To some, this is the first recorded same-sex couple in history.
Before I go into their story though, I need to point out a few things.
History is written by the victors. And in that time, it was pretty hard to write something that survives this long. So, what got written was important, and it's survival means something.
History is read by humans. Humans have bias. There's also a thing called Ethnocentrism, which I might post about later, but basically says that we assign our values to other cultures instead of treating the other culture as an equal. That means, if a homophobe (which isn't a good word and I'll discuss this later) is the one reading the history, they slant things to go with their values. For example, these two men in what is traditionally a marriage pose, are obviously siblings. Or friends. Or these two women buried together like a married couple are obviously mistress/servant or something. There is no way that homosexual relationships have been around for over 4 thousand years. Instead, it must be a new thing that's a big sin.
Unfortunately, I still can't load pictures, so you'll have to use the links at the bottom to find them yourself.
But, back to Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum.
So, in about 2400 BCE, these two were confidants to the Pharoah of the time and Overseers to the manicurists of the palace. They were important enough to get their own tomb, which is sometimes called 'The Tomb of Two Brothers' because historians can be biased idiots sometimes.
The panels of the tomb have them consistently together, sometimes in poses reserved for married couple (nose to nose), have gender-neutral terms for them, feminine symbols used for them sometimes, and so on, plus they were buried in the tomb together. But, somehow, historians think that they might be brothers, possibly conjoined, or maybe even just close friends. There are several panels that depict their wives and children, but the fact that they were buried together instead of with those wives, that says a lot.
To be (slightly) fair to the historians, it's possible. Family members might have been buried together, or they might have been buried together because of their close (platonic) connection or something. That's entirely true.
It doesn't explain everything though. The marriage pose, the intimacy in their panels, and the fact that the names inscribed can translate to 'Joined in Life, Joined in Death', and the fact that they were buried in what is described as an embrace, that all tells me that they were together.
Them being buried like this suggests that their relationship was not only known, but accepted by their lord.
Ancient Egypt and homosexuality was complicated. There are stories about one of the Gods, Set, trying to prove dominance over Horus by 'topping' him, which got reversed by Horus being smart about it, but there are also suggestions that some older Egyptians had similar relationships. We may never know, because there isn't a lot of evidence to check anymore, but we'll see what pans out.
Either way, I'm going to side with it being a homosexual couple. Far from the first in history, but a good famous couple from history that we know the names of. And another example of why you need to remember that things, even this, are written by humans. That means that everything can be wrong. I could misunderstand something, you could misunderstand this, and so on. With that in mind, I am trying to tell you the truth, and verify things by multiple sources, but that doesn't mean I'll get everything.
I'll see you again tomorrow. Hopefully you found this interesting like I did, but I'll understand if ancient gay people aren't at the top of your list of fun things.
Sources:
These articles do talk about this pair, but I'm not going to type that out every time.
Legacy Project Chicago-- Has a bunch of other links at the bottom to follow if you want
Out Adventures-- Egypt's First Gay Couple
Hyperallergic-- First Gay Couple in History
These are just historic gay couples
Teen Source-- LGBT History Lesson
World History-- 10 famous or not so famous LGBT couples in History
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