Pederasty or paederasty (US:  or UK: ) is a sexual relationship between an adult man and a pubescent or adolescent boy. The term pederasty is primarily used to refer to historical practices of certain cultures, particularly ancient Greece and ancient Rome. In most countries today such relationships are illegal. The local age of consent determines whether a person is considered legally competent to consent to sexual acts, and whether such contact is child sexual abuse or statutory rape. An adult engaging in sexual activity with a minor may be considered abusive by medical authorities for a variety of reasons, including the age of the minor, the likelihood of the minor developing one or more mental disorders, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, physical injury to the minor, and the minors propensity for further victimization in adulthood. Etymology and usage
Pederasty derives from the combination of Ancient Greek: παίδ-, romanized: paid-, lit. boy, child (stem) with ἐραστής, erastēs, lover (cf. eros). Late Latin pæderasta was borrowed in the 16th century directly from Platos classical Greek in The Symposium. (Latin transliterates αί as æ.) The word first appeared in the English language during the Renaissance, as pæderastie (e.g. in Samuel Purchas Pilgrimes), in the sense of sexual relations between men and boys. The Oxford English Dictionary defines it as "Homosexual relations between a man and a boy; homosexual anal intercourse, usually with a boy or younger man as the passive partner".
History
Ancient Greece
Pederasty in ancient Greece was a socially acknowledged romantic relationship between an adult male (the erastes) and a younger male (the eromenos), usually in his teens. It was characteristic of the Archaic and Classical periods. The influence of pederasty on Greek culture of these periods was so pervasive that it has been called "the principal cultural model for free relationships between citizens. "Some scholars locate its origin in initiation ritual, particularly rites of passage on Crete, where it was associated with entrance into military life and the religion of Zeus. It has no formal existence in the Homeric epics, and seems to have developed in the late 7th century BC as an aspect of Greek homosocial culture, which was characterized also by athletic and artistic nudity, delayed marriage for aristocrats, symposia, and the social seclusion of women. Pederasty was both idealized and criticized in ancient literature and philosophy. The argument has recently been made that idealization was universal in the Archaic period; criticism began in Athens as part of the general Classical Athenian reassessment of Archaic culture.Scholars have debated the role or extent of pederasty, which is likely to have varied according to local custom and individual inclination. Athenian law, for instance, recognized both consent and age as factors in regulating sexual behavior.Enid Bloch argues that many Greek boys in these relationships may have been traumatized by knowing that they were violating social customs, since the "most shameful thing that could happen to any Greek male was penetration by another male."