eunuch A eunuch ( , ) is a male who has been castration, castrated. Throughout history, castration often served a specific social function. The earliest records for intentional castration to produce eunuchs are from the Sumerian city of Lagash in the 2 ...

( ) is a

man A man is an adult male human. Before adulthood, a male child or adolescent is referred to as a boy. Like most other male mammals, a man's genome usually inherits an X chromosome from the mother and a Y chromosome from the f ...

who has been castrated. Throughout history, castration often served a specific social function. In China, castration included removal of the penis as well as the testicles (see emasculation). Both organs were cut off with a knife at the same time. Eunuchs existed in the Chinese court starting around 146 AD during the reign of Emperor Huan of Han, and were common as civil servants as early as the time of the

Qin dynasty The Qin dynasty ( ) was the first Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China. It is named for its progenitor state of Qin, a fief of the confederal Zhou dynasty (256 BC). Beginning in 230 BC, the Qin under King Ying Zheng enga ...

. From those ancient times until the

Sui dynasty The Sui dynasty ( ) was a short-lived Dynasties of China, Chinese imperial dynasty that ruled from 581 to 618. The re-unification of China proper under the Sui brought the Northern and Southern dynasties era to a close, ending a prolonged peri ...

, castration was both a traditional punishment (one of the Five Punishments) and a means of gaining employment in the Imperial service. Certain eunuchs gained immense power that occasionally superseded that of even the Grand Secretaries such as the

Ming dynasty The Ming dynasty, officially the Great Ming, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol Empire, Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming was the last imperial dynasty of ...

official

Zheng He Zheng He (also romanized Cheng Ho; 1371–1433/1435) was a Chinese eunuch, admiral and diplomat from the early Ming dynasty, who is often regarded as the greatest admiral in History of China, Chinese history. Born into a Muslims, Muslim famil ...

. Self-castration was a common practice, although it was not always performed completely, which led to it being made illegal. It is said that the justification for the employment of eunuchs as high-ranking civil servants was that, since they were incapable of having children, they would not be tempted to seize power and start a dynasty. In many cases, eunuchs were considered more reliable than the

scholar-official The scholar-officials, also known as literati, scholar-gentlemen or scholar-bureaucrats (), were government officials and prestigious scholars in Chinese society, forming a distinct social class. Scholar-officials were politicians and governmen ...

s. As a symbolic assignment of heavenly authority to the palace system, a constellation of stars was designated as the Emperor's, and, to the west of it, four stars were identified as his "eunuchs." The tension between eunuchs in the service of the emperor and virtuous Confucian officials is a familiar theme in Chinese history. In his ''History of Government'',

Samuel Finer Samuel Edward Finer FBA (22 September 1915 – 9 June 1993) was a British political scientist and historian specializing in comparative politics, who was instrumental in advancing political studies as an academic subject in the United King ...

points out that reality was not always that clear-cut. There were instances of very capable eunuchs who were valuable advisers to their emperor, and the resistance of the "virtuous" officials often stemmed from jealousy on their part. Ray Huang argues that in reality, eunuchs represented the personal will of the Emperor, while the officials represented the alternative political will of the

bureaucracy Bureaucracy ( ) is a system of organization where laws or regulatory authority are implemented by civil servants or non-elected officials (most of the time). Historically, a bureaucracy was a government administration managed by departments ...

. The clash between them would thus have been a clash of ideologies or political agenda. The number of eunuchs in Imperial employ fell to 470 by 1912, with the eunuch system being abolished on November 5, 1924. The last Imperial eunuch, Sun Yaoting, died in December 1996.

History

Qin dynasty

Men sentenced to

castration Castration is any action, surgery, surgical, chemical substance, chemical, or otherwise, by which a male loses use of the testicles: the male gonad. Surgical castration is bilateral orchiectomy (excision of both testicles), while chemical cas ...

were turned into eunuch slaves of the

state to perform forced labor for projects such as the

Terracotta Army The Terracotta Army is a collection of terracotta sculptures depicting the armies of Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of China. It is a form of funerary art buried with the emperor in 210–209 BCE with the purpose of protecting him in his aft ...

. The Qin government confiscated the property and enslaved the families of rapists who received castration as a punishment. Men punished with castration during the

Han dynasty The Han dynasty was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China (202 BC9 AD, 25–220 AD) established by Liu Bang and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–206 BC ...

were also used as slave labor.

Han dynasty

China, castration continued to be used as a punishment for various offenses.

Sima Qian Sima Qian () was a Chinese historian during the early Han dynasty. He is considered the father of Chinese historiography for the ''Shiji'' (sometimes translated into English as ''Records of the Grand Historian''), a general history of China cov ...

, the famous Chinese historian, was castrated by order of the Han Emperor of China for dissent. In another incident multiple people, including a chief scribe and his underlings, were subjected to castration. During the Han dynasty, the euphemism for castration was "sent to the silkworm house" since castrated men had to be shut in an enclosed room like how silkworms were raised during the castration procedure, and when they were recovering in order to prevent death. Castration as a punishment was known as ''gōngxíng'' (宮刑 "palace punishment") or ''fǔxíng'' (腐刑 "rotting punishment"). The Han dynasty under the reign of Emperor Wu castrated a prince of the kingdom of

Loulan Loulan ( zh, t=, p=Lóulán <

Eastern Han Chinese

''lo-lɑn'' <

Zhang Anshi was originally sentenced to death but was castrated instead when his brother pleaded for the sentence to be commuted. The Han dynasty ordered the castration of Li Yannian (musician) as punishment for a crime. Li Yannian's sister Lady Li was a concubine of the Han dynasty emperor. The Han dynasty ordered the castration of its envoy, Ge Du (Ke Too) because he did not kill the "Mad King" of the

Wusun The Wusun ( ) were an ancient semi-Eurasian nomads, nomadic Eurasian Steppe, steppe people of unknown origin mentioned in Chinese people, Chinese records from the 2nd century BC to the 5th century AD. The Wusun originally l ...

who deserved death in the eyes of the Han dynasty and instead helped the Mad King get doctors to cure his illness. Su Wen was a eunuch who supported prince Liu Fuling and his mother Lady Zhao against Liu Ju, Crown Prince of Wei and his mother Wei Zifu. Near the

end of the Han dynasty The end of the (Eastern) Han dynasty was the period of History of China, Chinese history from 189 to 220 CE, roughly coinciding with the tumultuous reign of the Han dynasty's last ruler, Emperor Xian of Han, Emperor Xian. It was followed by the ...

in 189, a group of eunuchs known as the Ten Attendants managed to gain considerable power at the imperial court, so that several warlords decided they had to be eliminated to restore the Emperor's government. However, the loyalist warlord, He Jin, was lured into a trap inside the palace and killed by the eunuchs. The other warlords led by

Yuan Shao Yuan Shao (, ; died 28 June 202), courtesy name Benchu (), was a Chinese military general, politician, and warlord who lived in the late Eastern Han dynasty. He occupied the northern territories of China during the civil wars that occurred tow ...

then stormed the palace and massacred the Ten Attendants and many other eunuchs. In the wake of the fighting,

Dong Zhuo Dong Zhuo () (c. 140s – 22 May 192), courtesy name Zhongying, was a Chinese military general, politician, and warlord who lived in the late Eastern Han dynasty. At the end of the reign of the Eastern Han, Dong Zhuo was a general and powerful ...

seized power. Castration was abolished twice as a legal punishment in the Han dynasty, the first time prior to 167 B.C. and the second time in the 110s A.D.

Northern Wei

北魏宦官 (Northern Wei eunuchs) In 446 an ethnic Qiang rebellion was crushed by the Northern Wei. Wang Yu was an ethnic Qiang eunuch and he may have been castrated during the rebellion since the Northern Wei would castrate the rebel tribe's young elite. Fengyi prefecture's Lirun town according to the Weishu was where Wang Yu was born, Lirun was to Xi'ans's northeast by 100 miles and modern day Chengcheng stands at its site. Wang Yu patronized Buddhism and in 488 had a temple constructed in his birthplace. The Northern Wei had the young sons of rebels and traitors castrated and made them serve as eunuchs in the palace like Liu Siyi (Liu Ssu-i), Yuwen Zhou (Yü-wen Chou 宇文冑), Duan Ba, Wang Zhi, Liu Teng and Sun Shao. Gao Huan of

Northern Qi Qi, known as the Northern Qi (), Later Qi (後齊) or Gao Qi (高齊) in historiography, was a Dynasties in Chinese history, Chinese imperial dynasty and one of the Northern and Southern dynasties#Northern dynasties, Northern dynasties during the ...

had Shu Lüè castrated and become a messenger eunuch because his father Fan Guan (Fan Kuan 樊觀) remained loyal to Northern Wei. The Northern Wei presented northern wives to

Liu Song Song, known as Liu Song (), Former Song (前宋) or Song of (the) Southern dynasties (南朝宋) in historiography, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and the first of the four Northern and Southern dynasties#Southern dynasti ...

generals Cui Mo and Shen Mo. Lingdu, a son was born to Shen Mo's northern wife. However Shen Mo fled back south to Liu Song when he had the opportunity and the Northern Wei castrated Lingdu in response. Cui Mo never went back south so his northern son would not be punished. The rebels themselves and their sons above the age of 14 were executed by chopping at the waist while the sons below 14 were castrated and served in the palace as eunuchs. The eunuch Zong Ai killed two Northern Wei Emperors and a Northern Wei prince. Empress Dowager Hu mourned for the eunuch Meng Luan.

Northern Qi

Empress Dowager Hu (Northern Qi) was said to have initially engaged in sexual relations with her

s—although, in light of their being previously castrated, the traditional historians used the term ''xiexia'' (褻狎, "immoral games") rather than "adultery" to describe her acts with them.

Tang dynasty

Indigenous tribals from southern China were used as eunuchs during the Sui and Tang dynasties. The rebel An Lushan had a Khitan eunuch named Li Zhu'er ( 李豬兒) (Li Chu-erh) who was working for An Lushan when he was a teenager. An Lushan used a sword to sever his genitals and he almost died, losing multiple pints of blood. An Lushan revived him after smearing ashes on his injury. Li Zhu'er was An Lushan's eunuch after this and was highly used and trusted by him. Li Zhu'er and another two men helped carry the obese An Lushan when he dressed and undressed. Li Zhu'er also helped An Lushan dress at the Huaqing (Hua-ch'ing) steam baths granted by Emperor Xuanzang. Later, An Lushan was stricken with a skin disease and became blind and paranoid. He started flogging and murdering his subordinates, and Li Zhuer was approached by people who wanted to assassinate An Lushan. An Lushan was stabbed in the stomach and disemboweled by Li Zhuer and Yan Zhuang (Yen Chuang) (嚴莊), another conspirator whom An Lushan had previously beaten. An Lushan screamed, "This is a thief of my own household!" as he desperately shook his curtains since he could not find his sword to defend himself.

Liao dynasty

The

Khitans The Khitan people (Khitan small script: ; ) were a historical nomadic people from Northeast Asia who, from the 4th century, inhabited an area corresponding to parts of modern Mongolia, Northeast China and the Russian Far East. As a people desce ...

adopted the practice of using eunuchs from the Chinese, and the eunuchs were non-Khitan prisoners of war. When they founded the Liao dynasty, they developed a

harem A harem is a domestic space that is reserved for the women of the house in a Muslim family. A harem may house a man's wife or wives, their pre-pubescent male children, unmarried daughters, female domestic Domestic worker, servants, and other un ...

system with concubines and wives and adopted eunuchs as part of it. The Khitans captured Chinese eunuchs at the Jin court when they invaded the Later Jin. Another source was during their war with the

Song dynasty The Song dynasty ( ) was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 960 to 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song, who usurped the throne of the Later Zhou dynasty and went on to conquer the rest of the Fiv ...

. The Khitan Empress Dowager Chengtian led the Khitan to raid China, capture Han Chinese boys as prisoners of war and emasculate them to become eunuchs. The emasculation of captured Chinese boys guaranteed a continuous supply of eunuchs to serve in the Liao Dynasty harem. She personally led her own army and defeated the Song in 986, fighting the retreating Chinese army. The Empress then ordered the

of around 100 Chinese boys she had captured, supplementing the Khitan's supply of eunuchs to serve at her court, among them was Wang Ji'en ( 王继恩 (辽朝)). The boys were all under ten years old and were selected for their good looks. Another Han Chinese eunuch who was castrated and captured by the Khitan as a boy was Zhao Anren ( 赵安仁) The Han Chinese boys captured and castrated by Empress Chengtian became domestic slaves in the Liao palace and did not gain political power. Khitan women, especially empresses and imperial concubines actively fought in war on the battlefield. The Liao enacted a new ling (ordinance) on castration, when an yila (i-la) (footsoldier) named Tuli (T'u-li)'s underage daughter was raped by an Imperial consort clan uncle, lang jun (lang-chün) Xiao Yan's (Hsiao Yen)'s slave Haili (Hai-li) in 962 when Emperor Muzong of Liao was reigning. Haili was made a slave to Tuli after being castrated. Boys were not executed but instead castrated if they were under 16 during the Qing and Liao dynasties as punishment during rebellions.

Jin dynasty

Eunuchs in the Jin dynasty were domestic slaves who served the women of the palace like the concubines and empresses and did not gain political power. Liang Chong 梁珫 was a eunuch in the Jin dynasty. Song Gui ( 宋珪) was another eunuch in the Jin dynasty.

Yuan dynasty

As with all parts of the

Mongol Empire The Mongol Empire was the List of largest empires, largest contiguous empire in human history, history. Originating in present-day Mongolia in East Asia, the Mongol Empire at its height stretched from the Sea of Japan to parts of Eastern Euro ...

Goryeo Goryeo (; ) was a Korean state founded in 918, during a time of national division called the Later Three Kingdoms period, that unified and ruled the Korea, Korean Peninsula until the establishment of Joseon in 1392. Goryeo achieved what has b ...

(Korea) provided eunuchs to the Mongols. One of them was Bak Bulhwa, who caused harm to Goryeo. Other Korean eunuchs in the Yuan included Go Yongbo and Bang Sin-u. Some Chinese and Korean eunuchs adopted Mongol names.

Ming dynasty

Castration as a legal punishment was banned at the end of the reign of the first Ming emperor, Ming Taizu. Huai'en (died in 1488) was originally surnamed Dai (戴) and born in Shandong's

Gaomi Gaomi () is a county-level city of eastern Shandong province, China, under the administration of Weifang City. It is the hometown of writer and 2012 Nobel Prize in Literature winner Mo Yan, who has set some of his stories in the region. Admin ...

city. He was forced to become a eunuch and was castrated as a young boy because his father and other members of the Dai family who worked as government officials were accused of crimes so he was punished as well. There were eunuchs from China's various ethnic tribes,

Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...

Korea Korea is a peninsular region in East Asia consisting of the Korean Peninsula, Jeju Island, and smaller islands. Since the end of World War II in 1945, it has been politically Division of Korea, divided at or near the 38th parallel north, 3 ...

Vietnam Vietnam, officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (SRV), is a country at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of about and a population of over 100 million, making it the world's List of countries and depende ...

Cambodia Cambodia, officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. It is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the north, and Vietnam to the east, and has a coastline ...

Central Asia Central Asia is a region of Asia consisting of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. The countries as a group are also colloquially referred to as the "-stans" as all have names ending with the Persian language, Pers ...

Thailand Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand and historically known as Siam (the official name until 1939), is a country in Southeast Asia on the Mainland Southeast Asia, Indochinese Peninsula. With a population of almost 66 million, it spa ...

, and

Okinawa most commonly refers to: * Okinawa Prefecture, Japan's southernmost prefecture * Okinawa Island, the largest island of Okinawa Prefecture * Okinawa Islands, an island group including Okinawa itself * Okinawa (city), the second largest city in th ...

. There were Korean, Jurchen, Mongol, Central Asian, and Vietnamese eunuchs under the

Yongle Emperor The Yongle Emperor (2 May 1360 – 12 August 1424), also known by his temple name as the Emperor Chengzu of Ming, personal name Zhu Di, was the third List of emperors of the Ming dynasty, emperor of the Ming dynasty, reigning from 1402 to 142 ...

