thumb|upright=1.35|Rainbow flags in the Netherlands where [[Queen Beatrix signed a law to make it the first country to legalize same-sex marriage.]]
The following is the timeline of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people's history.
<!--Please also add applicable entries to the List of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or queer firsts by year article-->
Before the Common Era
9th millennium BC – 3rd millennium BC
101st century BC – 50th century BC
- 9,600 BC – c, 5,000 BC – Mesolithic rock art in the Grotta dell'Addaura in Sicily depicts male figures in hives that have been interpreted variously, including as hunters, acrobats, religious initiates, and gay sex.
70th century BC – 17th century BC
- c. 1980 – Among the sexual depictions in Neolithic and Bronze Age drawings and figurines from the Mediterranean area, as one author describes it, a "third sex" human figure having female breasts and male genitals or without distinguishing sex characteristics. In Neolithic Italy, female images are found in a domestic context, while images that combine sexual characteristics appear in burials or religious settings. In Neolithic Greece and Cyprus, figures are often dual-sexed or without identifying sexual characteristics.
3rd millennium BC
29th century BC – 25th century BC
- c. 2900 BC – c. 2500 BC – A burial of a suburb of Prague, Czech Republic, a male is buried in the outfit usually reserved for women. Archaeologists speculate that the burial corresponds to a transgender person or someone of the third sex.
24th century BC
- c. 2400 BC – Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum are believed by some observers to be the first same-sex couple in recorded history.
2nd millennium BC
18th century BC
- c. 1775 BC – c. 1761 BC – During the reign of King Zimri-Lim of the Kingdom of Mari, he is recorded to have male lovers.
15th century BC – 12th century BC
- c. 1500 BC – c. 1101 BC – The Code of Assura from either the Old Assyrian Empire or the Middle Assyrian Empire prescribes the following on male rape:
1st millennium BC
10th century BC – 6th century BC
- c. 1000 BC – c. 500 BC – The Vendidad dates from this period and within the text it states the following:
The guilty may be killed by any one, without an order from the Dastur, and by this execution an ordinary capital crime may be redeemed.
- c. 630 BC – Dorian aristocrats in Crete adopt formal relations between adult aristocrats and adolescent boys; an inscription from Crete is the oldest record of the social institution of paiderastia among the Greeks (see Cretan pederasty). Marriage between men in Greece was not legally recognized, but men might form lifelong relationships originating in paiderastia ("pederasty," without the pejorative connotations of the English word). These partnerships were not dissimilar to heterosexual marriages except that the older person served as educator or mentor.
- Sappho, a Greek lyric poet born on the island of Lesbos, was born between 630 and 612 BC, and died around 570 BC. The Alexandrians included her in the list of nine lyric poets. She was famous for her lesbian themes, giving her name and that of her homeland to the very definition of lesbianism (and the lesser used term of "sapphism"). She was exiled c. 600 BC unrelated to lesbianism. She was later permitted to return.
6th century BC
- 534 – 492 BC – Duke Ling of Wey and Mizi Xia had a loving same-sex relationship, where various plays and stories have commemorated their love story in the phrase, "the bitten peach".
- c. 540 – 530 BC – Wall paintings from the Etruscan Tomb of the Bulls (Italian: Tomba dei Tori), found in 1892 in the Monterozzi necropolis, Tarquinia, depict homosexual intercourse. The tomb is named for the pair of bulls who watch human sex scenes, one between a man and a woman, and the other between two men; these may be apotropaic, or embody aspects of the cycle of regeneration and the afterlife. The three-chamber tomb was inscribed with the name of the deceased for whom it was originally built, Aranth Spurianas or Arath Spuriana, and also depicts Achilles killing the Trojan prince Troilus, along with indications of Apollo cult.
- 521 BC – The Achaemenid Empire crucifies Polycrates and suppresses pederasty in Samos, which causes pederastic poets Ibycus and Anacreon to flee Samos.
