As many readers are already aware, I am a queer woman who is currently a graduate student in Ancient Greek and Roman Studies. For a couple of years now, I have been following the subreddit r/SapphoAndHerFriend, which is named after the ancient Greek lyric poet Sappho, who is known for her homoerotic work, and is dedicated to showcasing humorous or mildly infuriating examples of queer erasure. It’s an amusing space. Unfortunately, people are constantly making posts in the subreddit about Sappho that are, shall we say, factually dubious. For instance, users frequently make posts in which they make fun of “historians” for having supposedly believed for ages in total earnestness that Sappho had a husband named “Kerkylas of Andros,” which they say translates as “Dick Allcock from the Isle of Man.”
Posts of this kind are a frequent occurrence, but this one happens to be the most recent. These posts regularly ignore the fact that the claim they mock “historians” for having supposedly believed only occurs in one extremely late, notoriously uncritical premodern source and modern scholars have generally recognized it as an obscene joke for nearly 170 years. Additionally, I think that people should be aware of some rather discomforting information about the man whose translation of the name they keep sharing.
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