, including Mongol eunuchs who served him while he was the Prince of Yan. Muslim and Mongol eunuchs were present in the Ming court, such as the ones captured from Mongol-controlled

Yunnan Yunnan; is an inland Provinces of China, province in Southwestern China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 47.2 million (as of 2020). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the Chinese provinces ...

in 1381, and among them was the great Ming maritime explorer

, who served Yongle. Muslim eunuchs were sent as ambassadors to the Timurids. Vietnamese eunuchs like Ruan Lang, Ruan An ( Nguyễn An), Fan Hong, Chen Wu, and Wang Jin were sent by Zhang Fu to the Ming. During Ming's early contentious relations with Joseon, when there were disputes such as competition for influence over the Jurchens in Manchuria, Korean officials were even flogged by Korean-born Ming eunuch ambassadors when their demands were not met. Some of the ambassadors were arrogant, such as Sin Kwi-saeng who, in 1398, got drunk and brandished a knife at a dinner in the presence of the king. Sino-Korean relations later became amiable, and Korean envoys' seating arrangement in the Ming court was always the highest among the tributaries. Korea stopped sending human tribute after 1435. A total of 198 eunuchs were sent from Korea to Ming. The Ming eunuch hats were similar to the Korean royal hats, indicating the foreign origins of the Ming eunuchs, many of whom came from Southeast Asia and Korea. Yishiha was a Jurchen eunuch in the Ming dynasty during the Yongle emperor's period and Jurchen women were also concubines of the Ming Yongle emperor. By the late Ming, nearly 80 percent of eunuchs came from North China, mainly the Beijing area. They came from a few counties around Beijing like Hejian. During the

Miao Rebellions There have been several rebellions among the Miao people (also known as the Hmong) in Chinese history: *Miao rebellions in the Ming dynasty (14th–15th centuries) *Bozhou rebellion (1589–1600) *Miao Rebellion (1735–36) *Miao Rebellion (1795– ...

, the Ming Governor castrated thousands of

Miao Miao may refer to: * Miao people, linguistically and culturally related group of people, recognized as such by the government of the People's Republic of China * Miao script or Pollard script, writing system used for Miao languages * Miao (Unicode ...

boys when their tribes revolted, and then gave them as slaves to various officials. The Governor who ordered the castration of the Miao was reprimanded and condemned by the Ming Tianshun Emperor for doing it once the Ming government heard of the event.

Zhu Shuang Zhu Shuang (3 December 1356 – 9 April 1395) was an imperial prince of the Chinese Ming dynasty. He was the second son of the Hongwu Emperor, the founder of the Ming. In May 1370, the Hongwu Emperor granted him the title of Prince of Qin, with ...

(Prince of Qin), while he was high on drugs, had some

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ), or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups s ...

an boys castrated, and Tibetan women seized after a war against minority Tibetan peoples. As a result, he was denounced after he died from an overdose. On 30 January 1406, the

expressed horror when the

Ryukyuans The are a Japonic-speaking East Asian ethnic group indigenous to the Ryukyu Islands, which stretch from the island of Kyushu to the island of Taiwan. With Japan, most Ryukyuans live in the Okinawa Prefecture or Kagoshima Prefecture. They sp ...

castrated some of their own children to give them to the emperor. The Yongle Emperor said that the boys who were castrated were innocent and did not deserve castration, and he returned the boys to Ryukyu and instructed them not to send eunuchs again. In the

Lê Dynasty The Lê dynasty, also known in historiography as the Later Lê dynasty (, chữ Hán: 朝後黎, chữ Nôm: 茹後黎), officially Đại Việt (; Chữ Hán: 大越), was the longest-ruling List of Vietnamese dynasties, Vietnamese dynasty, h ...

the Vietnamese Emperor Lê Thánh Tông was aggressive in his relations with foreign countries including China and cracked down on foreign contacts and enforced an isolationist policy. A large amount of trade between Guangdong (

Leizhou Peninsula The Leizhou Peninsula, alternately romanized as the Luichow Peninsula, is a peninsula in the southernmost part of Guangdong province in South China. As of 2015, the population of the peninsula was 5,694,245. The largest city by population and ...

and

Hainan Hainan is an island provinces of China, province and the southernmost province of China. It consists of the eponymous Hainan Island and various smaller islands in the South China Sea under the province's administration. The name literally mean ...

) and Vietnam happened during this time. Early accounts recorded that the Vietnamese captured Chinese whose ships had blown off course and detained them. Young Chinese men were selected by the Vietnamese for castration to become

slaves to the Vietnamese. It has been speculated by modern historians that Chinese who were captured and castrated by the Vietnamese were involved in regular trade between China and Vietnam instead of being blown off course, and that they were punished after a Vietnamese crackdown on trade with foreign countries. Several Malay envoys from the

Malacca sultanate The Malacca Sultanate (; Jawi script: ) was a Malay sultanate based in the modern-day state of Malacca, Malaysia. Conventional historical thesis marks as the founding year of the sultanate by King of Singapura, Parameswara, also known as I ...

were attacked and captured in 1469 by Vietnamese navy as they were returning to Malacca from China. The Vietnamese enslaved and castrated the young from among the captured. A 1499 entry in the

Ming Shilu The ''Ming Veritable Records'' or ''Ming Shilu'' (), contains the imperial annals of the emperors of the Ming dynasty (1368–1644). It is the single largest historical source of information on the dynasty. According to modern historians, it "p ...

recorded that thirteen Chinese men from Wenchang including a young man named Wu Rui were captured by the Vietnamese after their ship was blown off course while traveling from

Guangdong ) means "wide" or "vast", and has been associated with the region since the creation of Guang Prefecture in AD 226. The name "''Guang''" ultimately came from Guangxin ( zh, labels=no, first=t, t= , s=广信), an outpost established in Han dynasty ...

's Qin subprefecture ( Qinzhou), after which they ended up near the coast of Vietnam, in the 1460s, during the

Chenghua Emperor The Chenghua Emperor (9 December 1447 – 9 September 1487), also known by his temple name as the Emperor Xianzong of Ming, personal name Zhu Jianshen, changed to Zhu Jianru in 1457, was the ninth emperor of the Ming dynasty, reigning from 1464 ...

's rule (1464–1487). Twelve of them were enslaved to work as agricultural laborers, while the youngest Chinese man, Wu Rui (吳瑞) was selected by the Vietnamese court for castration since he was the only young man in among the thirteen and he became a eunuch at the Vietnamese imperial palace in Thang Long for nearly one fourth of a century. After years of serving the Vietnamese as a eunuch slave in the palace, he was promoted to a position with real power after the death of the Vietnamese ruler in 1497 to a military position in northern Vietnam as military superintendent since his service in the palace was apparently valued by the Vietnamese. However the Lạng Sơn guard soldier Dương Tam tri (Yang Sanzhi) told him of an escape route back to China and Wu Rui escaped to Longzhou after walking for 9 days through the mountains. The local ethnic minority

Tusi ''Tusi'', often translated as "headmen" or "chieftains", were hereditary tribal leaders recognized as imperial officials by the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties of China, and the Later Lê and Nguyễn dynasties of Vietnam. They ruled certain ...

chief Wei Chen took him into custody, overruling objections from his family who wanted to send him back to Vietnam. Vietnam found out about his escape and sent an agent to buy Wu Rui back from Wei Chen with 100 Jin in payment since they were scared that Wu Rui would reveal Vietnamese state secrets to China. Wei Chen planned to sell him back to the Vietnamese but told them the amount they were offering was too little and demanded more however before they could agree on a price, Wu was rescued by the Pingxiang magistrate Li Guangning and then was sent to

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

to work as a eunuch in the Ming palace at the Directorate of Ceremonial (silijian taijian 司禮監太監).Cooke (2011), p. 109 Li (2015), p. 202 The

Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư The ''Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư'' ( vi-hantu, 大越史記全書; ; ''Complete Annals of Đại Việt'') is the official national chronicle of the Đại Việt, that was originally compiled by the royal historian Ngô Sĩ Liên under ...