5th century BC
- c. 486 BC – King Darius I adopts the Holiness Code of Leviticus for Persian Jews of the Achaemenid Empire, enacting the first ever state sanctioned death penalty for male same-sex relationships.
- c. 440 BC – Herodotus publishes Histories, stating in the book that Persians welcomed foreign customs, including adopting pederasty from the Greeks.
4th century BC
- 385 BC – Plato publishes Symposium in which Phaedrus, Eryximachus, Aristophanes and other Greek intellectuals argue that love between males is the highest form, while sex with women is lustful and utilitarian. Socrates, however, differs. He demonstrates extreme self-control when seduced by the beautiful Alcibiades.
- 350 BC – Plato publishes Laws in which the Athenian stranger and his companions criticize homosexuality as being lustful and wrong for society because it does not further the species and may lead to irresponsible citizenry.
- 346 BC - Aeschines' speech Against Timarchus, who was on trial for male prostitution, reveals Athenian attitudes to homosexuality.
- 338 BC – The Sacred Band of Thebes, a previously undefeated elite battalion made up of one hundred and fifty pederastic couples, is destroyed by the forces of Philip II of Macedon who bemoans their loss and praises their honour.
3rd or 2nd century BC
- 227 BC, 226 BC, 216 BC, or 149 BC – During the Roman Republic, the Lex Scantinia imposed penalties on those who committed a sex crime (stuprum) against a freeborn youth; infrequently mentioned or enforced, it may also have been used to prosecute male citizens who willingly took the passive role in homosexual relations. It is unclear whether the penalty was death or a fine. For an adult male citizen to desire and engage in same-sex relations was considered natural and socially acceptable, as long as his partner was a male prostitute (amasius), slave (concubinus) or infamis, a person excluded from the legal protections accorded a citizen. In the Imperial period, the Lex Scantinia was revived by Domitian as part of his program of judicial and moral reform.
1st century BC
- c. 90s – 80s BC – Quintus Lutatius Catulus was among a circle of poets who made short, light Hellenistic poems fashionable in the late Republic. Both his surviving epigrams address a male as an object of desire, signaling a new homoerotic aesthetic in Roman culture.
- 57 – 54 BC – Catullus writes the Carmina, including love poems to Juventius, boasting of sexual prowess with youth and violent invectives against "passive" homosexuals.
- c. 50 BC – The Lex Julia de vi publica, a Roman Republic law, was passed to define rape as forced sex against "boy, woman, or anyone" and the rapist was subject to execution. Men who had been raped were exempt from the loss of legal or social standing suffered by those who submitted their bodies to use for the pleasure of others; a male prostitute or entertainer was infamis and excluded from the legal protections extended to citizens in good standing. As a matter of law, a slave could not be raped; he was considered property and not legally a person. The slave's owner, however, could prosecute the rapist for property damage.
- 46 BC – Lucius Antonius, the brother of Mark Antony, accuses Gaius Octavius for having "given himself to Aulus Hirtius in Spain for three hundred thousand sesterces."
- 42 – 39 BC – Virgil writes the Eclogues, with Eclogue 2 a notable example of homoerotic Latin literature.
- 27 BC – The Roman Empire is established under the rule of Augustus. The first recorded same-sex marriage occurs during his reign, homosexual prostitution is taxed, and if someone is caught being sexually passive with another male, a Roman citizen could lose his citizenship.
- 26, 25 and 18 BC – Tibullus writes his elegies, with references to homosexuality.
- 7 – 1 BC – Emperor Ai of Han had a loving same-sex relationship with Dong Xian. In one historical record, Emperor Ai cut his own sleeves to not wake up his beloved Dong Xian.
Common Era
1st millennium
1st century
- Philo of Alexandria and Marcus Manilius provided descriptions of transgender people during the early Roman Empire. Philo stated: "Expending every possible care on their outward adornment, they are not ashamed even to employ every device to change artificially their nature as men into women". He also attested that some members of this group, to that end, had their penises removed.
