How did eunuchs in ancient times serve concubines and meet their needs?

In the deep palace, concubines had long-term contact with the emperor's married life, which naturally had a great impact on the eunuchs. Although eunuchs have lost their normal sexual ability after castration, there are many signs that they still have certain sexual demands. Sexual affairs between the emperor and concubines in the palace were not taboo due to the eunuchs' special status, which also stimulated them and induced sexual desire.

First, let's understand where the eunuchs' bodies were cut during castration.

All of them must be castrated, even the testicles and penis cannot be left.

Some palace maids and concubines who have fallen out of favor can have an intimate relationship with eunuchs, which is called "Dui Shi", which means that the eunuchs will satisfy their needs. This is an open secret.

Feudal emperors would never tolerate their concubines having unfaithful behavior, and there were many tasks in the harem that women could not complete (due to physical strength differences), so eunuchs became necessary members of the harem.

In theory, castration of adult males would not endanger life if handled properly. Eunuchs in the Qing Dynasty were generally castrated during childhood and adolescence, and were divided into two categories: natural eunuchs and eunuchs later. Natural eunuchs were further divided into those with congenital dysplasia and those who castrated themselves (such as An Dehai). If a natural eunuch wanted to enter the palace, he would report to the local government, and the government would dutifully send him to the palace to serve as the "heir to heaven."

Others wanted to enter the palace. After going through various procedures such as introduction and guarantor, they went to "Xiaodao Liu" in Beijing to have themselves castrated. They had to give the "surgeon" a sum of money (they could write an IOU) and pay homage to the ancestor Sima Qian.

The man was not allowed to eat or drink for one day before castration. He was placed in a room with windows covered with thick cotton paper, and his limbs were tied to the door panel. There was a round opening on the door panel corresponding to the anus for defecation.

Tie the penis and the base of the scrotum with a thin rope, castrate with a sharp knife, apply herbal medicine, wood incense ash, etc. on the incision, cut a fresh pig kidney in half and stick them on top (to cool and stop bleeding). Insert a small section of goose feather tube into the urethra to prevent the incision from healing and causing permanent death, so that urination cannot be performed.

The severed penis, scrotum and testicles are soaked in salt or lime, dried and put into a brocade bag, commonly known as "treasure".

Do not eat or drink after the operation. You can only drink on the third day to prevent urinary tract infection. You can walk normally after three months.

The penis was removed, which means the urethra and even the muscles that control the contraction of the urethral opening were removed. To put it bluntly, they cannot control their urination consciously at all! After the circumcision, a feather is inserted into the urethra as a catheter, and nothing else is needed after the urethra is cut off. In other words, all eunuchs will suffer from urinary incontinence at any time! How to solve this problem? If the eunuch is of high rank and has free time, of course he can change his clothes at any time to keep clean. However, most of the eunuchs in the palace are menial servants. They are so busy every day that they have no time to change clothes, so they have to let them dry in the shade. Therefore, most eunuchs always have a foul smell on their bodies. Therefore, when common people cursed the eunuchs as "stinky eunuchs, stinky eunuchs", it was a great insult to the eunuchs.

If there are casualties during the entire process, no one will be held responsible.

After entering the palace, one must find an old eunuch as a master or godfather to learn etiquette and rules.

The secrets between eunuchs and concubines

In the deep palace, what kind of "unspoken rules" exist between eunuchs and concubines? Long-term contact with the emperor's married life naturally has a great impact on the eunuchs. Some people believe that this is why eunuchs marry. From another perspective, there were many concubines who were not favored by the emperor throughout the year, so the eunuchs who served him would receive their respect all year round. At the same time, some eunuchs would take this opportunity to commit some "inappropriate" acts against concubines. Therefore, when Japanese scholars studied this issue, they proposed the "theory of getting rid of loneliness", believing that this was the reason why eunuchs married.

If the concubines want to have a chance to put their fortune cards on the plate, they need the help of eunuchs. Because of this relationship, the eunuchs in the Jingshifang could attack these women. Of course, they could not touch virgins.

However, once favored by the emperor, the concubines' wisdom will be greatly enhanced and their interest may grow. Naturally, when their desires are strong, they will choose eunuchs without any discrimination.

After all, a eunuch is still a man, and young eunuchs often get the opportunity to get close to the ladies. They are called "bed eunuchs", which is an open secret in the palace. In this way, eunuchs will naturally enjoy doing this, and then it will be legal for them to marry.

Therefore, when Japanese scholars studied this issue, they proposed the "theory of getting rid of loneliness", believing that this was the reason why eunuchs married. Yoshio Terao wrote in his magnum opus "The Eunuch's Story", which is a study of eunuchs: "Eunuchs form families with women mainly to escape loneliness. They are looked down upon and despised in the world, so it is not difficult to understand that they want warmth from their wives." Most of the eunuchs' wives were female officials in the palace. Because palace life was isolated from the rest of the world, only palace ladies could pair up with eunuchs so they could rely on each other?

Since eunuchs have been castrated, their bodies will naturally undergo great changes. An abnormal body will gradually lead to an abnormal psychology, and their personality cannot be viewed from a normal perspective. They have lost the taste and ability of masculinity, and are not feminine, so their souls are twisted and their hearts are homeless.

Therefore, their personalities are very abnormal. They will cry for no reason, get angry for no reason over trivial matters, and then suddenly calm down, being moody. When they see someone stronger than themselves, they will fawn on him, and bow down to him, showing their inferiority and weakness.

