JesusA (imported) wrote: Mon Oct 15, 2001 1:11 pm The Cultural Aspects of Eunuchism<br>by Robert F. Spencer<br>(Ciba Symposia, vol. 8, no. 7 (Oct. 1946), pp. 406-20<p>part 1<p>The term eunuch is derived from Greek and means, literally, "one who has charge of the bedchamber." In modern usage, eunuch implies a man or woman who, voluntarily or otherwise, has undergone surgery designed to effect permanent impairment of the sexual powers. But not all forms of mutilation of the genitalia have this object in view. Such practices as infibulation, which produce temporary incapability to exercise the sexual function, are automatically excluded from the present discussion. The extirpation of the procreative organs is recognized to have a marked effect not only on the physical structure of the organism so treated, but on its psychological and personality growth as well. This is scarcely the case when the sexual proclivities are merely temporarily arrested.<p>Although a treatment of the physiological aspects of eunuchism is not contemplated here, a point or two may be raised if only to dispose of some of the popular fallacies regarding the phenomenon. While experimentation with regard to humans is obviously impossible, several students have been in a position to observe and compare castrated and emasculated males (cf. Koch, Tandler, Rieger, Wagenseil, et al.). Moreover, the deliberate spaying of healthy females, especially in youth, is such a rarity as to preclude much practical observation. It is agreed that among the lower vertebrates as well as among humans the effects of castration vary considerably with the individual, the age of the organism as the time of the operation, the completeness of the removal of the genitals, the general health or metabolism of the individual being inconsistent factors. It is conceded that differences may be noted as between those whose sexual organs were destroyed prior to puberty and those whose castration or emasculation follows it. In the former case, in humans, the development of the secondary sex characteristics is completely or partially arrested. Popular opinion to the contrary, however, loss of body hair, obesity, a pallid complexion, or a change in the timbre of the voice are not inevitable results following destruction of the sexual balance. Individual differences are marked, depending on the type of operation and the completeness of the deprivation of the sexual powers. Endocrinal imbalance, in turn dependent on pituitary dysfunction, is the fundamental cause of the physical peculiarities which characterize the eunuch, as he is commonly defined. The extremes of obesity or giantism or the failure of the ossification of the epiphyses are thus directly traceable to such glandular disruption. The complete castrate is commonly an infantilic physical type, but variations may be anticipated.<p>The earliest accounts of the eunuch ascribe to him physical weakness, docility of disposition, a general lack of strength or character and resoluteness. In the main, this opinion still persists. In whatever civilization eunuchs appear, their asexual nature makes of them a class apart, a not infrequent object of scorn and derision. And yet it seems to have been the nature of the tasks to which they were assigned rather than any abnormal physical inaptitute which has gained this reputation for them. Eunuchs almost universally have been stewards, chamberlains, keepers of the apartments of women, and more often than not slaves. But if the majority have been lost in the obscurity of servitude, others emerge on the pages of history as important and often virile figures. Several famous warriors and statesmen were eunuchs. There are the startling examples of Narses, the able general of the Byzantine emperor Justinian, Kafur, the Negro Sultan of Egypt in the 10th century, and the Persian Agha Muhammad who subjected his predecessors to a bath of blood when, in 1796, he usurped the Iranian throne to found the Qajah house. In China, on the other hand, Chao Kao deposed the second Ch'in emperor and was successful in holding the throne for himself for a short period. Again, the dominant scholarly personalities of Origen, the founder of a school of Christian metaphysics in 250 A.D., of Abelard, of Ssu-ma Ch'ien, the most outstanding of the Chinese historians, or of Ts'ai Lung, the inventor of paper, attest against the popular notion that the eunuch is a dullard. Macaulay remarks in his essay on Warren Hastings that the eunuch is a trustworthy, diligent and sagacious servant. This is as may be; while beasts of burden are castrated to enhance their tractability, in more complex human behavior asexuality may or may not be correlated with dispassion. <p>With Edward Hahn we must suppose the beginnings of eunuchism to be derived from the domestication and consequent gelding of animals. Cattle, sheep, pigs, and goats were associated with the Neolithic peoples of Asia Minor by at least 4000 B.C. It is assumed that at some time during the course of the process of domestication, the discovery was made that gelding increased the size, strength, docility of some animals and enhanced the palatability of their flesh. Even among primitive peoples who lack the concept of animal domestication, instances are recorded of the castration of wild animals with the object of increasing their size. Yet it was only the Caribs, avid cannibals of the Antilles and Northeast Brazil, who kept their war captives in stockades after castrating them to increase their weight and the tenderness of their flesh. Not only is the Carib instance the only one of human castration in the New World, but it's also the only one in which there is a connection between eunuchism and cannibalism. [The attribution of castration to the Caribs is now doubted by historians. It was a charge used by Spaniards intent on enslaving or exterminating their only real rivals for control of the Caribbean. There is, however, some evidence that guardians of the Inca's women in 15th century Peru were castrated. If so, this would be the only New World use of castration before the Europeans brought the idea with them.]

JesusA (imported) wrote: Mon Oct 15, 2001 1:11 pm The Cultural Aspects of Eunuchism<br>by Robert F. Spencer<br>(Ciba Symposia, vol. 8, no. 7 (Oct. 1946), pp. 406-20<p>part 1<p>The term eunuch is derived from Greek and means, literally, "one who has charge of the bedchamber." In modern usage, eunuch implies a man or woman who, voluntarily or otherwise, has undergone surgery designed to effect permanent impairment of the sexual powers. But not all forms of mutilation of the genitalia have this object in view. Such practices as infibulation, which produce temporary incapability to exercise the sexual function, are automatically excluded from the present discussion. The extirpation of the procreative organs is recognized to have a marked effect not only on the physical structure of the organism so treated, but on its psychological and personality growth as well. This is scarcely the case when the sexual proclivities are merely temporarily arrested.<p>Although a treatment of the physiological aspects of eunuchism is not contemplated here, a point or two may be raised if only to dispose of some of the popular fallacies regarding the phenomenon. While experimentation with regard to humans is obviously impossible, several students have been in a position to observe and compare castrated and emasculated males (cf. Koch, Tandler, Rieger, Wagenseil, et al.). Moreover, the deliberate spaying of healthy females, especially in youth, is such a rarity as to preclude much practical observation. It is agreed that among the lower vertebrates as well as among humans the effects of castration vary considerably with the individual, the age of the organism as the time of the operation, the completeness of the removal of the genitals, the general health or metabolism of the individual being inconsistent factors. It is conceded that differences may be noted as between those whose sexual organs were destroyed prior to puberty and those whose castration or emasculation follows it. In the former case, in humans, the development of the secondary sex characteristics is completely or partially arrested. Popular opinion to the contrary, however, loss of body hair, obesity, a pallid complexion, or a change in the timbre of the voice are not inevitable results following destruction of the sexual balance. Individual differences are marked, depending on the type of operation and the completeness of the deprivation of the sexual powers. Endocrinal imbalance, in turn dependent on pituitary dysfunction, is the fundamental cause of the physical peculiarities which characterize the eunuch, as he is commonly defined. The extremes of obesity or giantism or the failure of the ossification of the epiphyses are thus directly traceable to such glandular disruption. The complete castrate is commonly an infantilic physical type, but variations may be anticipated.<p>The earliest accounts of the eunuch ascribe to him physical weakness, docility of disposition, a general lack of strength or character and resoluteness. In the main, this opinion still persists. In whatever civilization eunuchs appear, their asexual nature makes of them a class apart, a not infrequent object of scorn and derision. And yet it seems to have been the nature of the tasks to which they were assigned rather than any abnormal physical inaptitute which has gained this reputation for them. Eunuchs almost universally have been stewards, chamberlains, keepers of the apartments of women, and more often than not slaves. But if the majority have been lost in the obscurity of servitude, others emerge on the pages of history as important and often virile figures. Several famous warriors and statesmen were eunuchs. There are the startling examples of Narses, the able general of the Byzantine emperor Justinian, Kafur, the Negro Sultan of Egypt in the 10th century, and the Persian Agha Muhammad who subjected his predecessors to a bath of blood when, in 1796, he usurped the Iranian throne to found the Qajah house. In China, on the other hand, Chao Kao deposed the second Ch'in emperor and was successful in holding the throne