- 54 – Nero becomes Emperor of Rome. Nero married two men, Pythagoras and Sporus, in legal ceremonies, with Sporus accorded the regalia worn by the wives of the Caesars. Juvenal and Martial note (with disapproval) that male couples are having traditional marriage ceremonies.
thumb|Wall painting of female couple from the Suburban Baths at Pompeii
- 79 – The eruption of Mount Vesuvius buries the coastal resorts of Pompeii and Herculaneum, preserving a rich collection of Roman erotic art, including representations of male-male and female-female.
- 98 – Trajan, one of the most beloved of Roman emperors, begins his reign. Trajan was well known for his homosexuality and fondness for young males. This was used to advantage by the king of Edessa, Abgar VII, who, after incurring the anger of Trajan for some misdeed, sent his handsome young son to make his apologies, thereby obtaining pardon.
:Publius Cornelius Tacitus writes Germania. In Germania, Tacitus writes that the punishment for those who engage in "bodily infamy" among the Germanic peoples is to "smother in mud and bogs under an heap of hurdles." Tacitus also writes in Germania that the Germanic warrior-chieftains and their retinues were "in times of peace, beauty, and in times of war, a defense". Tacitus later wrote in Germania that priests of the Swabian sub-tribe, the Naharvali or Nahanarvali, who "dress as women" to perform their priestly duties.
2nd century
- c. 200 – The Outlines of Pyrrhonism is published. In the book, Sextus Empiricus states that "amongst the Persians it is the habit to indulge in intercourse with males, but amongst the Romans it is forbidden by law to do so". He also stated in the book that "amongst us sodomy is regarded as shameful or rather illegal, but by the Germanic they say, it is not looked on as shameful but as a customary thing. It is said, too, that in Thebes long ago this practice was not held to be shameful, and they say that Meriones the Cretan was so called by way of indicating the Cretans' customed and some refer to this the burning love of Achilles for Patroclus. And what wonder, when both the adherents of the Cynic philosophy and the followers of Zeno of Citium, Cleanthes and Chrysippus, declare that this practice is indifferent?".
2nd century – 3rd century
- 193 – 211 – Roman emperor Septimius Severus prescribed capital punishment for homosexual rape throughout the Roman Empire.
3rd century
- 218 – 222 – Roman emperor Elagabalus's reign begins. At different times, Elagabalus marries five women and a man named Zoticus, an athlete from Smyrna, in a lavish public ceremony at Rome; but the Syrian's most stable relationship is with the chariot driver Hierocles, and Cassius Dio says Elagabalus delighted in being called Hierocles' mistress, wife, and queen.
- 222 – 235 – Roman emperor Severus Alexander deported homosexuals who were active in public life. According to Christius, Alexander increased the penalties for homosexuality throughout the Roman Empire. According to Augustan History, Alexander decreed that the taxes on pimps, prostitutes, and exoleti should not be deposited in the public purse; instead, he ordered that these taxes should be used for restoring the theatre of Marcellus, the Circus Maximus, the amphitheatre, and the stadium build by Domitian in the Campus Martius. According to Ælius Lampridus, Alexander even contemplated making male prostitution illegal.
- 244 – 249 – Roman emperor Marcus Julius Philippus either attempted to or did outlaw male prostitution throughout the Roman Empire.
- 337 – Constantius II and Constans I become the 62nd Emperor of the Roman Empire. During their reigns, they both engaged in same-sex relationships.
- 342 – The Roman emperors Constantius II and Constans I issue the following imperial decree for the Roman Empire:
- c. 380s – Ammianus Marcellinus publishes Res Gestae. In Res Gestae, Marcellinus writes that the Persians "are extravagantly given to venery, and are hardly contented with a multitude of concubines; they are far from immoral relations with boys." Also in Res Gestae, Marcellinus writes that "We have learned that these Taifali were a shameful folk, so sunken in a life of shame and obscenity, that in their country the boys are coupled with the men in a union of unmentionable lust, to consume the flower of their youth in the polluted intercourse of those paramours."
- 390 – The Roman emperors Valentinian II, Theodosius I and Arcadius issue the following imperial decrees for the Roman Empire: