If you’re squeamish, read no further! This is about a song tradition to rival rock.
The latest medical debate is whether it’s testosterone that shortens men’s lives. Witness for the prosecution: a Korean study that cites eunuchs as living much longer than men with their faculties intact, sorry unmolested, er, you know what I mean. For the defence: it may just be their pampered lifestyles that protects them from an earlier demise. A third source (Backside) avers that they simply avoid the trouble and strife – which must promote longevity!
Whatever. Even if it’s true I don’t envisage queues of 8 year old boys at the clinic for the snip – even if today’s procedure is relatively humane and some of them could join the King’s College choir for life. What is a long life without those teenage traumas of love and rejection, followed by subsequent bouts of much the same for another 60-odd years? Generally speaking (sorry, Sipu) I reckon irreversible mutilation of the body is a BAD THING. Like tattooing for example. One feels such a prat when it goes out of vogue.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-19699266
Boadicea's Chariot 
“Generally speaking (sorry, Sipu) I reckon irreversible mutilation of the body is a BAD THING.”
Que?
Well, they do say that people who can’t have fun live the longest…
I’m also sceptical about this. Eunuchs lived very sheltered lives.
In fact, the reason why they lost their dangly bits was that their main
purpose in life was to mind the king/emperor’s harem. Scholar-officials also
often lived very, very long lives.
Sipu, I was breaking my rule about generalising!
Christopher, the successful ‘castrati’ lived to ripe old ages too but the rest probably died young – being unemployable freaks.
My maternal grandmother had no fun in her life and lived to 96!
I guess discovering the optimal age for testicular termination to lead to testosterone cessation would be a difficult experiment to carry out. I mean, is it better to loved and lost, or never to have loved at all?
Eunuchs probably don’t go bald either….
Janus: I was thinking about the Chinese context. I rarely even think about the Western world in general any more. The Chinese eunuchs had a distinct purpose.
Pseu: oh, if you only knew some of the stories from the inner-confines of the Chinese palace!
And you do, Christopher? 🙂
Pseu: oh, I have a few juicy tidbits…
I read somewhere, in some historical novel or other, that eunuchs in Chinese palaces were renowned for their viciousness and spite. Perhaps unfair to generalise etc, but I can’t help but wonder if on a biological level, they didn’t have the worst of both sides; the spite of the female, the aggression of the male, and no way of releasing frustration of any kind.
Claire: should you are anyone else be interested I would be happy to write a brief post over the weekend about eunuchs in China.
That would be interesting. I gleaned some ideas from a novel called the last Empress, I think. I also remember seeing the film Farinelli in France about 20 years ago. That gives a very sad, poignant perspective of the eunuch’s tale.
Yes, please, Christopher.
There remains one recording of the last castrati in existence, made around 1902. Moreschi born 1858.
Today, rather than indulging in libidinous claptrap, the music is sung falsetto by counter tenors or children.
It takes a great deal of practise to keep the adult male voice able to achieve said, generally vertical rather than horizontal!
Castration was officially banned by the Pope in 1903.
CO, I had to smile at your last line! Maybe some of the RC church’s problems would have been avoided if he’d suggested his mates should have the operation.
Ain’t that the truth!
When i look at some of the trolls and sub human life inhabiting our towns I feel castration and forced sterilisation is a good thing.
I mean come on now if we had had abortion then Nick Clegg would not be with us 😉