When archaeologists uncovered a small, molded glass engraving of a classical-style portrait at a dig site in West Texas, its discovery opened many questions about origin, ownership, representation and meaning. Unearthed at Fort Davis beneath one of the former 19th-century military fort’s enlisted men’s barracks, the intaglio depicts an androgynous figure - perhaps that of Antinous, a first-century young man who was a lover of Emperor Hadrian and posthumously deified. His story deeply intertwines with queer history, says UC Irvine anthropologist Christopher Lowman, while adding that even without definitive identification the artifact raises multiple questions and possibilities. In a new article, Lowman and coauthors explore the artifact’s ambiguities through the lens of queer theory, questioning assumptions and normalizations about the object and what, when and who is associated with its history.

“The figure’s androgyny invites a queer perspective, but beyond this we believe that analyzing the intaglio from perspectives rooted in queer theory leads to an open-minded analysis of the object’s possibilities,” write Lowman and coauthors. “Who could the intaglio represent? How might its ambiguity itself inform understanding of the 19th-century frontier and military? What does the presence of such an object reveal about connections to art, tourism, and cultural discourse between the primarily Black and mixed-ancestry men at Fort Davis and the rest of the world?”

The full discussion, available online in Historical Archaeology, provides an opportunity to consider a wide range of interpretations.

“This can, and should, include those that are only whispered possibilities and haunting anticipations because they too are part of history," says Lowman and coauthors. "These are part of the messiness that makes up human relationships, as well as the ongoing, and sometimes historically intentional, gaps in records and remains. Uncertainty, in all its queerness, is the foundation of our research questions."

Below, Lowman expands on some of the uncertain conclusions that emerged from the research team’s review and how embracing a queer theoretical perspective opens possibilities for new lines of research, where ambiguity is seen as a virtue.

Coauthors of the article, “Ode to a Grecian Boy: Queering the Fort Davis Intaglio,” include Laurie A. Wilkie and Mark C. Emerson, UC Berkeley; Katrina C. L. Eichner, University of Idaho; and David G. Hyde, Sonoma Academy.

Q: What drew your team to apply queer theory to the analysis of this particular artifact, and how did that lens guide your understanding of the intaglio and its context?

A: There are so many unexpected connections here. It’s an ancient image, but remade in the nineteenth century. It likely came from Europe, but someone brought it to a fort in Texas where my coauthors Katrina Eichner and Laurie Wilkie ran archaeological projects. Even the building where my coauthor David Hyde found it should have been unoccupied according to historical records, but clearly that’s not the whole story. Queer theory encourages researchers to recognize assumptions in both the past and present, reminding our team that the challenges posed by this artifact are worth exploring even if they seem unexpected. Is there evidence of classical reception on the frontier? (yes), and among Black communities and members of the military? (yes!). But some questions are so far unanswerable: who owned it, how was it lost, what specifically would it have meant to the people who saw it? Queer theory involves intentionally not smoothing over the possible into just the probable, so we tried to use our limited evidence to learn more about classical education popular at the time and the multiple ways an intaglio might have been used in jewelry. We also questioned whether Antinous would have been recognized already as symbolic of love between men (yes, and this had been the case since long before) – although queer theory is not restricted to what we recognize as queer subjects.

Q: You mention Antinous as a strong contender for the depicted figure. Why Antinous?

A: Nineteenth century intaglios and cameos often featured classical figures, but usually they had some identifying trait: Psyche’s butterfly wings, Mercury’s caduceus, or clear references to well-known art. The Fort Davis intaglio has none of these. The portrait could be a generic bust, but what stood out most to us was the figure’s androgyny. As we showed the intaglio to colleagues and experts, no one we spoke to could conclusively say whether the portrait was male or female. Antinous is usually depicted as androgynous with flowing curls and a downcast gaze, as the bust on the intaglio has. But artists reproduced his image so often, partly because his lover Emperor Hadrian deified him, that all kinds of portrait styles have existed since ancient times. Queer theory helped us here too, since we recognized that perhaps all this ambiguity existed in the past as well. Queer history is rife with doubled and hidden meanings, and if the intaglio is indeed Antinous, then assigning only one interpretation to it would not be accurate. Rather, some people would have appreciated his image as an aesthetic ideal, while others wrote poems or had their portraits painted with Antinous as a clue to their desires. This uncertainty could have been an advantage as well, masking meanings for those not in the know.

Q: Based on where the intaglio was found, what narratives emerge regarding race, culture, sexuality and the U.S. military in the late 1800s?

A: With so few written sources available dealing either with classical reception among the Black community on the western frontier or nineteenth century military men’s sexuality, the artifact catalyzed our exploration of these subjects more deeply. I imagine that there were men whose sexual desires would have transgressed the social boundaries of gender and race of that time and place, as they have done across history, but it’s also important to carefully examine evidence and context. Our artifact-prompted questions gave us insights into life at the time. For example, most though not all Black and mixed-ancestry enlisted men at the fort were literate, contrary to some later historians’ assumptions. Memoirs record classical history and mythology among soldiers’ books and other everyday references. Military records indicate times when soldiers formed strong bonds with bunkmates, or when soldiers of different racial backgrounds spent free time together, drinking or embracing. One recorded desertion happened because of a soldier who had become too “greatly attached” to another. While these could be intense friendships or other non-sexual relationships, they clearly crossed lines of social expectation and weaken what we might assume to have been the hard boundaries of race and sexuality. The intaglio itself, found in a place where no one was supposed to be in a half-built barracks and nearby remains of fire and bottle glass, is a testament to someone breaking the rules.

Q: How might future research benefit from adopting a queering approach?

A: In any observational science, researchers need both imagination (to ask a range of questions) and multiple lines of evidence (to build a story and understand their subject). Queer theory encourages researchers to reject assumptions, accept ambiguity, and recognize that there are sometimes multiple answers to our questions. Exploring the possibility that the intaglio is Antinous led us to learn much more about topics outside expectations in frontier military history. I hope future researchers find this approach useful especially for subjects with little information available. This article is part of a thematic collection focused on queer theory now appearing in Historical Archaeology, and I encourage readers to explore other contributions to the volume.

-Heather Ashbach, UCI Social Sciences
-pictured: The Fort Davis intaglio, photographed at the University of California, Berkeley Historical Archaeology Lab, courtesy of Christopher B. Lowman, 2015. Interior headshot: Christopher Lowman, courtesy of UCI Social Sciences.