23) Jóhanna Sigurdardóttir (b.1942), the Prime Minister of Iceland who married her partner in 2010 after steering through the country’s same-sex marriage act. Jóhanna may not have become Prime Minister at all if the previous government hadn’t been forced out of office after the economic disaster caused by the collapse of the Icelandic banks. The credit for bringing down that government has been given to …
24) Hordur Torfason (b.1945), who organised the protests against the government outside the parliament building. He began his activism back in the 1970s by campaigning for the rights of asylum seekers from Africa. Hordur founded an lgbt organisation which still helps asylum seekers to find refuge in Iceland. There are many African refugees seeking asylum in Europe because of persecution in their home countries due to their sexuality. African governments often claim that homosexuality is “un-African” and a European “import” and keep imposing anti-gay legislation. This claim has been proved wrong by ethnologists such as …
25) Lydia Cabrera (1899-1991), who wrote extensively on the influence that the Yoruba religion of the African slaves had on her native Cuban culture. In particular she wrote about the influence those religions had on the Cuban faith called Santeria, a belief related to Voodoo. Lydia showed that some Santeria deities display distinct homosexual traits, such as …
26) Ochossi, the patron god of archery. This patronage also shows how religions assimilate attributes from other faiths. The Yoruba deities of the African slaves became linked to the Christian gods of their slave masters on Cuba. As god of archery Ochossi was equated with St. Sebastian, and both have become patron-protectors of gay men. In turn, St. Sebastian became equated with the Greek god of archery, …
27) Apollo, who’s most famous same sex partner was Prince Hyakinthos. Apollo had many other patronages, including sport, medicine and music. His musical skills were displayed many times in Greek mythology and he was often challenged to a music contest. One of these challengers was …
28) Pan, who also had several male lovers. Pan was also a musical god. As was always the case Apollo won the challenge, and this type of contest, in which a jury decides on the quality of the music, is still conducted to this day, not by the gods but by nations. The most well-known contest celebrating its 60th year in 2015 is the Eurovision Song Contest, which is no stranger to lgbt singers, the first being …
29) Bob Benny (1926-2011) in 1959. In 1961 his second entry came last with only one vote from Luxembourg (that year’s winner). One of the nations giving him “nil points” was Denmark, whose commentator for the contest was the father of …
30) Sandi Toksvig (b.1958) who has, herself, become a well-known broadcaster. Among her regular appearances are those on a popular archaeology television series, Sandi having graduated from Cambridge with a degree in archaeology. Other Danish lgbt archaeologists are few and far between, the only other well-known one being …
31) Count Eigil Knuth (1903-1996), who once worked for the same Danish broadcasting station as Sandi Toksvig’s father. Just as Sandi found fame as a broadcaster rather than an archaeologist, Eigil Knuth found fame as something other than what he trained for. Eigil originally trained as a gym teacher at the college founded and run by …
32) Niels Bukh (1880-1950), a pioneer of new gymnastic techniques which were popular in Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan during World War II. Japan officially adopted his training techniques in 1937 and made it compulsory in schools and the army, as experienced by …
33) Goh Mishima (1924-1989). Having been trained in the Bukh gymnastic techniques and serving in the Japanese army during World War II Goh became an artist specialising in depicting images of bondage and sado-masochism. In the Tokyo gyms Goh got to know and become friends with …
34) Yukio Mishima (1925-1970), who encouraged him to become more graphic and explicit in his art. The BDSM culture in Japan was very strong at the time and influenced some of the European bondage techniques. Sado-masochism itself is partly named after …
35) the Marquis de Sade (1740-1814), who had a reputation in his own lifetime for sexual cruelty and violence. His descendants disowned the family title out of shame until the 200th anniversary of his death in 2014 when the present heir re-adopted the title of Marquis de Sade. This is in contrast to the inhabitants of the island of Lesbos, which was once ruled by the Marquis’ imperial Byzantine ancestors. The Lesbians object to the use of the word lesbian as the name for a form of sexual preference, a name which came into use due to the writings of Lesbos’s most famous inhabitant, …
36) Sappho, the first female poet from Ancient Greece whose name is known to us. In her romantic poetry Sappho used allusions to the epic poems of Homer, especially in connection to the marriage ceremony. One famous hero she alludes to is …
37) Achilles, the famous Greek hero of the Trojan War. Before heading to Troy he hid from the war by disguising himself as a woman for several years before being discovered by Odysseus. During the Trojan War Achilles formed a close emotional (and probable sexual) relationship with a fellow soldier, …
38) Patrokles, upon whose death Achilles became inconsolable. Achilles’ previous relationship with a princess while he was disguised as a woman takes us back to the lesbians of Lesbos, an island which legend says Achilles conquered for the Greeks. The Greeks exiled 36) Sappho from Lesbos, but during the Byzantine Empire many royals and officials were exiled to Lesbos, including the ancestor of 35) the Marquis de Sade, a Byzantine Emperor. Other emperors fared worse, such as his earlier ancestor, …
39) Emperor Mikhael III (840-867), who only escaped being exiled to Lesbos like so many others by being assassinated by his usurper, who was also his lover, adopted son and Co-Emperor, …
40) Emperor Basileios I (d.886). Basileios was a peasant who rose to the imperial throne in spite of not being “born in the purple”, a term meaning being born to the reigning emperor. Purple was a colour used exclusively for the imperial robes and was produced from a dye made from sea snail shells found on the island of Kythira, the legendary birthplace of Aphrodite and site of the main shrine to …
41) Eros.
We restart our journey Around the World in 80 Gays at the weekend, when we begin our final 40 names with Eros, and over the coming months we’ll link together the Mutiny on the Bounty, splatter movies, The Three Musketeers, extraterrestial life and Oscar Wilde before arriving back at the name we began with.
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