records that in 1467 in An Bang province of Dai Viet (now Quảng Ninh Province) a Chinese ship blew off course onto the shore. The Chinese were detained and not allowed to return to China as ordered by Le Thanh Tong. A 1472 entry in the Ming Shilu reported that some Chinese from Nanhai escaped back to China after their ship had been blown off course into Vietnam, where they had been forced to serve as soldiers in Vietnam's military. The escapees also reported that they found out that more than 100 Chinese men remained captives in Vietnam after they were caught and castrated by the Vietnamese after their ships were blown off course into Vietnam in other incidents. The Chinese Ministry of Revenue responded by ordering Chinese civilians and soldiers to stop going abroad to foreign countries. These 100 men were taken prisoner around the same time as Wu Rui and the historian Leo K. Shin believes all of them may have been involved in illegal trade instead of being blown off course by wind. The over 100 Chinese men who were castrated and made into eunuchs by the Vietnamese remained captives in Vietnam when the incident was reported. Both the incidents of the young Chinese man Wu Rui and the more than 100 Chinese men being castrated and used as eunuchs point to possible involvement in trade according to historians John K. Whitmore and Tana Li which was then suppressed by the Vietnamese government instead of them really being blown off course by the wind. China's relations with Vietnam during this period were marked by the punishment of prisoners by castration. An anti-pig slaughter edict led to speculation that the Ming

Zhengde Emperor The Zhengde Emperor (26 October 149120 April 1521), also known by his temple name as the Emperor Wuzong of Ming, personal name Zhu Houzhao, was the 11th List of emperors of the Ming dynasty, emperor of the Ming dynasty, reigning from 1505 to 1 ...

adopted

Islam Islam is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the Quran, and the teachings of Muhammad. Adherents of Islam are called Muslims, who are estimated to number Islam by country, 2 billion worldwide and are the world ...

due to his use of Muslim eunuchs who commissioned the production of

porcelain Porcelain (), also called china, is a ceramic material made by heating Industrial mineral, raw materials, generally including kaolinite, in a kiln to temperatures between . The greater strength and translucence of porcelain, relative to oth ...

with Persian and Arabic inscriptions in white and blue color. Muslim eunuchs contributed money in 1496 to repairing Niujie Mosque. It is unknown who really was behind the anti-pig slaughter edict. At the end of the

, there were about 70,000 eunuchs (huànguān or tàijiàn) employed by the emperor with some serving inside the imperial palace. There were 100,000 eunuchs at the height of their numbers during the Ming. In popular culture texts such as Zhang Yingyu's ''The Book of Swindles'' (), eunuchs were often portrayed in starkly negative terms as enriching themselves through excessive taxation and indulging in cannibalism and debauched sexual practices. The

Southern Ming The Southern Ming (), also known in historiography as the Later Ming (), officially the Great Ming (), was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and a series of rump states of the Ming dynasty that came into existence following the ...

Yongli emperor The Yongli Emperor (1623–1662; reigned 24 December 1646 – 1 June 1662), personal name Zhu Youlang, was the fourth and last emperor of the Southern Ming dynasty, reigning in turbulent times when the former Ming dynasty was overthrown and the ...

's wife Empress Wang (Southern Ming) had a boy eunuch slave who later wrote his autobiographical account "Yangjian biji". He was from Huguang province's

Jingzhou Jingzhou ( zh, s=, c=荆州, t=, p=Jīngzhōu) is a prefecture-level city in southern Hubei province, China, located on the banks of the Yangtze River. Its total residential population was 5,231,180 based on the Seventh National Population Censu ...

prefecture. Rebels killed his parents and he was adopted by Liu, one of the rebels. Liu became a Southern Ming soldier. The Southern Ming court needed eunuchs so they ordered high-ranking military officers to give up their older than 7 year old sons to be castrated in Kunming (Yunnan Fu) for the Yongli court in 1656. Over 20 boys were castrated 1 month after the order despite Liu's attempts to save his adopted son from the castration. Wang Ruoshue (Joseph) and Pang Tianshou (Achilles) were eunuchs at the Southern Ming Yongli emperor's court, and they along with Crown Prince Zhu Cixuan ( 朱慈煊) (Constantine), Empress Dowager Wang (Southern Ming) (Helena), Empress Dowager Ma (Southern Ming) (Maria), Empress Wang (Southern Ming) (Anne) and Qu Shisi ( 瞿式耜) (Ch'ü Shih-ssu), the Guangxi provincial governor, were all baptized as Roman Catholics by

Jesuits The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

Andreas Wolfgang Koffler and

Michał Boym Michał Piotr Boym, SJ ( zh, c=卜彌格, p= Bǔ Mígé;Transliterated also (using Wade-Giles) as ''Pu Che-yuen Mi-ko'' c. 1612 – 1659) was a Polish Jesuits, Jesuit missionary to China, scientist and explorer. He was an early Western traveller w ...

. A novel was written about them by Robert Elegant. Other Southern Ming eunuchs included Gao Qiqian ( 高起潛) and Lu Jiude ( 盧九德).

Path to the occupation

In Ming China, the royal palace acquired eunuchs from both domestic and foreign sources. On the one hand, the eunuchs in Ming China came from foreign sources. The enemies of Ming China were castrated as a means of punishment when they are captured by the Ming army as prisoners. For example, the population of Mongol eunuchs in Nanjing increased significantly during Yongle's reign when there was a war between Ming China and the Mongols. The foreign eunuchs also came as tribute from many small countries around China. On the other hand, eunuchs also came from indigenous Chinese. In Ming China, many men castrated themselves to be hired in the palace, when the only way for these men to enter into a life of privilege was through eunuchism. Besides the royal palace, bureaucratic elites, such as mandarin officials, also hired eunuchs to be servants in their families. With this demand, many men were willing to castrate themselves to become eunuchs.

Daily functions of normal eunuchs

Eunuchs in Ming China also played a critical role in the operation of the imperial palace. Their responsibilities varied in significance with jobs that included almost every aspect of everyday routine in the imperial palace. Some of their responsibilities were procuring copper, tin, wood, and iron. Also, they had to repair and construct ponds, castle gates, and palaces in major cities like

and

Nanjing Nanjing or Nanking is the capital of Jiangsu, a province in East China. The city, which is located in the southwestern corner of the province, has 11 districts, an administrative area of , and a population of 9,423,400. Situated in the Yang ...

, and the mansions and mausolea in the living spaces of imperial relatives. They prepared meals for a great number of people in the palace. Taking care of the animals in the palace was another one of their jobs. In a word, the eunuchs' work was the cornerstone of the palace's daily operation, and they were responsible for the Emperor and his relatives' comfortable life.

Relationship with other occupations in the royal palace

The eunuchs were also highly associated with other lower ranking occupations in the royal palace. For example, some eunuchs would have special relationships with serving women in the palace. Some eunuchs would form a partnership with serving women to support each other, which was called a "vegetarian couple" (Duishi). In this kind of relationship, both the eunuchs and serving women could be more secure when they encountered conflicts with those of higher rank such as mandarin bureaucrats.

Power of eunuchs in the palace

The eunuchs also had an opportunity to rise to higher ranks. For example, the duties and jobs of eunuchs gradually changed in Ming dynasty. In the

Hongwu Emperor The Hongwu Emperor (21 October 1328– 24 June 1398), also known by his temple name as the Emperor Taizu of Ming, personal name Zhu Yuanzhang, courtesy name Guorui, was the List of emperors of the Ming dynasty, founding emperor of the Ming dyna ...

's time, the Emperor decreed that the eunuchs were to be kept in small numbers and of minimal literacy to prevent them from seizing power. However, in later generations, the Emperors began to train and educate the eunuchs and made them their personal secretaries. The lack of the restrictions allowed some eunuchs to rise to great power, for example, Wang Zhen,

Liu Jin Liu Jin (1451–1510) was a Chinese eunuch who held significant power in the government of the Zhengde Emperor of the Ming dynasty from 1506 to 1510. He was part of a group of eunuchs known as the " Eight Tigers" who had served the Zhengde Emperor ...

, and Wei Zhongxian especially. There was even a eunuch supervised secret police, which worked for the emperor. It was known as the

Eastern Depot Eastern Depot or Eastern Bureau () was a Ming dynasty spy and secret police agency run by eunuchs. It was created by the Yongle Emperor. History After the Yongle Emperor usurped the throne in 1402 from his nephew, the Jianwen Emperor, he attempt ...

and Western Depot. Also,

, a famous eunuch in China's history, became an early pioneer of seafaring and spread Chinese influence around the world.

Reputation of eunuchs in China

However, the reputation of eunuchs was controversial in Ming China, especially considering the way they had their eyes and ears everywhere. Since the eunuchs served both the harem and the emperors, it was believed that they were able to carry valuable information that could either break or create an emperor's status, so out of fear, Chinese bureaucrat-scholars always depicted eunuchs negatively as greedy, evil, cunning, and duplicitous. The Chinese seemed to have a stereotypical view toward the eunuchs. This bad reputation may be explained by the fact that the eunuchs, to get employment in the royal palace or official houses, needed to be castrated. Castration gave the eunuchs the license to work in the palace or official houses in Ming China because the officials and the Emperor in Ming China usually kept many concubines. However, in Chinese society, castration broke with conventional moral rules. A son who could not have a male heir to carry on the family name contradicted Confucian ideology. The eunuchs, despite their awareness of losing the ability to have children, would get castrated to have better lives. Another stereotypical view of eunuchs in the palace was that they exceeded their power in areas they did not belong, or that they did unpleasant work. For example, they were spies for emperors or officials. The

gave the eunuchs the authority to be in charge in the implementation of political tasks. As the eunuchs' presence and power grew, they gradually took over the duties of female palace musicians and become the dominant musicians in the Ming palace. When they came to power, eunuchs would even interfere in politics such as the succession to the throne.

Qing dynasty

Qing eunuchs had their testicles, scrotum and penises removed. Many Qing eunuchs were Mongol and Manchu origin despite laws against Manchus becoming eunuchs. While eunuchs were employed in all Chinese dynasties, their number decreased significantly under the Qing, and the tasks they performed were largely replaced by the Imperial Household Department. At the beginning of the 20th century, there were about 2,000 eunuchs working in the Forbidden City. The eunuchs at the Forbidden City during the later Qing period were infamous for their corruption, stealing as much as they could.Behr, Edward ''The Last Emperor'' London: Futura, 1987 page 73. The position of a eunuch in the Forbidden City offered opportunity for theft and corruption. China was such a poor country that countless men willingly became eunuchs to live a better life. However, eunuchs as the Emperor's slaves had no rights and could be abused at the Emperor's whim. The Emperor

Puyi Puyi (7 February 190617 October 1967) was the final emperor of China, reigning as the eleventh monarch of the Qing dynasty from 1908 to 1912. When the Guangxu Emperor died without an heir, Empress Dowager Cixi picked his nephew Puyi, aged tw ...

recalled in his memoirs of growing up in the Forbidden City that: "By the age of 11, flogging eunuchs was part of my daily routine. My cruelty and love of power were already too firmly set for persuasion to have any effect on me... Whenever I was in a bad temper the eunuchs would be in for trouble." The Qing beile (princes) were told that their palace women would have sex with their boys slaves so they were told to have the young boy slaves castrated by Nurhaci in 1621. The Imperial Household Department managed eunuchs since the Kangxi reign. The Qing palace leaned towards recruiting eunuchs from

Zhili Zhili, alternately romanized as Chihli, was a northern administrative region of China since the 14th century that lasted through the Ming dynasty and Qing dynasty until 1911, when the region was dissolved, converted to a province, and renamed ...

, mainly mid 20 year olds or adolescent Han Chinese who were not married, mainly from northern Shandong and the counties of Wanping, Jinghai, Daxing and Hejian in southern Hebei near Beijing. Some southern Chinese from Yunnan, Zhejiang and Guangdong people became eunuchs but in a minor amount compared to the counties around Beijing. Sons of rebels 15 and younger from the Lin Shuangwen rebellion in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...

were castrated as ordered by the

Qianlong emperor The Qianlong Emperor (25 September 17117 February 1799), also known by his temple name Emperor Gaozong of Qing, personal name Hongli, was the fifth Emperor of China, emperor of the Qing dynasty and the fourth Qing emperor to rule over China pr ...

and Heshen. The Taiwanese boys who were castrated were aged 4 to 15 years old and 40 of them were named on one memorial. This new policy of castrating sons of killers of 3 or more related people and rebels helped solve the supply of young eunuchs for the Qing Summer Palace. The Qing were willing to lower their normal age limit for castration all the way to 4 when using castration as punishment for sons of rebels when it normally wanted eunuchs castrated after 9. Other times, the Qing Imperial Household Department waited until the boys reached 11 years old before castrating them, like when they waited for the two young imprisoned sons of executed murderer Sui Bilong from Shandong to grow up. The Imperial Household Department immediately castrated the 11-year-old Hunanese boy Fang Mingzai to become a eunuch slave in the Qing palace after his father was executed for murder. The Qing Summer palace, due to this policy of castrating sons of mass murderers and rebels received many young healthy eunuchs. Sons of rebels leaders above 15 were beheaded. Female relatives of Taiwanese rebel leaders (daughters, wives, concubines) were sent to the northeastern frontier in Ningguta in

Heilongjiang Heilongjiang is a province in northeast China. It is the northernmost and easternmost province of the country and contains China's northernmost point (in Mohe City along the Amur) and easternmost point (at the confluence of the Amur and Us ...

to become slaves of the Solon. 130 sons of the Taiwanese rebel leaders 15 and younger were taken into custody by the Qing. The rebel leader Zhuang Datian's 4-year-old grandson Zhuang Amo was one of those castrated. There was another Lin family who joined the Lin Shuangwen rebellion. Lin Da was ordered to lead 100 people by Lin Shuangwen and given the title "general Xuanlue". Lin Da was 42 when he was executed by Lingchi. He had six sons; the two older ones died before, and his third son Lin Dou died from sickness before he could be castrated in Beijing, while his fourth and fifth sons were castrated, the 11-year-old Lin Biao and 8-year-old Lin Xian. However, his sixth and youngest son, 7-year-old Lin Mading, was given away to a relative (uncle) named Lin Qin for adoption, and Lin Qin did not join the rebellion, so Lin Mading was not castrated. Lin Mading had 2 children after marrying his wife in 1800 when he was 20. Descriptions of fingerprints were recorded for castrated sons of criminals and rebels, but it was barely used for other eunuchs when trying to find escapee eunuchs and only a written description of the fingerprints was taken, not an actual print. Fingerprints were used in the Qing bureaucracy in other instances to identify people. Sometimes castrations were not fully done since an

undescended testicle Cryptorchidism, also known as undescended testis, is the failure of one or both testes to descend into the scrotum. The word is . It is the most common birth defect of the male genital tract. About 3% of full-term and 30% of premature infant boy ...

would not be removed and it was only found out when puberty brought out the "secondary sex characteristics". If they were found out then they would be sent back to their hometowns and out of the palace. They would still be called eunuchs. In one case reviewed by the Qianlong emperor, a man named Zhao Youliang (赵友谅) was innocent of all crime but his father Zhao Cheng (赵成) slept with his son's wife. Zhao Youliang didn't want to report his father out of filial piety so he took his wife elsewhere to their relatives, the Niu (牛) family's house to hide her from his father Zhao Cheng. Sun Si (孙四), a friend of Zhao Cheng then helped Zhao Cheng murder 5 members of the Niu family, and then Zhao Cheng blamed his son Zhao Youliang for the murder. Zhao Youliang did not implicate his father out of filial piety when he was being tortured in interrogation but the officials realized one person couldn't have killed 5 the government officials tortured and interrogated the neighbors until they revealed that Sun Si and Zhao Cheng committed the murder. The penalty for mass murdering multiple people was that the same number of people from the perpetrator's family would get executed. The officials did not want to execute Zhao Youliang for his father's crimes so they asked the Qianlong emperor to decide. Qianlong decided that the son was to be sentenced to castration since he deserved death under Qing law because he was the son of a murderer but "commuted" his sentence to castration as mercy because he was personally victimized when his father who slept with his wife, and he had filial piety and said he had to be castrated because his father did not deserve offspring. There was also a mass murder incident where a murderer injured 12 and murdered 11 unrelated people in 1791. The Qing law on mass murdering said that castration was to be done on sons of murderers who mass murdered against one family and killed 3 or more members of it, but nevertheless the Qing emperor ordered the sons of this mass murderer be castrated as well. After one boy was injured severely and his three brothers were killed in Henan by a murderer surnamed Zhang who was a tenant farmer in 1788, the emperor ordered castration for the 2 sons of Zhang while a lingchi sentenced was passed for Zhang himself. The Qing passed a law that castration was the punishment for grandsons and sons of rebels by the Imperial Household Department after changing a death sentence to a castration sentence in the case of an 18 year old who was a nephew of a rebel in 1781, however despite the law being inspired by this case, nephews weren't covered in the people to be castrated in the law and only the direct sons and grandsons of the rebels were. Qianlong reintroduced castration of relatives of those who murdered multiple people or rebelled. The Ming code and Tang code both do not have such a law. Castration for sons of rebels was reintroduced in by the Qing in the 18th century after it was abolished in the Ming and Tang dynasties. Sons of murderers above 15 were not beheaded unlike sons and grandsons of rebels and instead they were also castrated as eunuchs in the palace. The wives and daughters of murderers would be given to the murder victims' relatives if they still lived unlike wives and daughters of rebels. Qianlong and the Imperial Household Department under Heshen later decreed that sons of murderers who were 16 years old and older would be exiled as become slaves of the Solon on the frontier in Ningguta in Heilongjiang or Ili in Xinjiang after castration while the sons 15 and younger would be kept as eunuchs in the Imperial palace since the younger sons could be controlled while the older sons were uncontrollable in a decision made in 1793. Imposing a penalty of castration upon the sons of rebels and murderers of 3 or more related people was part of a new Qing policy to ensure a supply of young boy eunuchs since the Qianlong emperor ordered young eunuchs to be shifted towards the main imperial residence in the Summer Palace. Norman A. Kutcher connected the Qing policy on obtaining young eunuchs to the observation that young boy eunuchs were prized by female members of the Qing Imperial family as attendants, noted by the British George Carter Stent in the 19th century. Norman Kutcher noted that George Stent said young eunuchs were physically attractive and were used for "impossible to describe" duties by female imperial family members and they were considered "completely pure". Kutcher suggests the boys were used for sexual pleasure by Qing imperial women, connecting them to the boy eunuchs called "earrings" who were used for that purpose. Boy eunuchs were used for intimate bathroom and bedroom duties by palace ladies. An amusement part model peasant village with a complete market street (Maimaijie) in the Summer palace was staffed by eunuch actors.

Sir John Barrow, 1st Baronet Sir John Barrow, 1st Baronet, (19 June 1764 – 23 November 1848) was an English geographer, linguist, writer and civil servant best known for serving as the Second Secretary to the Admiralty from 1804 until 1845. Early life Barrow was ...

noted on his visit to the Qing summer palace as part of the Macartney Embassy in 1793 that there were two kinds of Chinese eunuchs. Some only had their testicles cut off, who inspected and maintained buildings, gardens and other works in the palaces. The others were called rasibus by Catholic missionaries there and had all their genitals, including penises and testicles cut off, since they served in the interior of the palace and served and attended upon the women of the Qing imperial harem. The rasibus were reportedly as coquettish as the women they served, and painted their faces like them. Barrow also noted all the Chinese eunuchs there including the rasibus had their own women slaves who were the daughters of poor people they purchased them from and they used these women for sex. Sir George Staunton, 1st Baronet explained that the term "black eunuch" did not refer to skin colour but referred to the term used in the Ottoman Empire for eunuchs who had their penis cut off along with their testicles. During the Qing, Chinese eunuchs who were fully castrated with their penises removed had to resort to either dildos, oral sex or foreplay to satisfy women during sex. Qing era writer Liang Zhangju (1775–1849) wrote in his sketches "Wandering Talk" that when palace eunuchs performed oral sex on the women and caressed them with their hands until the women were sexually satisfied and sweating. Chinese eunuchs used dildos and hormone therapy to have a "dry-run orgasm with diminished sensation", and they could "to reduce the effects of castration" especially if they were past puberty when castrated. Eunuchs still had sexual urges after castration as well as libido. The eunuchs were sexually "frustrated". The eunuch Zhang Delang engaged in sexual acts with a prostitute in Tianjin's Japanese concession where he lived after the fall of the Qing and he also married three women. Another eunuch who worked for him, Yu Chunhe said he was "burning with fever and desire" as he watched the prostitute and Zhang. The Qing court and the eunuchs themselves considered eunuchs as male, not as female or a third sex. The prostitute's body was kissed all over by Zhang Lande as he lifted her and "threw himself on her like a wolf". It was also reported that the eunuch Xiao Dezhang (Hsiao Teh-chang) (Zhang Lande) was suggested by Cixi (Tsu-hsi) as a sexual partner for the Longyu empress (Lung-yu) since the Guangxi emperor (Kuang Hsu) was impotent. Zhang Lande had the building later known as Qingwangfu (Prince Qing's Mansion) in Tianjin built for himself before Zaizhen, Prince Qing bought it from him. The eunuch Zhang Lande had a love affair with Han Bannerwoman Yu Roung Ling, a sister of Princess Der Ling. Nellie Roungling Yu

The Qing Dynasty Cixi Imperial Dowager Empress of China with Attendant

The Manchu palace maid Ronger (榮兒) (born 1880) came from the Manchu Hešeri clan. She later adopted the surname He and became known as "He Rong'er". When Ronger turned 18 and retired as a palace maid, the Qing Dowager Empress Cixi married Ronger off to a Han Chinese eunuch surnamed Liu as a present to her. Liu was an adopted son of the eunuch Li Lianying. Ronger recounted in her memoir that the Qing court rules were that all eunuchs must be Han Chinese not from the Eight banners, while all palace maids must be Manchu bannerwomen from the three upper banners of the Eight Banners and Han Chinese girls were forbidden to become palace maids. For 8 years Cixi had Ronger serving her as maid and Cixi gave her the name Ronger. She was 13 when she was recruited at palace maid during mandatory recruitment drives from the banners. She wrote the book "The Memoirs of a Palace Maid" about her life. The rules had been changed to recruit mainly Manchu and Mongol banner girls for palace maids and ban Han banner girls from palace made work in 1806, ostensibly and officially to help Han bannermen reduce their monetary burdens but the historian Shuo Wang also believes it was due to the fact that Han banner girls followed Han customs and not Manchu ones. Any Han bannerman who was not a high official and not of the 6th rank did not have to send his daughters to the palace maid draft while every Manchu and Mongol bannerman had to send their daughters. The "servant girls" were "daughters of Manchu soldiers" and had to "stay ten years at the palace to wait upon Her Majesty, and then they are free to marry". When George N. Kates lived in Beijing in the 1930s, he lived in a dwelling he rented from a eunuch and his wife, who were given the abode by the Empress Dowager as a gift and the eunuch's wife was a former handmaiden to the Empress Dowager. During the Great Leap Forward, malnutrition caused the wife of the eunuch to die. Sexual relations and marriage between eunuchs and palace maids were referred to as "Duishi" or "Caihu". Ma Saihua, a 19-year-old woman was married by the eunuch An Dehai when he was 24. A yellow bag with bamboo sticks was kept in the Forbidden City and Empress Dowager Cixi once ordered the palace servant girls and court ladies to beat the eunuchs with them. Eunuchs would be punished even more unless they begged their mistress or master for mercy when they were being beaten for infractions and rule breaking. There was a difference between eunuchs who served the inner court of the palace and the outer court of the palace. There were fewer rules and restrictions on outer court eunuchs and they dwelled outside the palace and received less salary. They were the musicians, actors, taking care of the tombs and served as the Imperial Household Department's zongguan and maintained temples, altars, parks and gardens, belonging to 5 different sections. They were subject to the Jingshifang and did mostly menial work. The eunuchs of the inner court were higher in rank and received more salary. Out of the total eunuch population, one fifth to one fourth were from the inner court and they numbered 400 to 500. The inner court eunuchs were of 5 categories, those in the general service, those who serves princesses and princes, those who served the dowager empress, those who served the concubines and empress, and those who served the emperor. The film "The Conqueror" (征服者) starring actress Chen Hong depicts the castration of the 8–15 year old sons of rebels in the White Lotus Rebellion in 1804. Zhang Wenxiang (張汶祥) who was accused in the assassination case of Ma Xinyi was executed and his 11-year-old son Zhang Changpao (張長幅) was castrated by the Imperial Household Department to become a eunuch. His son was first tortured in front of him to get him to confess to the assassination which many believed was an inside conspiracy by the Qing government against Ma Xinyi. Zhang Wenxiang's daughter was already married so she was not enslaved by the government. Taiping rebel

Shi Dakai Shi Dakai (1 March 1831 – 25 June 1863; ), born in Guigang, Guangxi, also known as the Wing King () or phonetically translated as Yi-Wang, was one of the most highly acclaimed leaders in the Taiping Rebellion and a poet. Early life Shi Dak ...

