Ancient kiss-tory: new perspectives on the evolution of early historical kissing

This article examines the earliest historical evidence for kissing in societies of the ancient Middle East and surrounding regions, from the mid-3rd to the early 1st millennium BCE. Drawing on linguistic, textual, visual, and archaeological sources, the study explores the cultural roles of romantic-sexual and familial-friendly kissing in ancient Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq and Syria). The paper demonstrates that early written references to kissing range from mythological narratives of divine intimacy to legal texts regulating social behavior. The work employs translations of cuneiform sources, and all materials are available in previously published works referenced throughout the article. By situating these practices within broader debates on the origins and cultural contexts of especially romantic-sexual kissing, the article considers whether the earliest evidence reflects not only acts of intimacy, but also social practices that, in the 3rd millennium BCE, could have been associated with elite behavior. The analysis contributes to ongoing discussions in anthropology, by reconsidering whether romantic-sexual kissing originated as an elite practice or was more widely embedded in everyday life, while highlighting the methodological challenges of interpreting ancient sources.