Antinous, also called Antinoös, (; ; 111 – 130) was a Greek youth from Bithynia, a favourite and lover of the Roman emperor Hadrian. Following his premature death before his 20th birthday, Antinous was deified on Hadrian's orders, being worshipped in both the Greek East and Latin West, sometimes as a god () and sometimes merely as a hero ().Renberg, Gil H.: Hadrian and the Oracles of Antinous (SHA, Hadr. 14.7); with an appendix on the so-called Antinoeion at Hadrian's Villa and Rome's Monte Pincio Obelisk, Memoirs of the American Academy in Rome, Vol. 55 (2010) , 159–198; Jones, Christopher P., New Heroes in Antiquity: From Achilles to Antinoos (Cambridge, Massachusetts & London, 2010), 75–83; Bendlin, Andreas: "Associations, Funerals, Sociality, and Roman Law: The Collegium of Diana and Antinous in Lanuvium (CIL 14.2112) Reconsidered", in Öhler, M. (ed.), Aposteldekret und antikes Vereinswesen: Gemeinschaft und ihre Ordnung (WUNT 280; Tübingen, 2011), 207–296.
Little is known of Antinous's life, although it is known that he was born in Claudiopolis (present day Bolu, Turkey), in the Roman province of Bithynia et Pontus. He was probably introduced to Hadrian in 123, before being taken to Italy for a higher education. He had become the favourite of Hadrian by 128, when he was taken on a tour of the Roman Empire as part of Hadrian's personal retinue. Antinous accompanied Hadrian during his attendance of the annual Eleusinian Mysteries in Athens, and was with him when he killed the Marousian lion in Libya, an event highly publicised by the Emperor. In October 130, as they were part of a flotilla going along the Nile, Antinous died amid mysterious circumstances. Various suggestions have been put forward for how he died, ranging from an accidental drowning to an intentional human sacrifice or suicide.
Following his death, Hadrian deified Antinous and founded an organised cult devoted to his worship that spread throughout the Empire. Hadrian founded the city of Antinoöpolis close to Antinous's place of death, which became a cultic centre for the worship of Osiris-Antinous. Hadrian also founded games in commemoration of Antinous to take place in both Antinoöpolis and Athens, with Antinous becoming a symbol of Hadrian's dreams of pan-Hellenism. The worship of Antinous proved to be one of the most enduring and popular of cults of deified humans in the Roman empire, and events continued to be founded in his honour long after Hadrian's death.
Antinous became a symbol of male homosexuality in Western culture, appearing in the works of Oscar Wilde, Fernando Pessoa and Marguerite Yourcenar.
Biography Birth and childhood
Antinous was born to a Greek family near the city of Claudiopolis,Cassius Dio pp. 444–445 which was located in the Roman province of Bithynia, in what is now north-west Turkey. He was born in the territory to the east of the city called Mantineion, a rural locality:
The year of Antinous's birth is not recorded, although it is estimated that it was probably between A.D. 110 and 112 . Early sources record that his birthday was in November, and although the exact date is not known, Royston Lambert, one of Antinous's biographers, asserted that it was probably on 27 November. Given the location of his birth and his physical appearance, it is likely that part of his ancestry was not Greek.
Status There are various potential origins for the name "Antinous"; it is possible that he was named after the character of Antinous of Ithaca, who is one of Penelope's suitors in Homer's epic poem, the Odyssey. Another possibility is that he was given the male equivalent of "Antinoë", the name of a woman who was one of the founding figures of Mantineia, a city which probably had close relations with Bithynia. Although many historians from the Renaissance onward asserted that Antinous had been a slave, only one of around fifty early sources claims that. This possibility remains unlikely, as it would have been extremely controversial to deify a former slave in Roman society. There is no surviving reliable evidence attesting to Antinous's family background, although Lambert believed it most likely that his family would have been peasant farmers or small business owners, thereby being socially undistinguished yet not from the poorest sectors of society. Lambert also considered it likely that Antinous would have had a basic education as a child, having been taught how to read and write.
Life with Hadrian
The Emperor Hadrian spent much time during his reign touring his empire, and arrived in Claudiopolis in June 123, which was probably when he first encountered Antinous. Given Hadrian's personality, Lambert thought it unlikely that they had become lovers at this point, instead suggesting it probable that Antinous had been selected to be sent to Italy, where he was probably schooled at the imperial paedagogium at the Caelian Hill. Hadrian meanwhile had continued to tour the empire, only returning to Italy in September 125, when he settled into his villa at Tibur. It was at some point over the following three years that Antinous became his personal favourite, for by the time he left for Greece three years later, he brought Antinous with him in his personal retinue:
Lambert described Antinous as "the one person who seems to have connected most profoundly with Hadrian" throughout the latter's life. Hadrian's marriage to Sabina was unhappy, and there is no reliable evidence that he ever expressed a sexual attraction for women, in contrast to much reliable early evidence that he was sexually attracted to boys and young men. For centuries, pederasty existed among Greece's leisured and citizen classes, with an older (the "lover," aged between 20 and 40) undertaking a sexual relationship with an (the "beloved," aged between 12 and 18) and taking a key role in his (the latter's) education. There is no historical evidence available to support at what age Antinous became a favourite of Hadrian.Fox, T. E. (2014). The Cult of Antinous and the Response of the Greek East to Hadrian's Creation of a God [Undergraduate thesis, Ohio University].