's had 2 sons, 5 year old Shi Dingzhong and a younger son named Shi Dingji. His sons were sentenced to imprisonment until they reached 11 when they would then be castrated. It is unknown if it was carried out. When the Qing forces under Zuo Zongtang put down the

Dungan Revolt (1862–1877) The Dungan Revolt (1862–1877), also known as the Tongzhi Hui Revolt (, Xiao'erjing: تُ‌جِ خُوِ لُوًا, ) or Hui (Muslim) Minorities War, was a war fought in 19th-century western China, mostly during the reign of the Tongzhi Emp ...

, the sons of Muslim Hui and Salar rebel leaders like Ma Benyuan (马本源) and Ma Guiyuan (马桂源) in

Ningxia Ningxia, officially the Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region, is an autonomous region in Northwestern China. Formerly a province, Ningxia was incorporated into Gansu in 1954 but was later separated from Gansu in 1958 and reconstituted as an autonomous ...

Gansu Gansu is a provinces of China, province in Northwestern China. Its capital and largest city is Lanzhou, in the southeastern part of the province. The seventh-largest administrative district by area at , Gansu lies between the Tibetan Plateau, Ti ...

and

Qinghai Qinghai is an inland Provinces of China, province in Northwestern China. It is the largest provinces of China, province of China (excluding autonomous regions) by area and has the third smallest population. Its capital and largest city is Xin ...

were castrated by the Qing Imperial Household Department once they became 11 years old and were sent to work as eunuch slaves for Qing garrisons in Xinjiang and the wives of the Muslim rebel leaders were also enslaved. Ma Jincheng, a son of the Hui

Naqshbandi Naqshbandi (Persian: نقشبندیه) is a major Sufi order within Sunni Islam, named after its 14th-century founder, Baha' al-Din Naqshband. Practitioners, known as Naqshbandis, trace their spiritual lineage (silsila) directly to the Prophet ...

leader Ma Hualong was also castrated after being held in jail in

Xi'an Xi'an is the list of capitals in China, capital of the Chinese province of Shaanxi. A sub-provincial city on the Guanzhong plain, the city is the third-most populous city in Western China after Chongqing and Chengdu, as well as the most populou ...

until he was 11 years old. The Imperial Household Department immediately castrated the 9 sons of Ma Guiyuan since they already reached age 12 and were enslave as eunuchs to Qing soldiers in Xinjiang. Ma Zhenyuan, Ma Benyuan and Ma Guiyuan's wives were all enslaved to soldiers and officials in provincial garrisons after the husbands were executed. Ma Yulong was the father of the boys Ma Sanhe and Ma Jibang. Ma Dingbang was the father of Ma Qishi, Ma Shaba, Ma Suo and Ma Youzong. Ma Chenglong was the father of Ma Feifei. Their sons were all sentenced to castration. The sons and grandsons of the Central Asian Muslim conqueror, Yaqub Beg, in China were all castrated. Surviving members of Yaqub Beg's family included 4 sons, 4 grandchildren (2 grandsons and 2 granddaughters), and 4 wives. They either mostly died in prison in

Lanzhou Lanzhou is the capital and largest city of Gansu province in northwestern China. Located on the banks of the Yellow River, it is a key regional transportation hub, connecting areas further west by rail to the eastern half of the country. His ...

, Gansu, or were killed. However, his sons, Yima Kuli, K'ati Kuli, Maiti Kuli, and grandson, Aisan Ahung, were the only survivors in 1879. They were all underage children, and put on trial, sentenced to an agonizing death if they were complicit in their father's rebellious "sedition", or if they were innocent of their fathers' crimes, were to be sentenced to

and serve as eunuch slaves to Chinese troops, when they reached 11 years old. They were handed over to the Imperial Household to be executed or castrated. In 1879, it was confirmed that the sentence of castration was carried out; Yaqub Beg's son and grandsons were castrated by the Chinese court in 1879 and turned into eunuchs to work in the Imperial Palace. Yaqub Beg's sons and grandsons who were captured were under 10 years old Aisin Ahongju, Kadihuli and 10 year old Imahuli . A man in Shaanxi had his penis cut off by his daughter in law, surnamed Xie during the Qing dynasty In 1872 boy named Liu Ch'ang-yu from Henan was taken by the Imperial Household Department for castration when he grew of age to be enslaved as a eunuch in a princely establishment since his father had murdered several relatives. In 1856, some rebels were captured in the metropolitan province (Zhili) and several boys under 15 years old were with them. The adults were beheaded and the children were castrated. A boy named Li Liu was the son of a rebel named Li Mao-tz'e (Li Maozi) who rebelled on the border of Henan (Honan) and Anhui (Anhwei) provinces in 1872. Li Liu was captured when he was 6 years old by Qing government forces in Anhui (Anhwei) and handed over to Yulu (Yu Luh), the governor of Anhui. He was imprisoned in the office of the district magistrate of Huaining (Hwaining) until he reached 11 years old in 1877 and was then ordered to be handed to the Imperial Household Department for castration. His case appeared on 28 November 1877 in the

Peking Gazette The ''Peking Gazette'' was an official bulletin published with changing frequency in Beijing until 1912, when the Qing dynasty fell and Republican China was born. The translated name, as it is known to Western sources, comes from Ming dynasty-era ...

. The Qing later changed its law in 1801, 1814, 1835 and 1845, saying that all the sons and grandsons of rebels who were ignorant of their father and grandfather's rebellious intents were to be sent to the Imperial Household Department for castration regardless of whether they were adults or children. Young boys would be imprisoned until reaching 11 and they would be castrated and boys between 11 and 16 would be castrated without respite. Many of these rebellions were caused by the Qing state persecuting religions and were provoked by Qing actions against these religious sects. During the Qing, punitive castration was done on a man in Shanxi for breaking the law. He was married to a woman but could not father children with her due to his castration. She went back to her parents several times until her father committed murder suicide, with him hanging himself after she was hanged. This case appeared in Chen Dongyuan's book on women's history in China . After the execution of anti-Qing revolutionary Xu Xilin (Hsü Hsi-lin) in 1907, his family including his son Xu Xuewen (1906–1991) were arrested by the Qing. Under Qing law, his son under the age of 16 was supposed to be castrated to become a eunuch and serve in the Qing palace. The Qing was overthrown in 1912 and the castration was not carried out. Xu Xuewen later married a German woman, Maria Henriette Margarete Bordan (1915–2003). They had a daughter together named Xu Naijin (Nancy Zi) (1937 – August 20, 2005) who married Chiang Hsiao-wen the son of the Republic of China President

Chiang Ching-kuo Chiang Ching-kuo (, 27 April 1910 – 13 January 1988) was a politician of the Republic of China. The eldest and only biological son of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, he held numerous posts in the government of the Republic of China and ended ...

and his wife, a Belarusian woman Chiang Fang-liang (Faina Ipat'evna Vakhreva). Empress Dowager Longyu wanted the imperial palace to have the right to make more eunuchs during the negotiations for abdication of the Qing in 1912 in the Articles of Favourable Treatment but she was forced to concede her demand. After the revolution of 1911–12 that toppled the Qing, the last emperor, Puyi, continued to live in the Forbidden City with his eunuchs as if the revolution had never happened while receiving financial support from the new Chinese republic until 1924 when the former Emperor and his entourage were expelled from the Forbidden City by the warlord General

Feng Yuxiang Feng Yuxiang (; ; 6 November 1882 – 1 September 1948), courtesy name Huanzhang (焕章), was a Chinese warlord and later general in the National Revolutionary Army. He served as Vice Premier of the Republic of China from 1928 to 1930. A ...

. In 1923, after a case of arson that Puyi believed was started to cover the theft of his Imperial treasures, Puyi expelled all of the eunuchs from the Forbidden City.

Notable Chinese eunuchs

First millennium BC

* Zhao Gao (3rd Century BC): favourite of Qin Shihuangdi, who plotted against

Li Si Li Si (; 208 BC) was a Chinese calligrapher, philosopher, and politician of the Qin dynasty. He served as Chancellor from 246 to 208 BC, first under King Zheng of the state of Qin—who later became Qin Shi Huang, the "First Emperor" o ...

. *

(old romanization Ssu-ma Chi'en; 2nd/1st century BC): the first person to have practiced modern

historiography Historiography is the study of the methods used by historians in developing history as an academic discipline. By extension, the term ":wikt:historiography, historiography" is any body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiog ...

– gathering and analyzing both primary and secondary sources to write his monumental history of the Chinese Empire.

First millennium AD

Cai Lun Cai Lun ( zh, s=蔡伦; courtesy name: Jingzhong ( zh, labels=no, t=敬仲, s=敬仲); – 121 CE), formerly romanization of Chinese, romanized as Ts'ai Lun, was a Eunuchs in China, Chinese eunuch court official of the Eastern Han dynasty. H ...

(old romanization Ts'ai Lun; 1st/2nd century AD): Former attribution to Lun as the inventor of paper has been rescinded following discovery of many earlier manuscripts written on paper. It is now highly questionable if he was directly involved in making paper. * Huang Hao: eunuch in the state of Shu during the

Three Kingdoms The Three Kingdoms of Cao Wei, Shu Han, and Eastern Wu dominated China from AD 220 to 280 following the end of the Han dynasty. This period was preceded by the Eastern Han dynasty and followed by the Jin dynasty (266–420), Western Jin dyna ...

Period; also appears in the ''

Romance of the Three Kingdoms ''Romance of the Three Kingdoms'' () is a 14th-century historical novel attributed to Luo Guanzhong. It is set in the turbulent years towards the end of the Han dynasty and the Three Kingdoms period in Chinese history, starting in 184 AD and ...

''. * Cen Hun: eunuch in the state of Wu during the Three Kingdoms Period. * Zhang Ci: eunuch and military general in the state of

Former Qin Qin, known as the Former Qin and Fu Qin (苻秦) in historiography, was a Dynasties of China, dynastic state of China ruled by the Fu (Pu) clan of the Di (Five Barbarians), Di peoples during the Sixteen Kingdoms period. Founded in the wake of ...

during the

Sixteen Kingdoms The Sixteen Kingdoms (), less commonly the Sixteen States, was a chaotic period in Chinese history from AD 304 to 439 when northern China fragmented into a series of short-lived dynastic states. The majority of these states were founded b ...

Period. * Gao Lishi: a loyal and trusted friend of Tang emperor Xuanzong. * Li Fuguo: Tang eunuch who began another era of eunuch rule. * Yu Chao'en: Tang eunuch who began his career as army supervisor. * Yang Liangyao

Second millennium AD

* Jia Xian ( – ): Chinese mathematician; invented the Jia Xian triangle for the calculation of

square root In mathematics, a square root of a number is a number such that y^2 = x; in other words, a number whose ''square'' (the result of multiplying the number by itself, or y \cdot y) is . For example, 4 and −4 are square roots of 16 because 4 ...

s and

cube root In mathematics, a cube root of a number is a number that has the given number as its third power; that is y^3=x. The number of cube roots of a number depends on the number system that is considered. Every real number has exactly one real cub ...

s. *

(1371–1433): famous admiral who led huge Chinese fleets of exploration around the Indian Ocean. * Bian Lingcheng ( 邊令誠) * Wang Zhen: first Ming eunuch with much power; see Tumu Crisis. * Gang Bing: patron saint of eunuchs in China who castrated himself to demonstrate his loyalty to the

. * Yishiha: admiral in charge of expeditions down the

Amur River The Amur River () or Heilong River ( zh, s=黑龙江) is a perennial river in Northeast Asia, forming the natural border between the Russian Far East and Northeast China (historically the Outer and Inner Manchuria). The Amur ''proper'' is ...

under the Yongle and Xuande Emperors. *

: corrupt eunuch official of the Ming dynasty and de facto emperor, member of the Eight Tigers. * Wei Zhongxian: eunuch of the Ming dynasty, considered the most powerful eunuch in Chinese history. * Wu Rui: a Chinese eunuch in

Annam (Vietnam). * An Dehai * Li Lianying: a despotic eunuch of the

Qing dynasty The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

. * Xin Xiuming (1878–1959): Entered Emperor Puyi's service in 1902; left palace service in 1911; became abbot of the Taoist temple at the

Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery The Babaoshan Revolutionary Cemetery () is Beijing's main resting place for the highest-ranking revolutionary heroes, high-ranking government officials and, in recent years, individuals deemed of major importance due to their contributions to soc ...

by 1930; wrote memoir ''Eunuch's Recollection'' (老太监的回忆). * Sun Yaoting (1902–1996): last surviving imperial eunuch of Chinese history.

In popular culture

* Eunuchs also exist in the Japanese light novel and anime series, '' The Apothecary Diaries'', where one of the main characters, Jinshi, is a eunuch within a fictional nation heavily inspired by the

Tang dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, c=唐朝), or the Tang Empire, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907, with an Wu Zhou, interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed ...

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * Tuotuo. Liaoshi istory of Liao Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1974 (or Tuotuo, ''Liaoshi'' (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1974)) * * * * * * * * * * "A Eunuch Cooks Boys to Make a Tonic of Male Essence," in Zhang Yingyu,
The Book of Swindles: Selections from a Late Ming Collection
', translated by Christopher Rea and Bruce Rusk (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2017), pp. 138–141. * Mary M. Anderson, Hidden Power: The Palace Eunuchs of Imperial China (Prometheus Books, 1990) * Taisuke Mitamura (trans. by Charles A. Pomeroy), Chinese Eunuchs: The Structure of Intimate Politics (Tuttle Publishing, 1970) * Shih-Shan Henry Tsai, The Eunuchs in the Ming Dynasty (State University of New York Press, 1995) * English language Abstracts of the thesis *** **

* '' In Our Time: The Eunuch''. Presenter:

Melvyn Bragg Melvyn Bragg, Baron Bragg (born 6 October 1939) is an English broadcaster, author and parliamentarian. He is the editor and presenter of ''The South Bank Show'' (1978–2010, 2012–2023), and the presenter of the BBC Radio 4 documentary series ...

. Interviewed Guests: Karen Radner, Professor of Ancient Near Eastern History at

University College London University College London (Trade name, branded as UCL) is a Public university, public research university in London, England. It is a Member institutions of the University of London, member institution of the Federal university, federal Uni ...

; Shaun Tougher, Reader in Ancient History at

Cardiff University Cardiff University () is a public research university in Cardiff, Wales. It was established in 1883 as the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire and became a founding college of the University of Wales in 1893. It was renamed Unive ...

; Michael Hoeckelmann, British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of History at

King's College London King's College London (informally King's or KCL) is a public university, public research university in London, England. King's was established by royal charter in 1829 under the patronage of George IV of the United Kingdom, King George IV ...

. Producer: Thomas Morris. Broadcaster:

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

. Date: 26 February 2015

External links

* * * {{cite web, url=http://www.eunuch.org/ , website=eunuch.org, title=The Eunuch Archive Eunuchs History of China Society of China Demographics of China