Taking as his starting point the sexuality of all living organisms, Spencer traces the history of homosexuality through early societies (considering Balinese cross-dressing and Peruvian temple sacrifice on the way), and first civilizations (taking in Sumerian male temple prostitutes and Egyptian sexual positions), the Greeks, the Jews, Romans and Christians. Moving through time from the early Middle Ages (in the sixth and eighth centuries the western world was surprisingly tolerant of homosexuality), through the Renaissance (many of the greatest Renaissance artists were famously homosexual), to Victorian male bonding, public schools and the rise of gay politics, Spencer concludes that from the earliest times, homosexuality has found a level of social acceptance only in open societies, those that are loosely democratic in nature.