, and among all mortal men she is chief of the goddesses. Of these three Aphrodite cannot bend or ensnare the hearts.

Much turns on whether "bend" means "influence at all" or "arouse desire to such an extent that consquences would ensue," but it is certainly less than "ensnare," and that she has no influence at all on all three is a probable reading.

(I note that it is wide spread that Dionysius married Ariadne, against the abstinent view.)