In 594 B.C. Solon was elected as one of the chief magistrates of Athens, and was empowered to write a new code of law, which laid the foundations of Athenian democracy. He ranked as one of the "Seven Sages" of the ancient world.

In his code he declared the death penalty for any unauthorised adult male who mingled in a school-yard with boys before the age of puberty. Yet he had no problem with relationships involving older youths; his own poetry includes such homoerotic lines as "boys in the flower of their youth are loved" and "when amid the delectable flowers of youth he loves a boy, yearning for thighs and a sweet mouth".