Byzantine Intersectionality: Sexuality, Gender, and Race in the Middle Ages

by Roland Betancourt

A fascinating history of marginalized identities in the medieval world

While the term “intersectionality” was coined in 1989, the existence of marginalized identities extends back over millennia. Byzantine Intersectionality reveals the fascinating, little-examined conversations in medieval thought and visual culture around sexual and reproductive consent, bullying and slut-shaming, homosocial and homoerotic relationships, trans and nonbinary gender identities, and the depiction of racialized minorities. Roland Betancourt explores these issues in the context of the Byzantine Empire, using sources from late antiquity and early Christianity up to the early modern period. Highlighting nuanced and strikingly modern approaches by medieval writers, philosophers, theologians, and doctors, Betancourt offers a new history of gender, sexuality, and race.

Betancourt weaves together art, literature, and an impressive array of texts to investigate depictions of sexual consent in images of the Virgin Mary, tactics of sexual shaming in the story of Empress Theodora, narratives of transgender monks, portrayals of same-gender desire in images of the Doubting Thomas, and stereotypes of gender and ethnicity in representations of the Ethiopian Eunuch. He also gathers evidence from medical manuals detailing everything from surgical practices for late terminations of pregnancy to save a mother’s life to a host of procedures used to affirm a person’s gender.

Showing how understandings of gender, sexuality, and race have long been enmeshed, Byzantine Intersectionality offers a groundbreaking look at the culture of the medieval world.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Queer, LGBT, Gender, Race, Feminism

288 pages, Hardcover

Published October 6, 2020

Reviews

[Morgan M. Page · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some 20th Century theorists around gender, sexuality, and race posited that one cannot read identities backwards into time, as this is an anachronism. We cannot say there are "gay men" in, say, late antiquity because the conditions in which our modern conception of "gay men" as a static community-based identity had no yet coalesced. And while this may be technically true, it subtly does the work of cutting people off from the past — creating the appearance that to be gay, to be trans, and even to Black are solely social constructions that exist exclusively within their historical context.

Byzantine Intersectionality provides a long-overdue counterpoint to this way of conceptualising the past. Betancourt brings out examples from the Byzantine Empire which serve to illustrate how much the past resonates with (and in important ways, differs from) the present's conceptions of sexuality, gender, and race. From trans monks to the figure of "the Ethiopian eunuch," Betancourt skilfully undoes a lot of our assumptions about the Middle Ages by applying contemporary intersectional politics.

This is an eye-opening read, even for me as a trans historian.

[Nina ( picturetalk321 ) · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of those rare scholarly books that change my mind (and therefore my life) about my professional academic discipline (art history). An extraordinary tour de force of erudition, insight and political acuity. How to apply current theoretical and activist terminology -- intersectionality, transgender, post-racial, queer, slut shaming, cis normativity, sexual consent, the pronoun 'they' -- to a remote past and make it seem the most exciting, up-to-date enterprise: this book is an object lesson in just that. Astounding insights on each page (eunuchs as Byzantium's most visible people whose gender has been surgically transformed! so obvious when you think about it). Beautifully subtle and carefully observed visual analyses. Brilliant, committed and deeply humane.

From the Introduction: 'Many of the subjectivities encompassed here have been actively denied, negated, or simply assumed to have not existed in the Middle Ages. I will take their existence for granted and treat them as real, because they were real.' (p.17)

From the Epilogue: 'To say that articulating and calling out these forces [intersectional marginalised oppression] is anachronistic or contrary to the historian's project is to be complicit with oppression.' (p.207)

'...to believe that our historical inquiries can begin only when our primary texts willingly offer up and display subjectivities is to be a crude apologist for social inequality and oppression.' (p.208)

Chapter I: The Virgin's Consent. Applies current discussion of consent to Mary's consent to being impregnated by the son of God in her encounter with the angel Gabriel (the Annunciation). Excellent.

Chapter II: Slut-Shaming an Empress. Examines why and how contemporary writers denounced Theodora for supposed sexual excesses and discusses this without denying the accusations nor shaming her for possibly indulging in non-normative practices. Very, very good.

Chapter III: Transgender Lives. Eunuchs and women living as male monks. Excellent.

Chapter IV: Queer Sensations. Possibilities of homoerotic, homosexual and asexual same-sex love as well as homophobia in Byzantine monasteries. Very, very good.

