Cassius Dio is the most reliable source because we have crap sources for the period. The fact is that there are good reasons not to take his stuff on this particular topic at face value, and we don’t have the other sources that might contradict him. I wouldn’t criticise a historian (or a student) for reading it as just more transphobic invective, even if I personally think there’s something to it as LGBT history.
As to the privacy, that’s how I read these bits of Dio, he is quite coy about what is happening in the palace vs outside of it. Maybe I’m too skeptical.
Cassius Dio is the most reliable source because we have crap sources for the period. The fact is that there are good reasons not to take his stuff on this particular topic at face value, and we don’t have the other sources that might contradict him. I wouldn’t criticise a historian (or a student) for reading it as just more transphobic invective, even if I personally think there’s something to it as LGBT history.
As to the privacy, that’s how I read these bits of Dio, he is quite coy about what is happening in the palace vs outside of it. Maybe I’m too skeptical.