Ancient Rome

Unlike the Greeks, Romans never institutionalized pederasty. Roman boylove though influenced by the Greeks slaves brought to Rome often was as violent and brutal as the Romans themselves. The Romans tended to value sexual conquest above romance and love. Pederasty came in and out of fashion during different periods of both the republic and the empire. Roman patricians frequently condemned the practice of Greek love publicly while privately complaining that “a pretty boy cost more than a plot of land ….”