Chapter V: The Ethiopian Eunuch. Just a mindblowing chapter focusing on one image: the illuminated manuscript page of Philip and the Ethiopian Eunuch in the 'Menologion' of Basil II. The eunuch who is feminine. The Ethiopian who is black as the personification of Night (and not black like the foreigners depicted elsewhere). The Christian who is the equal of Philip. A skin that radiates darkness. Racialisation beyond the epidermis. Glowing red angels. Delicate pink tunics. An amazing chapter.

Format: Chunky hard-back with so-so black & white illustrations and an inset of shiny paper for the very good colour plates. Pleasing largeish font with good line spacing for underlinings.

[Dasha · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a really interesting history into a topic (Byzantium) that I knew very little about. The literature and artwork analysis are superb and Betancourt does an excellent job using accessible language in his summaries of sources and his analysis. While I wasn't a fan of the title "Transgender Lives," mostly because it places modern language/associations onto figures of the past, this was not present in the actual analysis where he focuses more on transmasculinity and transing one's gender broadly.

[Simon Peeples · Rating 4 out of 5]

Yay a book with pictures!

I really enjoyed reading this book and it helped that it was loaned to me by a friend. It is really interesting to see well constructed evidence of queer practices, much more nuanced race relationships, and how those collided in medieval Byzantine.

Betancourt does a really good jobs of organizing the sections to lead up to the last chapter where he analyzes a truly exemptional piece of art with the subject fully contextualized by contemporary paintings, laws, songs and religious texts. This work is then also used to deepen and connect the previous chapters.

The translations for pivotal words are heavily justified and interesting to learn. The framework for visual analysis was laid out very nicely. And it was just cool and meaningful to see how history as a practice has changed to where stories of historically queer identities are being critically constructed instead of being posed as laying outside the bounds of scholarship due to previous historical authorship imposing what they believed to be a normative world view.

[Darian Burns · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ronald Betancourt, in his book Byzantine Intersectionality, uses a conceptual lens of intersexuality between gender and race to understand the Byzantine Middle Ages fully. He accomplishes this by focusing on several topics linked within the larger conceptualization of the intersectionality of race and sexuality. The way he analyzes Roman intersectional identities is methodologically challenging and conceptually intriguing.

Byzantine Intersectionality relies on cultural objects, Christian art, and textual documents as primary sources. There are many images included within the manuscripts, including color plates. Most of his sources come from the Vatican Library. Numerous resources, such as Bibles, chronicles, paintings, and icons, are used. By combining textual and visual representations, he better understands how Roman people interacted with one another and organized their society. Additionally, using Vatican Library sources allows him to access various resources and materials. Despite his choice of sources being primary, coupled with intensive research and adroit study, the book has two fatal flaws.

First, the author appears to consider representations of Byzantine Christianity without theological contextualization. Many of the artworks he interprets were created with a clear understanding of their meaning and what they represented. Betancourt seems uninterested. A solid understanding of theological arguments and varied interpretations of that material is imperative when presenting religious material as evidence for one's thesis. Without a historical, linguistic, or cultural context, discussing the concepts of the Virgin Mary, the Immaculate Conception, and the Apostle Thomas' sexuality is impossible. An example of how this is problematic can be seen in his discussion of the record of "doubting Thomas" inserting his hand into Jesus' wound. Betancourt disregards the virtual questions of doubt and faith and instead sees a homoerotic scene of Thomas acting out his sexuality by entering into another man's flesh.

Likewise, his assertion that Byzantine artists convey Thomas' possible homosexuality by making him appear with rosy cheeks. Christian tradition has always considered the disciples between 13 and 30, with Thomas among the youngest. Rosey cheeks were regularly used in iconic art to represent youth. Therefore, the Byzantine artists gave Thomas rosey cheeks the same as John, who was known to be the youngest apostle (the fact that Betancourt is an art historian leaves a lot of questions and confusion on this matter). In much of Western history, religion was a predominant force for culture. Understanding a concept's cultural significance and theological implications within this historical context is essential. Although the book does get it right in this regard at times, At others, it misses the mark by superimposing presentism upon objects and manuscripts to a lesser degree.