for himself for a short period. Again, the dominant scholarly personalities of Origen, the founder of a school of Christian metaphysics in 250 A.D., of Abelard, of Ssu-ma Ch'ien, the most outstanding of the Chinese historians, or of Ts'ai Lung, the inventor of paper, attest against the popular notion that the eunuch is a dullard. Macaulay remarks in his essay on Warren Hastings that the eunuch is a trustworthy, diligent and sagacious servant. This is as may be; while beasts of burden are castrated to enhance their tractability, in more complex human behavior asexuality may or may not be correlated with dispassion. <p>With Edward Hahn we must suppose the beginnings of eunuchism to be derived from the domestication and consequent gelding of animals. Cattle, sheep, pigs, and goats were associated with the Neolithic peoples of Asia Minor by at least 4000 B.C. It is assumed that at some time during the course of the process of domestication, the discovery was made that gelding increased the size, strength, docility of some animals and enhanced the palatability of their flesh. Even among primitive peoples who lack the concept of animal domestication, instances are recorded of the castration of wild animals with the object of increasing their size. Yet it was only the Caribs, avid cannibals of the Antilles and Northeast Brazil, who kept their war captives in stockades after castrating them to increase their weight and the tenderness of their flesh. Not only is the Carib instance the only one of human castration in the New World, but it's also the only one in which there is a connection between eunuchism and cannibalism. [The attribution of castration to the Caribs is now doubted by historians. It was a charge used by Spaniards intent on enslaving or exterminating their only real rivals for control of the Caribbean. There is, however, some evidence that guardians of the Inca's women in 15th century Peru were castrated. If so, this would be the only New World use of castration before the Europeans brought the idea with them.]

JesusA (imported) wrote: Mon Oct 15, 2001 1:11 pm The Cultural Aspects of Eunuchism<br>by Robert F. Spencer<br>(Ciba Symposia, vol. 8, no. 7 (Oct. 1946), pp. 406-20<p>part 1<p>The term eunuch is derived from Greek and means, literally, "one who has charge of the bedchamber." In modern usage, eunuch implies a man or woman who, voluntarily or otherwise, has undergone surgery designed to effect permanent impairment of the sexual powers. But not all forms of mutilation of the genitalia have this object in view. Such practices as infibulation, which produce temporary incapability to exercise the sexual function, are automatically excluded from the present discussion. The extirpation of the procreative organs is recognized to have a marked effect not only on the physical structure of the organism so treated, but on its psychological and personality growth as well. This is scarcely the case when the sexual proclivities are merely temporarily arrested.<p>Although a treatment of the physiological aspects of eunuchism is not contemplated here, a point or two may be raised if only to dispose of some of the popular fallacies regarding the phenomenon. While experimentation with regard to humans is obviously impossible, several students have been in a position to observe and compare castrated and emasculated males (cf. Koch, Tandler, Rieger, Wagenseil, et al.). Moreover, the deliberate spaying of healthy females, especially in youth, is such a rarity as to preclude much practical observation. It is agreed that among the lower vertebrates as well as among humans the effects of castration vary considerably with the individual, the age of the organism as the time of the operation, the completeness of the removal of the genitals, the general health or metabolism of the individual being inconsistent factors. It is conceded that differences may be noted as between those whose sexual organs were destroyed prior to puberty and those whose castration or emasculation follows it. In the former case, in humans, the development of the secondary