ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the reasons behind this apparent divergent judicial norm by the court records of Frankfurt's two trials: Case of Ludwig Boudin and Case of Heinrich Krafft. Several factors greatly enhanced this project: first, the nearly complete legal dossiers of the two cases. Located in Frankfurt's municipal archives, they contain statements by the suspects, witness accounts, detailed torture proceedings, legal opinions by the city's advocates, private pleas and summaries of the various judicial meetings. The criminalization process of same-sex relations is closely connected to the Roman Catholic Church, with its emphasis on the procreative purpose of sexual relations. In contrast, secular legislation had a longer germination period. Germanic law codes, with three exceptions, did not cite same-sex relations as a felony. In Frankfurt's case, the records list the term sodomy interchangeably for bestiality and same-sex relations. The prosecution of sodomy became an affair of the state, albeit of the legal profession and not the people.