It is known that Hadrian believed Antinous to be intelligent and wise, and that they had a shared love of hunting, which was seen as a particularly manly pursuit in Roman culture. Although none survive, it is known that Hadrian wrote both an autobiography and erotic poetry about his boy favourites; it is therefore likely that he wrote about Antinous. During their relationship, there is no evidence that Antinous ever used his influence over Hadrian for personal or political gain.
In March 127, Hadrian—probably accompanied by Antinous—travelled through the Sabine area of Italy, Picenum, and Campania. From 127 to 129, the Emperor was then afflicted with an illness that doctors were unable to explain. In April 128, he laid the foundation stone for a temple of Venus and Rome in the city of Rome, during a ritual where he may well have been accompanied by Antinous. From there, Hadrian went on a tour of North Africa, during which he was accompanied by Antinous. In late 128, Hadrian and Antinous landed in Corinth, proceeding to Athens, where they remained until May 129, accompanied by Empress Sabina; the Caesernii brothers, frequent companions of the Emperor; and Pedanius Fuscus the Younger (a great-nephew of Hadrian). It was in Athens in September 128 that they attended the annual celebrations of the Great Mysteries of Eleusis, where Hadrian was initiated into the position of in the Telesterion.Cassius Dio pp. 444-445 It is generally agreed, although not definitely proved, that Antinous was also initiated at that time.
From there they headed to Asia Minor, settling in Antioch in June 129, where they were based for a year, visiting Syria, Arabia, and Judaea. From there, Hadrian became increasingly critical of Jewish culture, which he feared opposed Romanisation, and so introduced policies banning circumcision and building a Temple of Zeus-Jupiter on the former site of the Jewish Temple.Cassius Dio p. 447 From there, they headed to Egypt. Arriving in Alexandria in August 130, there they visited the sarcophagus of Alexander the Great. Although welcomed with public praise and ceremony, some of Hadrian's appointments and actions angered the city's Hellenic social elite, who began to gossip about his sexual activities, including those with Antinous.
Soon after, and probably in September 130, Hadrian and Antinous travelled west to Libya, where they had heard of a Marousian lion causing problems for local people. They hunted down the lion, and although the exact events are unclear, it is apparent that Hadrian saved Antinous's life during their confrontation with it, before the beast itself was killed. Hadrian widely publicised the event, casting bronze medallions of it, getting historians to write about it, commissioning Pancrates to write a poem about it, and having a tondo depicting it created which was later placed on the Arch of Constantine. On this tondo it was clear that Antinous was no longer a youth, having become more muscular and hairier, perceptibly more able to resist his master; and thus, it is likely that his relationship with Hadrian was changing as a result.
Throughout history there has been much controversy concerning the relationship between Hadrian and Antinous. In Royston Lambert's book Beloved and God, he writes "But as far as the central issues go—the history of Antinous, his relationship with Hadrian and the death—we have precious little more information than the earliest writers." Many of these early writers were biased towards Hadrian especially in regard to his relationship with Antinous.
The controversy surrounding the relationship between Hadrian and Antinous is due to a lack of extant evidence for where Antinous was during the years from 123–130 CE.Fox, T. E. (2014). The Cult of Antinous and the Response of the Greek East to Hadrian's Creation of a God [Undergraduate thesis, Ohio University]. The first mention of Antinous is from Pancrates and his Lion Hunt poem from 130 CE.A.R. Birley, Hadrian: The Restless Emperor, 241; T. Opper, Hadrian: Empire and Conflict (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2008), 173.
Hard evidence regarding Antinous's life is available in the form of the Pincian obelisk on Pincian Hill. On the west side of the relief is a mutilated phrase which states "he grew up to be a beautiful youth". This would suggest that Antinous was already an ephebe and that he was established in his home in Bithynia when he met Hadrian.D.R. Cartlidge, D.L. Dungan, Documents for the Study of the Gospels, 195; R. Lambert, Beloved and God: The Story of Hadrian and Antinous, 60. Many scholars believe, with the circumstantial evidence, that the relationship of Hadrian and Antinous lasted approximately three years: from 127 CE to October 130 CE, when Antinous drowned in the Nile. The conclusion is that there is little documentation for or about the actual relationship of Hadrian and Antinous.
Death
In late September or early October 130, Hadrian and his entourage, among them Antinous, assembled at Heliopolis to set sail upstream as part of a flotilla along the River Nile. The retinue included officials, the Prefect, army and naval commanders, as well as literary and scholarly figures. Possibly also joining them was Lucius Ceionius Commodus, a young aristocrat whom Antinous might have deemed a rival to Hadrian's affections. On their journey up the Nile, they stopped at Hermopolis Magna, the primary shrine to the god Thoth. It was shortly after this, in October 130—around the time of the festival of Osiris—that Antinous fell into the river and died, probably from drowning. Hadrian publicly announced his death, with gossip soon spreading throughout the Empire that Antinous had been intentionally killed. The nature of Antinous's death remains a mystery to this day; however, various speculations have been put forward: