“Your thighs pressed against mine, firm as marble, yet alive with the strength of the pasture’s rams.”

This engraving evokes two figures from ancient Sicily. Hiero II (c. 306–215 BCE), once a general and later tyrant before being recognized as king, made Syracuse a prosperous city and a political and agricultural center of the Hellenistic world. He appears here as a heroic nude sovereign, enthroned with the majesty of an ancient ruler.

Opposite him stands Diodorus, his favorite and advisor, clothed and crowned with foliage. A member of the Syracusan elite, Diodorus was more than a courtier: tradition places him close to the king as confidant and companion, sharing not only counsel but intimacy.

The moment is charged with intensity: Hiero, with a hand both firm and tender, cradles Diodorus’ face, drawing him near in a gesture that anticipates a kiss. At once regal and deeply personal, the scene allows sovereignty to dissolve into affection.

At their sides, the animals echo the men themselves: a powerful ram beside Hiero, its younger counterpart beside Diodorus. These creatures not only root the scene in Sicily’s pastoral abundance but also serve as symbolic extensions of the virility and vitality of both protagonists. The presence of the flocks recalls the bucolic world of Theocritus, the Syracusan poet of the 3rd century BCE, whose idylls sang of herdsmen, rustic gods, and the loves between men unfolding among pastures. In his verses, homosexual desire found its stage amid fields and flocks — a poetic backdrop echoed here in visual form.

On the ground, scattered walnuts appear almost casually, yet their roundness and paired shells recall the male gonads, extending the imagery of fecundity and desire into the very soil of the scene.

Theatrical in style, the engraving recalls the language of Doré and his circle. It transforms an imagined encounter into a vision of rare intensity: not the king in military triumph, but the man who, at the height of his power, allows himself the tenderness of a kiss.

Idylle inspired by Theocritus

The shade of the plane-tree covered us,
and your beard brushed my cheek like the thistles in bloom.
I breathed your nearness, warm as the summer wind,
and sweeter than the thyme crushed beneath the feet of the flock.
Your thighs pressed against mine, firm as marble,
yet alive with the strength of the pasture’s rams.
The meadow knew our wrestling,
and the grass bent gladly under the weight of our bodies.
Your breath poured upon me like honey from the comb,
your voice low, a murmur gentler than the reed’s song.
Even Pan, master of desire, would envy such union,
for no god has known the joy I found in you.

Strophes inspired by Theocritus

Seated beside me, you laid your hand upon my shoulder,
and I felt the strength of your arm, firmer than the trunk of the olive tree.
Your chest rose like a hill beneath the sun,
and my eyes found rest there, like a ram beneath the shade of the pine.
Your laughter leapt clear as the waters of the spring,
your lips outshone the sweet apples ripening in the orchard.
When you gazed at me, shepherd wreathed with wild flowers,
I knew in your eyes the flame that was searching for mine.
Not even Apollo, nor the satyrs drunk with wine,
have tasted a sweeter companionship than yours.
We share both the couch and the flocks,
and love moves between us like the breeze across the meadow.

Notes on the Poet Theocritus

Theocritus (c. 300 – after 260 BCE), born in Syracuse in Sicily, is regarded as the founder of Greek bucolic poetry. His poems, known as Idylls, created a new pastoral world in which shepherds, flocks, rustic gods, and landscapes provided the setting for lyrical expression. He spent part of his life in Alexandria, at the Ptolemaic court, where he also composed urban mimes and mythological pieces, but it is his rustic scenes that have left a lasting mark on Western tradition.

Among his Idylls, several address love between men with striking clarity. Idyll XII (The Beloved) takes the form of a passionate song addressed to a young man and is often read as a celebration of eros paiderastikos. Idyll XXIX, though fragmentary, conveys the voice of a narrator speaking to his male beloved, expressing the troubling power of unrequited desire. Idyll XXX develops a similar register, that of a lover reproaching his companion for abandoning him. Taken together, these texts give homoerotic love an explicit place within the pastoral landscape. Some scholars estimate that as many as seven Idylls contain homoerotic themes, underscoring the persistence of this motif in Theocritus’ work.

Bucolic poetry in this sense has little in common with epic or tragedy. It is marked instead by anti-heroism and simplicity: it highlights intimacy, daily relationships, nature, and emotion. The myth of Daphnis, the shepherd beloved of the gods and often portrayed as the object of male desire, captures this spirit. In Theocritus, love — including homosexual love — is not presented as an exception or a drama, but as a natural component of rustic life.