Second, Betancourt reassesses the Byzantine period using contemporary terms, categories, and language. This usage is not limited to transgender or other modern understandings of sexuality. It is used throughout the book on a variety of subjects and classifications. This, unless I am mistaken, is that the utility of this method is one of his main arguments. This approach can be helpful and is increasingly the preferred method of dealing with antiquity, but it comes with risks in some respects.

Sometimes, Betancourt assumes and superimposes contemporary ideas and language upon his subject matter. Byzantine identity was not determined by language, ethnicity, skin color, or sexuality as we understand them today. It drew upon shared beliefs, principles, and cultural heritage as a fluid construct. It also was free of the modern emphasis on identity and more concerned with being and actions. Despite contemporary conceptualizations, ethnicity, culture, sexuality, and religion were not the same as we viewed them in the Twenty-First Century.

An example of this can be found in the book's presentation of Mary of Egypt, seen as a Saint by the Coptic, Roman, and Greek Orthodox, whom the author argues adopted a transgender identity. Despite the compelling argument, Mary of Egypt may also be considered a gender-fluid person, asexual, gender expansive, gender non-conforming, one who rejects sexuality or a myriad of possibilities. Even more likely, she did not consider herself any of these things. Instead, she defined herself by what she believed, what she did, how she lived, and whom she loved, which might have been an individual or individuals of the same sexuality. However, those relationships would not have defined her identity.

[Kev Nickells · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent.

So it's been a while since I read anything like this - during my Theology MA I was very much immersed in this world of historiographical theory. It's been a while since I've touched anything like it. The basic premise of this is relatively simple - queerness is more present in history than perhaps is thought in contemporary times. The reach of it is pretty extensive - taking evidence from Patristic Theology and a good millennium after.

So we meet various trans / gender non-confirming / queer sexualities (including a brief discussion on asexual practices). The sense of the Byzantine is geographically broad. It's (perhaps necessarily) limited to Christian sources but there's an enormous amount of linguistic attention paid to the sources in multiple languages. The image is that of a Christian society that was far more heterogenous than might be realised. There's attention paid to the thorny issue of race - thorny because Betancourt is carefully circumspect about how 'race' was understood - in some senses Christian communities regarded it as a non-issue; in other ways there are signs of prejudice towards darker-skinned people, or racialisation on other grounds.

It's clearly the work of an academic - the research is imperiously careful. But the tone is by no means overwrought or tricky to read. It's a book that's the work of an academic who cares to be read outside his circle, rather than a straight[!] academic book.

I should imagine there's two cohorts this book is aimed at - queers looking for historical precedent, and medievalists keen to expand the remit of the subject (the two no doubt overlap). I imagine theologians and sociologists looking for histories that are more pluralist than popular conceptions will dig this. It's a fascinating world Betancourt paints, and one that's filled with complexity - but also a world that's very clear that queers not only existed in Byzantine times but that many of them held significant positions in society, frequently without (apparent) friction.

Much recommend.

[Ruz El · Rating 5 out of 5]

Stoya's Book Club March 2022

4.5/5

This one is a scholarly look at what the cover says. Kind of hard to review these kinds of books, or at least maybe not fair since they are designed to impart information first, and hopefully be interesting enough to "entertain" the reader. As a non-scholar I found it a success. A deep dive into certain representations from the period offering a history of represented consent, race, transgender figures and the like through passages and artwork from the era. My main take away was basically, how valuable would this have been/would be to young LGBTQ+ kids and others that are confused and "othered" by their blossoming internal feelings? Not a light read, but a valuable, thought provoking one.

[Alice Pederkoff · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thoughtful, scholarly work. I’ll be thinking about this book for a long time, both for what it says about the past and the lenses it gave me to think about gender, sexuality, racialization, and intersectionality more broadly.

[Ida Østby · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is not fun, and it isn't meant to be. It's a brave challenge, and it's made skillfully. I think it's so important it cannot have a star rating below 5 - at the same time, it is not a book read for pleasure, but for arming yourself for understanding our world.

[Sloan Touchet · Rating 4 out of 5]

sweet read, betancourt poses some really fun and fresh ideas and offers really beautiful and woven interpretation

[Corno De · Rating 3 out of 5]

Intersectionality opens new windows on the past (and present) that do justice to how it really was. Without this approach a lot would have remained in the dark.

[Alexander · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a really interesting read. If you're into byzantine history this is a great perspective into how marginalized people lived day to day. From trans saints to Slut-shaming an empress. This book is very detailed and well researched.