sex characteristics is completely or partially arrested. Popular opinion to the contrary, however, loss of body hair, obesity, a pallid complexion, or a change in the timbre of the voice are not inevitable results following destruction of the sexual balance. Individual differences are marked, depending on the type of operation and the completeness of the deprivation of the sexual powers. Endocrinal imbalance, in turn dependent on pituitary dysfunction, is the fundamental cause of the physical peculiarities which characterize the eunuch, as he is commonly defined. The extremes of obesity or giantism or the failure of the ossification of the epiphyses are thus directly traceable to such glandular disruption. The complete castrate is commonly an infantilic physical type, but variations may be anticipated.<p>The earliest accounts of the eunuch ascribe to him physical weakness, docility of disposition, a general lack of strength or character and resoluteness. In the main, this opinion still persists. In whatever civilization eunuchs appear, their asexual nature makes of them a class apart, a not infrequent object of scorn and derision. And yet it seems to have been the nature of the tasks to which they were assigned rather than any abnormal physical inaptitute which has gained this reputation for them. Eunuchs almost universally have been stewards, chamberlains, keepers of the apartments of women, and more often than not slaves. But if the majority have been lost in the obscurity of servitude, others emerge on the pages of history as important and often virile figures. Several famous warriors and statesmen were eunuchs. There are the startling examples of Narses, the able general of the Byzantine emperor Justinian, Kafur, the Negro Sultan of Egypt in the 10th century, and the Persian Agha Muhammad who subjected his predecessors to a bath of blood when, in 1796, he usurped the Iranian throne to found the Qajah house. In China, on the other hand, Chao Kao deposed the second Ch'in emperor and was successful in holding the throne for himself for a short period. Again, the dominant scholarly personalities of Origen, the founder of a school of Christian metaphysics in 250 A.D., of Abelard, of Ssu-ma Ch'ien, the most outstanding of the Chinese historians, or of Ts'ai Lung, the inventor of paper, attest against the popular notion that the eunuch is a dullard. Macaulay remarks in his essay on Warren Hastings that the eunuch is a trustworthy, diligent and sagacious servant. This is as may be; while beasts of burden are castrated to enhance their tractability, in more complex human behavior asexuality may or may not be correlated with dispassion. <p>With Edward Hahn we must suppose the beginnings of eunuchism to be derived from the domestication and consequent gelding of animals. Cattle, sheep, pigs, and goats were associated with the Neolithic peoples of Asia Minor by at least 4000 B.C. It is assumed that at some time during the course of the process of domestication, the discovery was made that gelding increased the size, strength, docility of some animals and enhanced the palatability of their flesh. Even among primitive peoples who lack the concept of animal domestication, instances are recorded of the castration of wild animals with the object of increasing their size. Yet it was only the Caribs, avid cannibals of the Antilles and Northeast Brazil, who kept their war captives in stockades after castrating them to increase their weight and the tenderness of their flesh. Not only is the Carib instance the only one of human castration in the New World, but it's also the only one in which there is a connection between eunuchism and cannibalism. [The attribution of castration to the Caribs is now doubted by historians. It was a charge used by Spaniards intent on enslaving or exterminating their only real rivals for control of the Caribbean. There is, however, some evidence that guardians of the Inca's women in 15th century Peru were castrated. If so, this would be the only New World use of castration before the Europeans brought the idea with them.]

