Female eunuchs in India
Posted: Tue Dec 31, 2002 5:16 pm
From http://www.people.virginia.edu/~wwc2r/v ... uchae.html
"Female Eunuchs in India," Lancet 2 (May 20, 1843) 262.
EVERY one knows the cruel acts to which Oriental jealousy has given rise with respect to the male attendants on the harems of the great; but few, perhaps, are aware that in India even women are subject to a process, not of emasculation, but (if we may coin a word) efæ mination. Dr. Roberts, the author of a memoir of a journey from Delhi to Bombay, says that near Feridabad he was met by an eunuch fakir and three singing girls, the latter of whom executed several dances, accompanying them by their voices. The lofty stature, harsh voices, and bold masculine movements of the damsels so terrified the worthy doctor, that he at first thought them to be Thugs in disguise; but when he had ascertained their true sex, curiosity overcame his terrors, and, by dint of a little persuasion and sundry rupees, he prevailed on the ladies to visit him at his tent, and exhibit their physical peculiarities. They appeared to have no development either of the larynx or nipples; the vaginal orifice was obliterated without even the trace of a scar, while the meatus urinarius, on the contrary, was salient and exposed; there was no mons veneris, and, in facts a complete atrophy of the cellular tissue, not only in the genital but other parts also of the body, and no hair whatever on the parts usually so covered, the buttocks and thighs were not more spread than in the male; there was no trace of, or substitute for, the menstrual discharge; nor had the individuals any venereal desires. Large, robust,and muscular, they enjoyed excellent health, being about twenty-five years old, and their chief occupation was that of itinerating the villages,dancing, singing, and circumcising the male infants of the native population. They had no recollection of having undergone any operation, nor could Dr. Doherty find any indications whereby to judge of the manner in which they had been unsexed; but they said (what he knew not himself and could not ascertain from others) that many females similarly situated were to be found at Delhi and Agra. An old Brahmin, at Indore, in Malwah, afterwards told Dr. R. that these women, called hedgirahs, are punctured in the ovaries with needles, dipped in the green fruity juice of the tree called bhel-poul.
"Female Eunuchs in India," Lancet 2 (May 20, 1843) 262.
EVERY one knows the cruel acts to which Oriental jealousy has given rise with respect to the male attendants on the harems of the great; but few, perhaps, are aware that in India even women are subject to a process, not of emasculation, but (if we may coin a word) efæ mination. Dr. Roberts, the author of a memoir of a journey from Delhi to Bombay, says that near Feridabad he was met by an eunuch fakir and three singing girls, the latter of whom executed several dances, accompanying them by their voices. The lofty stature, harsh voices, and bold masculine movements of the damsels so terrified the worthy doctor, that he at first thought them to be Thugs in disguise; but when he had ascertained their true sex, curiosity overcame his terrors, and, by dint of a little persuasion and sundry rupees, he prevailed on the ladies to visit him at his tent, and exhibit their physical peculiarities. They appeared to have no development either of the larynx or nipples; the vaginal orifice was obliterated without even the trace of a scar, while the meatus urinarius, on the contrary, was salient and exposed; there was no mons veneris, and, in facts a complete atrophy of the cellular tissue, not only in the genital but other parts also of the body, and no hair whatever on the parts usually so covered, the buttocks and thighs were not more spread than in the male; there was no trace of, or substitute for, the menstrual discharge; nor had the individuals any venereal desires. Large, robust,and muscular, they enjoyed excellent health, being about twenty-five years old, and their chief occupation was that of itinerating the villages,dancing, singing, and circumcising the male infants of the native population. They had no recollection of having undergone any operation, nor could Dr. Doherty find any indications whereby to judge of the manner in which they had been unsexed; but they said (what he knew not himself and could not ascertain from others) that many females similarly situated were to be found at Delhi and Agra. An old Brahmin, at Indore, in Malwah, afterwards told Dr. R. that these women, called hedgirahs, are punctured in the ovaries with needles, dipped in the green fruity juice of the tree called bhel-poul.