Eunuchs and the Islamic Caliphate

[JesusA (imported)]

A new article has just been posted on The Conversation, an Australian web site, about the failings of the Islamic Caliphate (or ISIS or ISIL, if you prefer). To be a proper caliphate, they need eunuchs. I would appreciate any and all readers of the Eunuch Archive making comments on the site.

The button to add a comment is on the bottom right hand side of the page, just above the red band.

https://theconversation.com/islamic-sta ... uchs-32729

[nvrgag44 (imported)]

Interesting article. I was aware of the valued position of eunuchs in the Ottoman empire but never saw them as vital to its survival. I forwarded it to a friend who was a career intelligence officer in the Navy and spent years working in that sandbox. Even in retirement he is passionate about staying up to speed on the region and knows far more about the Mideast than anyone else I know. it will be interesting to read his thoughts about this.

[nvrgag44 (imported)]

Interesting article. I was aware of the valued position of eunuchs in the Ottoman empire but never saw them as vital to its survival. I forwarded it to a friend who was a career intelligence officer in the Navy and spent years working in that sandbox. Even in retirement he is passionate about staying up to speed on the region and knows far more about the Mideast than anyone else I know. it will be interesting to read his thoughts about this.

It didn't take long for my friend to respond. FYI: I made no mention of EA, just forwarded the link to the story without comment.

"The foreigners are beheaded, the eunuchs are created froom birth to prepubescence and treated well. These non sexual beings are not distracted. Many of the oriental monarchies had the same, the Chinese called them "mandarins".

You must catch them early when they can be trained for their future positions. and be rewarded by the ruler.

As for capitals, consider Baghdad."

[Dave (imported)]

Some of those readers failed to recognize the article for what it was.

This is going to be fun read and comment.

[nvrgag44 (imported)]

Yes, a very interesting article. I can understand the reasons for putting eunuchs in charge of caring for the women but why were they also valued for other positions of authority and influence? Even to the point of castrating prepubescent young boys and grooming them for these positions. Were they also used as sex slaves? And how were certain boys selected while others were not? Questions abound.

[devi (imported)]

They'd probably eat their eunuchs for lunch, literally. If the ISIL can be so smug and proud as to be whacking off innocent people's heads off, -which is against Mosaic hence Sharia law (the 'good' part of the law that is) then I can easily see them as being cannibals too. So me being a eunuch myself I would definitely have to pass on ever going out that way.

[nvrgag44 (imported)]

I can't think of one good reason to go there, eunuch or not.

[JesusA (imported)]

Yes, a very interesting article. I can understand the reasons for putting eunuchs in charge of caring for the women but why were they also valued for other positions of authority and influence? Even to the point of castrating prepubescent young boys and grooming them for these positions. Were they also used as sex slaves? And how were certain boys selected while others were not? Questions abound.

A very good set of important questions. There are several reasons why eunuchs were valued over the course of the 4,000 years that they were an important part of culture. Some of the reasons will, of course, be covered in the book on the history of human castration that I'm working on.

The hacking off of the sexual parts of a defeated enemy probably goes back to our prehuman ancestors. There are reports of champanzees doing it to a defeated alpha male – though by ripping off with brute force, no cutting involved. However, the earliest date that we can find for systematic human castration – where the person castrated is expected to live and to prove useful – was recorded in the Sumerian city of Lagash at about 2100 BCE.

A major industry in Lagash, probably the largest city in the world at the time, was weaving. The weavers were all slave women who, as slaves, were not allowed to marry. They had many children (as recorded in detailed census records of the time). The girls were expected to join their mothers as slave weaving women. The boys were superfluous until someone thought to castrate them to help pull barges on the canals alongside castrated donkeys and onagers (a horse relative that was used before horses were domesticated). It was quickly discovered that the castrated boys had other uses.

Since domestic animals of various varieties (goat, sheep, donkey, onager) had been castrated for generations (goats and sheep probably for 4000 years by that time), permanent and absolute sterility was already well known as a consequence of castration. Guardians of someone else's women was a logical additional use for the new eunuchs. That their voices remained high and ethereal may have been a new discovery, but some became praise singers to the gods not long after systematic castration of humans was invented.

An addiitional factor that became important was changes in personality. The research on members of the Eunuch Archive community has demonstrated that the removal of testosterone from a brain that is already masculinized (which takes place before and shortly after birth) results in a basic personality structure that is neither male nor female. Specifically, eunuchs have the Emotional Stability of males, which in personality tests from around the world is always significantly higher than in females. The eunuchs are also higher in Agreeableness and Conscientiousness, two traits that are important for many bureaucratic roles. Eunuchs quickly became desirable as government officials, staffing offices within the palace and later being sent to rule distant provinces. These same traits made them ideal as military officials and many of the dynastic states of Asia had eunuch generals and admirals.

That eunuchs were thought not to be able to found their own dynasty was an added bonus. However, we do know of some who deposed the intact head of state and took control. A few even put intact nephews on the throne to begin new dynasties.

For the early Islamic caliphates all of these factors were important. What is most interesting to me is the source of the administrative eunuchs and, in fact, most of the early eunuchs in the Moslem world. Europe was the major source. The modern city of Dublin was founded as a Viking slave trading post. Boys and girls were kidnapped from around the Irish Sea for export to the Caliphate. The boys were generally castrated in the area that is now the modern Ukraine before shipment to Bagdad, or castrated in what is modern France for export to North Africa. The Venetians also traded in slaves from the Holy Roman Empire, castrating the boys in Venice before sending them on. The Slavic lands of Eastern Europe were also favored slave raiding territory for future eunuchs. In the Balkans slave raids were directed especially at Christian monasteries to capture already educated boys to become eunuch officials. The trade in European eunuchs continued well into the 17th century. Gazanfer Agha, the most powerful member of the Ottoman court, after the caliph/emperor himself, was Venetian by birth. Captured in 1559 at age 9 and castrated a year or two later. Hasan Agha, one of the most powerful Ottoman eunuchs of the early 17th century, had been born Samson Rowlie, and had been kidnapped off the beach at Great Yarmouth, England.

Large numbers of eunuchs in the Moslem world also came from Central Asia and from the Indian Subcontinent. It was reported that in 1675 alone, more than 22,000 eunuchs were exported from the kingdom of Golconda into the Moslem world.

[A-1 (imported)]

Isis?

REALLY!!!

I thought that they were already castrated as Isis is a GODDESS... (http://isiopolis.com/2012/01/28/the-dis ... f-isis-re/)

[nvrgag44 (imported)]

Jesus, you've started a most interesting discussion. As is often the case, a "teaser" of information like you've written cultivates an increased interest on a given subject. I'm aware of a little about the Ottoman Empire but the whole eunuch culture associated with it makes me want to know more. And your post goes much further back than the Ottomans. I hope this thread continues on. I'd like to know more about that book you said you're writing.