The Tenth Century Equivalent of 🍑 🍆? 🥬.

This essay on erotic communications about lettuce in the tenth century is the thirteenth installment of the Botanical Imaginations series, which complicates, diversifies, and proliferates the stories we tell about plants. Series editors: Laleh Ahmad, Tessa Archambault, Dylan Couch, Ellie Kincaid, Rebecca Laurent, Kayleigh Lobdell, Clare Michaud, Nicolás Felipe Rueda Rey

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Due to its resemblance to a vulva or a buttocks, the peach emoji has become synonymous with both hetero- and homosexual desire. The symbolism is so widely recognized that Instagram has banned the emoji in suggestive contexts. So too has the eggplant emoji also gained sexual connotations, igniting humorous debates online about when the plant is meant to be phallic versus vegetal.

These emojis provide users playful ambiguity that hints at further sexual encounters, be they virtual or in-person. Modern dating apps generally lead couples to text through social media before any traditional face-to-face conversation, and as such peach and eggplant emojis can serve as digital foreplay. Emojis are vital to convey non-verbal cues that are often lost in text, such as tone, charm, and playful teasing.

While emojis have become a crucial form of flirtation in the twenty-first century’s digital world, pictographic language has a much longer legacy. One linguist, Hamza Alshenqeeti, argues that emoji usage parallels ancient forms of communication, such as Egyptian hieroglyphs and Sumerian cuneiform. Alshenqeeti also argues that our daily emoji usage may help us to better understand the communicative depths of these ancient languages.

Had I read Alshenqeeti’s work a few years ago, I might have been skeptical of his conclusions due to the many thousands of years separating ancient Egypt from today. However, this past year, I have found myself identifying a unique kind of non-alphabetic communication that is neither emoji, nor hieroglyphic within my own research in medieval history.

I was certainly surprised to learn that two men—a bishop named Theodore and his friend, the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Emperor Constantine VII—sent letters and a head of lettuce(!) back and forth to each other in the tenth century C.E. In this culture, letters are normal to exchange… Lettuce, on the other hand, is not!

The more I read the letters, however, the better I was able to contextualize and understand what the lettuce may have meant for these two men. The two men seem to be flirting with each other through the letters (and lettuce!) they sent back and forth. Like the peach or the eggplant, I believe the lettuce is a form of erotic communication between Theodore and Constantine VII. Like emojis, lettuce serves as a literary and physical vehicle through which these two men could flirt with each other with the kind of ambiguity and suggestiveness that would be familiar to any Hinge user today.

Modern emojis are certainly anachronous to the tenth century. However, they also reveal the long durée of botanical stand-ins to connote eroticism both in contemporary dating platforms and in Medieval Europe.

Tenth Century Love Letters

In the tenth century, the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Emperor Constantine VII proved to be a unique figure. Due to his keen intellect, his cataloguing tendencies, and his impressive literary output, he produced more (still existing) writing than any other individual from the Eastern Roman Empire. The modern pejorative “byzantine” comes from the very bookish culture that Constantine himself helped shape.

One of Constantine’s most understudied writings, however, are eighteen letters between him and his friend and confidant, Bishop Theodore of Cyzicus. In these letters, the two men express their longing to see each other, describing their “burning hearts” for each other and stating that the words of each new letter are “as sweet as honey.” On one occasion, Constantine admits to wanting to bite Theodore, “not to cause pain, but to increase our pleasures more.”

It is anachronous to describe such relationship as “gay” or “homosexual,” especially when neither man had these terms himself. Nor is it fair for me to give a label to the relationship that they themselves could not have. Yet, the letters hint at a deeper relationship than non-romantic or non-erotic friendship. I believe the gift of lettuce is key to understanding their relationship.

In this culture, gifts were often sent alongside letters, including food items like wine, fresh fruits, fish, and vegetables, and non-perishables such as lotion, tree-resin, and glassware. Like a modern care package or bouquet with a note, these men used gifts to express their feelings for each other. They also referenced the gifts in their letters, hinting at what those feelings might be.

