In Ancient Greece love between males was in many ways analogous to the marriages of the time, seen as equally important in the life of the individual, and enshrined in Greek mythology it was the cornerstone of a cultural tradition that 2500 years ago provoked the awakening of democracy, theater, philosophy, mathematics, history, and so on. Male love was thought to bring out the best qualities in a youth, especially manliness and courage. In warfare soldiers often fought side-by-side with their beloveds, as in the renowned Theban band; later, led by Alexander the Great and his boyfriend Hephaestion, the Greeks conquered the known world. Greece, of course, was no Utopia: prostitution and rape, often attended by slavery, were common.

In Japan,apprentice Samurai paired up with older warriors to be trained in love and war, and even the shogun had – besides his concubines – many boyfriends, their “nanshoku” loves recorded by writers and shunga painters who immortalized “shudo,” the Way of the Young. They likewise immortalized the hard lives of the “tobiko” or fly boys, traveling young kabuki actors who had to labor on stage by day and please their clients in bed by night.

In the Moslem lands, famous Iranian and Arab poets such as Hafiz i-Shirazi and Abu Nuwas praised and rued the charms of boys (whom they sometimes plied with wine and seduced). Mullahs and censors railed against male love, but men of all walks of life, from Caliphs to porters, delighted in it and all looked forward to being attended by “unaging youths as beautiful as pearls” once in paradise. Sufi holy men from India to Turkey sought to find Allah by gazing upon the beauty of beardless youths. Storytellers enshrined gay love tales in the Thousand and One Nights. Artists like Riza i-Abbasi amused kings and princes with exquisitely wrought Persian miniatures and calligraphies.
Mullahs and censors railed against male love, but men of all walks of life, from Caliphs to porters, delighted in it and all looked forward to being attended by “unaging youths as beautiful as pearls” once in paradise.

Check out the Androphile Gay History Project.