queer masculinities

150 Queer Masculinities, 1550–1800
did not preclude ongoing sexual involvement with women, whether
inside or outside of marriage, and thus this identity differs from
modern homosexuality. Carolyn Dinshaw argues that ‘[i]dentities may
be constituted by acts,’ and ‘“acts”, as an analytical category, cannot in
itself be regarded as sufficient and self-explanatory,’ despite the centrality
which many queer theorists have given to acts in analysis of premodern
sexualities. 35 Because of the Muslim custom of not discussing
homosexual acts, differentiation between boy and boy-lover was outwardly
based on age and/or status than on an economy of acts, though
such a dichotomy existed. Burton notes that a distinction was drawn
amongst South Asians between the ‘doer’ and the ‘done.’ 36 A ghazal of
Mazmoon indicates that sometimes position was mentioned: ‘In the
tavern what is done is totally indecent/But when I saw the school there
too they talked only of the “active” and the “passive”.’ 37 Patriarchy,
and the power invested in it, did not allow the South Asian adult male
to identify (openly) as sexually passive, unless he lost the status associated
with his masculinity (see below). According to Rahman, Mughal
society did not create a socially acceptable place for egalitarian relationships
between adult men. 38
An egalitarian relationship with respect to age might have been
socially acceptable only if two males were young. One such relationship
may be depicted in a miniature from the ‘Fitzwilliam album’ (ca.
1555–60, see Fig. 2). 39 The text accompanying the illustration has not
been analyzed to my knowledge. At this time it cannot be ruled out
that one of the couple is a slave. However, a Persian miniature (ca.
1540), believed to be by the same artist, shows a very similar scene, in
which two boys, courting, are attended by a third male, who is likely a
servant (see Fig. 3). 40 Richard Burton indicates that the ‘Persian vice’
began in boyhood:
It begins in boyhood and many Persians account for it by paternal
severity. Youths arrived at puberty find none of the facilities with
which Europe supplies fornication. Onanism is to a certain extant
discouraged by circumcision, and meddling with the father’s slavegirls
and concubines would be risking cruel punishment if not death.
Hence they use each other by turns, a ‘puerile practice,’ known as
Alish-Takish the Lat. Facere vicibus or mutuum facere. Temperament,
media, and atavism recommend the custom to the general; and after
marrying and begetting heirs, Paterfamilias returns to the Ganymede.
Hence all odes of Hafiz are addressed to youths … 41