Love Letters Lettuce

While these letters were full of surprising turns of phrases, what caught my attention the most was the gift of a head of lettuce which Constantine requested, and Theodore happily sent.

Constantine first brings up the lettuce when mentioning Theodore’s rural dwelling. Constantine says, “I deemed Olympian lettuce above the precious stones and emeralds of the Indians.” Here “Olympian” could refer to both the Mount Olympus of Greek mythology and to the region of Anatolia where Theodore lives (which had its own regional “Mount Olympus”). Constantine expresses how much Theodore’s gifts mean to him—and by extension how much Theodore means to him—when he says that his gift of even a lettuce would be better than the most valuable jewels of mortals.

Constantine references the lettuce again in a subsequent letter. In it, he highlights features of Theodore’s home which are “well-suited for good health,” including the cool mountain breeze, the sweet and ever-flowing abundance of water, and the “abundant moisture of the lettuce and whatever else nourishes the holy fathers in that place.” Constantine’s constant refrain about being watered is a projection of his own thirst—be it for water or for Theodore himself!

Consumed by Desire

Theodore addresses Constantine’s thirst for lettuce in a subsequent letter, when he finally agrees to send Constantine the much-anticipated vegetable.

These letters are written in a highly rhetorical level of Greek, which makes English translations sound almost Shakespearean. For example, Theodore assures Constantine that his rural environment—the aforementioned, cool breezes, sweet water, and lettuce—ought to quench his “ardent heartfelt flame for you [Constantine]…” However, much like Adele’s classic, the heat of Constantine’s letter overpowers these moist and wet conditions—and in fact fired up Theodore’s “desire for you [Constantine].”

Theodore can’t see Constantine in person but wants to send something tangible to him in his place: He would like Constantine to “partake [with him] in something external.” He sends the “Olympus-worthy gifts of lettuce, so that as [the lettuce] is being chewed in your sweetest mouth, the memory of us may dwell…in the sacred chamber of your mind.”

For Theodore, the lettuce is not merely a gift but a conduit through which he can be consumed by Constantine. In case this meaning is unclear, Theodore affirms his desire in the conclusion of the letter. He states there is nothing more pleasurable to him than if he and Constantine remain “[lodged] in the mind of the beloved and vice versa.” Ultimately, for Theodore, the lettuce is a proxy of his self—his mind, his body, and his memory. He wishes for Constantine to consume the lettuce—Theodore’s being—so that his memory might remain part of Constantine’s body and the two might never be separated. 

Although we, the modern audience, might find the lettuce to be an odd expression of erotic desire, it seems to tickle Constantine’s fancy. He replies with obvious joy. Constantine considers it to be “tastier than honey… while eating and gazing at it…I felt great pleasure—indeed more than if the very nectar was lavishly poured upon my lips.”

Constantine has not only eaten the lettuce, but he has used the Olympian analogy again: Nectar was the mythological food of the Olympic gods. In this mention of it, Constantine paints a sensual imagery, where nectar drips from his lips. Constantine wants to ensure that Theodore is imagining his mouth open and succulent.

An Erotic Anti-Aphrodisiac?

The eroticism of lettuce is perhaps not as obvious to a contemporary audience as the phallic/yonic imagery of modern emojis. However, like the peach and eggplant of today, lettuce had its own connotations in the Eastern Roman tradition.

Constantine himself had commissioned a book on agriculture which explains that “lettuce is a wet and cold vegetable… It is a food that suppresses thirst and induces sleep … It also suppresses libido, which is why Pythagoreans call it eunouchos ‘castrato’ and women call it… ‘impotent.’”

It may seem contradictory for these two men who express being “enflamed” for each other to send anti-aphrodisiacs between them. However, I think this is characteristic of the coy, playfulness of flirtation—both in these tenth century letters and in modern praxis.

The anti-aphrodisiac may have been a way of conveying a playful retreat, or perhaps a necessary means of dampening the flames of their desire. The lettuce might be Theodore’s way of telling Constantine playfully to “cool” off. Perhaps this conversation was quite literally becoming too hot to handle, and Theodore decided it was time for Constantine to take a cold, vegetal shower.

