ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the problem of moral panics in medieval society, examining moments of moral panics over threatened boundaries, beginning when Christians alleged that Muslim men were raping Christian women, as part of the campaign to retake Spain from its Islamic rulers. The chapter also addresses ordinary times; despite the Church’s prohibitions on fornication, municipal authorities believed desire was natural. So they set up official municipal brothels, where women who sold sex were supposed to work as prostitutes. In Italy, it was fairly common for men to have sex with men as well. But when the boundaries of Italian cities were threatened by plague or war, moral panics about sodomy broke out. Martin Luther also insulted the Pope as a sodomite to draw lines between the Catholic Church and the new Protestant sects. He also redrew the dividing lines of sexuality, repudiating the Catholic hierarchy of celibacy as superior and marriage as second-best, to celebrate what would later be termed heterosexuality and marriage as the most holy institution.