Their abnormal personality makes people unwilling to associate with them. They will express love to children and women, and they will also be abnormally obsessed with the puppies they raise. Because they are lonely and lost, the emptiness in their hearts makes them willing to marry a wife so that they can get rid of this loneliness.

There are two other viewpoints based on medicine and physiology, which believe that eunuchs marrying wives is related to these relevant factors, namely the thoroughness of castration and the existence of sex genes.

Xiao Dezhang, a eunuch in the Qing Dynasty, was a eunuch who had been castrated since childhood. However, when he reached puberty, he suddenly became interested in women, and later he married several wives. This incident caused people to speculate that his purification was not thorough. Chen Cunwang, a famous Chinese doctor of medicine and historian, has studied the issue of eunuchs for many years. He believed that if the eunuchs' castration was not thorough, it was very likely that their penis would regenerate, thus restoring their sexual desire. The young eunuchs in the palace have to be examined every three years and checked again every five years to see if they have any protruding flesh. This is a palace custom. However, things in the palace cannot be simply speculated based on common sense. If a concubine favored a young eunuch, she only had to say "forget it" to the eunuch who was examining him, and the eunuch would not need to be examined. In this way, even if the eunuch has a bulge of flesh growing out, it can develop freely and eventually grow into adulthood. In addition, there were some families with ulterior motives who had already prepared to send their children to the palace to become eunuchs in the future. So when these children were still in their cradles, special maids would use their clever surgery to twist the babies' lower bodies until their genitals gradually atrophied and their natural functions were completely destroyed. Such child eunuchs, because they had the opportunity to play with young princes and princesses, were likely to naturally regain their sexual abilities during their developmental period. As long as they had a very good relationship with the little prince, the eunuchs in the palace would not dare to examine them too carefully.

In addition to these more natural situations, there are also man-made situations. During the castration process of eunuchs, the old eunuchs led the underdeveloped young men into the castration room for the operation. In this case, if the person performing the castration was bribed, the new eunuch would not have to be completely castrated. As long as some of his roots were left, there would be hope for rebirth. Similarly, the examination to enter the palace could also be passed through bribery.

From a medical point of view, if a man has just developed and has not been castrated completely, the powerful development function of the human body may very likely allow him to regenerate his penis. This is the case with the several situations mentioned above, that is, eunuchs are no longer eunuchs in the true sense. If a handsome and lovely eunuch was assigned to serve a concubine in the deep palace, it is not impossible that they would fall in love with each other after being together day and night. The imperial concubine lived alone in the deep palace for a long time and became resentful. However, eunuchs were men after all, so she pulled the handsome young eunuch onto her bed. Even just hugging him and sleeping with him was quite interesting to the imperial concubine. So if a eunuch who was not a eunuch appeared, wouldn't it be more satisfying? In other words, the imperial concubine had great expectations for eunuchs who had not been castrated. In this case, of course, such a thing was very likely. This statement is not just speculation. In the notes of Ming Dynasty people such as "Zao Lin Za Zu", there are talks about Wei Zhongxian's "rebirth of the jade penis", and there is also talk about "activation of sex genes" from a physiological perspective.

The origin of this statement is an interesting story that caused a sensation in the foreign medical community in 1988. There was a boy in a certain country who lost his penis due to a medical accident when he was one year old. For the sake of their child's happiness, the parents discussed with the doctor and decided to change the child's gender by eradicating all of his male gonads and, at an appropriate time, injecting him with a large amount of female hormones to induce him to develop secondary female characteristics. Modern surgical techniques are of course much more thorough than the castration of eunuchs. The doctor created an artificial vagina for the boy, and since childhood, his parents have been training him as a girl. In this way, fourteen years passed, and this "girl" grew into a graceful young lady.

Just as this extraordinary experiment was about to succeed, an unexpected change occurred. This "girl" suddenly became interested only in "the same sex" and expressed her willingness to be a "man". Undoubtedly, the operation has failed.

There is a type of "hermaphrodite" with congenital deformity, who has both male and female sexual organs in their body, or who looks like a male (or female) in appearance, but actually has female (or male) reproductive organs, but they are defective or deformed. Medical practice has shown that sexual reassignment surgery can be successful in this situation. But as in the case mentioned above, completely artificially changing a normal boy into a girl is unprecedented in the history of world medicine. The experiment ultimately failed, but it revealed a major scientific discovery: a person's gender is not solely determined by their reproductive organs. The real center of sex is the hypothalamus, which prompts the human body to develop into a given sex (male or female) during puberty. The function of the hypothalamus is controlled by the sex genes on the chromosomes of human cells. In other words, the activation of sex genes is the real reason why the human body shows gender (either male or female). The choice of this sex gene is determined at the moment the egg is fertilized. This established fact cannot be changed by any skilled doctor.

This important physiological discovery provides a unique perspective on eunuchs’ marriage. This view holds that although eunuchs have lost their male reproductive organs, they are still men and naturally have the desire to approach women when they reach puberty. From this perspective, Chinese scholars such as Kong Xianzhang believe that the activation of sex genes is the fundamental reason why eunuchs marry.

All of the above statements about the issue of eunuchs marrying wives seem to have their own reasons and are self-consistent. But what is the eunuch's real motive? This is a very complicated question and I am afraid that we cannot draw a conclusion from just one aspect. If we want to truly solve this mystery, we should connect related disciplines such as history, environment, psychology, medicine, etc. and conduct in-depth research. Perhaps we will find the answer one day.