Lettuce & Dreams: Nightly Visitation

The lettuce’s function as a sleep aid may also contribute to yet another flirtatious interpretation of the exchange. On six different occasions within the letters, Theodore and Constantine mention seeing each other in their dreams.

Constantine complains, “Many dreams often both disturb and gladden me, just as if they give my beloved in hand, but they mislead that [there is] conversing and deceive that [there is] caressing.”

In the very letter where Constantine mentions the “abundant moisture of the lettuce” he also writes that he is seized by “the all-tantalizing passion” of his dreams which “tyrannize” him with the image of Theodore, the “one I desire above all.”

Both men find sexual temptation and relief in these dreams; if they cannot see each other in person, at least they can see each other in nightly visions. In this sense, the lettuce is not just a gift, but a means for the two men to visit.

When Theodore sends Constantine a lettuce, he is not only asking Constantine to treat the lettuce as an extension of Theodore’s own body to consume; but he is also inviting Constantine to join him together in their dreams.

The Garden(s) of Eden

The lettuce of these letters plays into a longer Greek and Roman tradition which placed plants in the center of desire.

In Eastern Roman novels, gardens and pastures are considered “third spaces,” or places of ambiguity. By virtue of being cultivated, these sites straddle uninhabited wildernesses—places of danger and loneliness—and the so-called “civilization” of cities and towns. Young lovers would meet in such gardens to share secret trysts and stolen kisses.

Gardens often served as stand-ins for the natural state of humans, where the desires of the flesh could be acted upon without danger or social consequence. The Garden of Eden was the first place of temptation in Christian tradition, and its seductive connotations were incredibly influential in the times of Constantine and Theodore.

One Roman author, Lucian, took this relationship between gardens, plants, and sexuality a step further. In his ironically named sci-fi novel A True Story, he writes about the sexuality of anthropomorphic trees, the Tree-Humans. Baby Tree-Humans were harvested from “acorns” (notably, in Greek the term for “acorn” also describes the head of a penis) which hung from phallus-shaped trees, which themselves only grew when one of the Tree-Humans cut off their right testicle and planted it in the ground.

For the Romans, plants could embody the very essence of sexuality!

🍑, 🍆, and 🥬!

While Medieval emperors and bishops did not have cellphones and emojis to communicate or invite sexual desire, playful flirtation and coy entendres appear to transcend time and space.

Just as emojis take on specific forms and functions in modern texts, in these tenth century letters, the lettuce becomes a multi-leafed, multi-faceted expression of erotic desire. Through ambiguous meanings, the lettuce both ignites and cools passion. It both quells erections and invites (wet) dreams. In Constantine’s mouth, its mild crispness turns to honey. The lettuce is as ambiguous as both men allow it to be.

It is also worth noting that the moist, leafy folds of a head of lettuce might easily be compared to the vulva. In the intensely heteronormative society of both the past and present, sexual desire is often symbolized through penises and vaginas. For Theodore and Constantine, it would have been natural to think of sex in this heteronormative way.

We can only speculate on if these desires were ever acted upon. It is certainly worth considering, though, if Theodore is offering his lettuce for Constantine’s eggplant.

Regardless of if either man was left on read, the “text” message was sent. And rather than being deleted by Snapchat after 24 hours, it remains visible to a whole new audience a thousand years later.

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Featured image: Two heads of lettuce in the ground. Photo by Dwight Sipler, 2012.

Tiffany VanWinkoop is a Ph.D. Candidate at the University of Wisconsin-Madison finishing her dissertation in Eastern Roman (Byzantine) History, titled “Gender Fluidity and Queer Desire in Constantinople, 867-1025.” She has presented her work at conferences all over the world and has pieces in publication with Palgrave Macmillan and Edinburgh University Press. When not exploring the world of Constantinople, she is probably following her cursed hockey team, the Vancouver Canucks. Contact.