Friendship has always remained a treasured ideal in the Latin West, from the time that Greek thought was first absorbed by Latin writers in the age of the late Roman Republic to the Renaissance, when a renewed interest in classical antiquity asserted itself throughout Western Europe. In truth, classical traditions of friendship never completely disappeared in those centuries that scholars came to identify as “medieval.” Yet there were also profound shifts in the understanding of friendship, provoked not least by the encounter between the elitism of classical culture and the universalizing ambitions of the Christian religion. Above all, we see – at least in the context of formal religious life – an apparent tendency to subordinate the ideal of friendship to that of union with God in the life to come. At the risk of great simplification, this chapter will explore how the dominant ideals of friendship evolved in the world of ancient Rome and Latin Europe (that of the Byzantine world deserves a study of its own) and were defined in overwhelmingly male terms, both in the public and private spheres.

While we cannot doubt that friendships existed between women throughout this period, it is only occasionally that they come to public attention. The issue of male–female friendship was even more fraught, as women became idealized as objects of love rather than as equal partners in a relationship.