JesusA (imported) wrote: Mon Oct 15, 2001 1:11 pm The Cultural Aspects of Eunuchism<br>by Robert F. Spencer<br>(Ciba Symposia, vol. 8, no. 7 (Oct. 1946), pp. 406-20<p>part 1<p>The term eunuch is derived from Greek and means, literally, "one who has charge of the bedchamber." In modern usage, eunuch implies a man or woman who, voluntarily or otherwise, has undergone surgery designed to effect permanent impairment of the sexual powers. But not all forms of mutilation of the genitalia have this object in view. Such practices as infibulation, which produce temporary incapability to exercise the sexual function, are automatically excluded from the present discussion. The extirpation of the procreative organs is recognized to have a marked effect not only on the physical structure of the organism so treated, but on its psychological and personality growth as well. This is scarcely the case when the sexual proclivities are merely temporarily arrested.<p>Although a treatment of the physiological aspects of eunuchism is not contemplated here, a point or two may be raised if only to dispose of some of the popular fallacies regarding the phenomenon. While experimentation with regard to humans is obviously impossible, several students have been in a position to observe and compare castrated and emasculated males (cf. Koch, Tandler, Rieger, Wagenseil, et al.). Moreover, the deliberate spaying of healthy females, especially in youth, is such a rarity as to preclude much practical observation. It is agreed that among the lower vertebrates as well as among humans the effects of castration vary considerably with the individual, the age of the organism as the time of the operation, the completeness of the removal of the genitals, the general health or metabolism of the individual being inconsistent factors. It is conceded that differences may be noted as between those whose sexual organs were destroyed prior to puberty and those whose castration or emasculation follows it. In the former case, in humans, the development of the secondary sex characteristics is completely or partially arrested. Popular opinion to the contrary, however, loss of body hair, obesity, a pallid complexion, or a change in the timbre of the voice are not inevitable results following destruction of the sexual balance. Individual differences are marked, depending on the type of operation and the completeness of the deprivation of the sexual powers. Endocrinal imbalance, in turn dependent on pituitary dysfunction, is the fundamental cause of the physical peculiarities which characterize the eunuch, as he is commonly defined. The extremes of obesity or giantism or the failure of the ossification of the epiphyses are thus directly traceable to such glandular disruption. The complete castrate is commonly an infantilic physical type, but variations may be anticipated.<p>The earliest accounts of the eunuch ascribe to him physical weakness, docility of disposition, a general lack of strength or character and resoluteness. In the main, this opinion still persists. In whatever civilization eunuchs appear, their asexual nature makes of them a class apart, a not infrequent object of scorn and derision. And yet it seems to have been the nature of the tasks to which they were assigned rather than any abnormal physical inaptitute which has gained this reputation for them. Eunuchs almost universally have been stewards, chamberlains, keepers of the apartments of women, and more often than not slaves. But if the majority have been lost in the obscurity of servitude, others emerge on the pages of history as important and often virile figures. Several famous warriors and statesmen were eunuchs. There are the startling examples of Narses, the able general of the Byzantine emperor Justinian, Kafur, the Negro Sultan of Egypt in the 10th century, and the Persian Agha Muhammad who subjected his predecessors to a bath of blood when, in 1796, he usurped the Iranian throne to found the Qajah house. In China, on the other hand, Chao Kao deposed the second Ch'in emperor and was successful in holding the throne for himself for a short period. Again, the dominant scholarly personalities of Origen, the founder of a school of Christian metaphysics in 250 A.D., of Abelard, of Ssu-ma Ch'ien, the most outstanding of the Chinese historians, or of Ts'ai Lung, the inventor of paper, attest against the popular notion that the eunuch is a dullard. Macaulay remarks in his essay on Warren Hastings that the eunuch is a trustworthy, diligent and sagacious servant. This is as may be; while beasts of burden are castrated to enhance their tractability, in more complex human behavior asexuality may or may not be correlated with dispassion. <p>With Edward Hahn we must suppose the beginnings of eunuchism to be derived from the domestication and consequent gelding of animals. Cattle, sheep, pigs, and goats were associated with the Neolithic peoples of Asia Minor by at least 4000 B.C. It is assumed that at some time during the course of the process of domestication, the discovery was made that gelding increased the size, strength, docility of some animals and enhanced the palatability of their flesh. Even among primitive peoples who lack the concept of animal domestication, instances are recorded of the castration of wild animals with the object of increasing their size. Yet it was only the Caribs, avid cannibals of the Antilles and Northeast Brazil, who kept their war captives in stockades after castrating them to increase their weight and the tenderness of their flesh. Not only is the Carib instance the only one of human castration in the New World, but it's also the only one in which there is a connection between eunuchism and cannibalism. [The attribution of castration to the Caribs is now doubted by historians. It was a charge used by Spaniards intent on enslaving or exterminating their only real rivals for control of the Caribbean. There is, however, some evidence that guardians of the Inca's women in 15th century Peru were castrated. If so, this would be the only New World use of castration before the Europeans brought the idea with them.]