9. Pharaonic Egypt, 330 – 30 BC
The ancient Egyptians were quite relaxed about sexuality and gender. They had some of the world’s most progressive gender norms, at the time, with women’s rights being almost on par with men, including the valuable right to both purchase and inherit property. The gods of ancient Egypt also led the way for progressive values, with the god Hapi having numerous wives and also being represented in both male and female forms. The gods Horus and Set were described as having a homosexual relationship in The Pyramid Texts, with a passage stating, “Horus has penetrated Seth’s anus with his seed. Seth has penetrated Horus’ anus with his seed.”
Despite the relatively high status of women’s rights, almost nothing is said in ancient Egyptian texts about lesbians or sex between women. While homosexuality is quite thoroughly discussed, there are only two possible references to lesbians throughout all the recorded works historians have access to. For men’s homosexual activity, Egyptians carried similar prejudices to the later Greeks and Romans, with the act of submitting to another man in sex frowned upon, but homosexual urges and dominant activity were widely tolerated. The ancient Egyptians were also notable for having ritual prostitutes, encouraging incest in their ruling families, and the belief that intercourse would occur in the afterlife.