E unuchs have gained a secure place in ancient Chinese as well as ancient European history. Moreover, they seem to be a phenomenon that is not restricted to the ancient world or, for that matter, to any geographic or cultural region in particular. Many societies knew them and made use of them throughout the centuries. Many examples are to be found in China, India, Persia,223 Arabian culture, the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire, and Russia: eunuchs are a common anthropological feature.
I. Eunuchs in the Ancient World
Eunuchs appear in very different contexts. For instance, they are mentioned in the Bible. In Matthew 19.12, we read, “For there are eunuchs who have been so from birth, and there are eunuchs who have been made eunuchs by men, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom of heaven.”224 While a number of religious sects and cults required eunuchs, such as the cult of Cybele in ancient Greece and Rome,225 the eighteenth-century Christian sect of the Skopzi in Russia,226 and the Hindu sect of the Hijra in India,227 the predominant function of a eunuch was to be a servant. As servants, they performed very specific tasks within a household: as women’s guardians, bed-attendants, or providers of special erotic services. However, only the courts of centrally organized empires offered an environment where they were able to gain tremendous political influence and legendary wealth. The eunuch system helped maintain the mysterious distance between the ruler and his subjects. Well-documented examples in antiquity include the courts of the Eastern Roman emperors from the fourth and fifth centuries c. e.6 and the Chinese court from the first emperor Qin Shihuangdi until 1912. But what made these castrated men so successful in political systems that also developed elaborate career patterns for the aristocracy to serve in the government? Why did these counterparts to the official and aristocratic male world become the perfect courtiers? And what made them so special that they became a firmly established power at the grandest courts of the ancient world?
1.1. Becoming a Eunuch: Methods and Reasons
The one thing eunuchs all had in common was a deficiency of their genitals, in most cases caused by the irreversible act of castration. Let us first take a closer look at different types of castration. We encounter part-castration, where only the testicles were removed. Total castration was the alternative: it entailed the removal of both the penis (penectomy) and the testicles. Methods varied from a slash of a sword to a clash between two stones.228 229 Total castration had a higher mortality rate and seems to have been the norm in China.
The age at which castration took place also played an important role. Most eunuchs seem to have been created before puberty as castration in childhood was less dangerous for the eunuch-to-be: the evidence shows that the mortality rate was higher after puberty. However, there were several reasons for the high number of castrations of adult men. In ancient China, castration was a traditional punishment, for instance, for prisoners of war or traitors.230 Even high-ranking officials could face this fate.231 Similarly in the Roman Empire and Byzantium, castration was practiced as a penalty for prisoners of war, political opponents, sexual offenders, and disobedient slaves.232 It could also be employed as a means of torture.233
If the testicles were removed after puberty, the eunuch was still capable of achieving an erection since, although he would be sterile, he continued to receive testosterone through the adrenal glands.234 Numerous sources show that eunuchs were highly valued sexual partners; moreover, they interacted with both sexes. In Rome, slaves were castrated so that they could be used to satisfy their owners’ sexual desires; young men who had already been castrated were likewise regarded as useful additions to the household.235 They had to play the despised passive role in homosexual relationships and were therefore called pathici, meaning “those who give themselves like a woman.”236 In China, too, eunuchs were the submissive sexual partners of most of the emperors. Homosexuality was a normal part of a prince’s life. Princes and eunuchs had grown up and been educated together.237 But eunuchs’ erotic services were not limited to homosexual acts, either in the East or in the West.238 Wealthy women preferred intercourse with castrated slaves for a good reason: there was no risk of pregnancy.239 In the fourth and fifth centuries c. e., women’s intercourse with eunuchs had become a widespread topic of public debate.240 The women of the emperor’s palace in China also seem to have relied on eunuchs to fulfill their sexual desires.241
1.2. The Procedure: A Modern Example
Nineteenth-century accounts shed light on how the castration procedure was undertaken in China where total castration was the norm and the “eunuch-maker” was a special occupation. In preparation for surgery, the patient’s abdomen and upper thighs were tightly bound with strings or bandages that left the penis and scrotum exposed. These were then washed three times in hot pepper water while the patient sat in a semireclining position on a heated piece of furniture known in Chinese as the kang. The “eunuch-maker” repeatedly questioned the patient whether he really wanted to go through with the surgery. If the patient confirmed his commitment, he was firmly held down by assistants while his penis and the scrotum were cut off with one sweep of a razor-sharp sickle-shaped knife. The urethra was plugged and blocked off, and the wound was covered by paper soaked in cold water; tight bandages were applied. The assistant then had to walk the patient around for two or three hours before allowing him to lie down. He was forbidden to take fluids for three days. After this period was over, the urethra plug was removed and if urine gushed out, the operation was regarded as a success. If no urine appeared, the prognosis was that the man would soon die an agonizing death. After castration, the eunuch’s genitals were put in a container where they were pickled, after which they were returned to him for safekeeping. The eunuch would have to present them for advancement in rank, and after his death, his genitals would be buried together with the corpse.242 The wounds usually healed in about 100 days, whereupon the new eunuch would proceed to the imperial household for instruction. At the end of the first year, the eunuch would be transferred to the Imperial Palace to take up his new occupation.243
1.3. Provenance of Eunuchs
Apart from some noble young men from subject tribes who had been taken as hostages and then castrated, eunuchs came from the lowest strata of society. The sources of supply were the same as for slaves. In the Roman Empire, the market for eunuchs prospered because prices for castrates were high, much higher in fact than for normal slaves, which is hardly surprising given that since the end of the first century c. e., castration had been forbidden on Roman soil. The emperor Domitian had passed a law that prohibited castration against somebody’s will. Penalties were severe.244 The poet Martial praised this law that restricted the power of the pater familias?245 Several laws that more or less reiterated this injunction followed during the subsequent centuries. Therefore, most eunuchs apparently came from outside the empire: there was no penalty on owning them.246 Most of them were slaves or ex-slaves.247 The provenance of Chinese eunuchs seems to have been mixed. At first, eunuchs were commonly obtained from outside the empire.248 But toward the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, there seems to have been a large number of self-castrated men. Voluntary castration was based upon the economic principle of supply and demand. Demand was strong enough to encourage men to accept the risks of castration in the hope of making a career as a eunuch. A cultured man had to study many years to pass the state examinations in order to attain a position as an official. Some lower-class individuals who lacked the means to attend the Confucian schools and master their examination system chose a different road to influence, wealth, and social standing by castrating either themselves or a son. In the latter case, the father was usually responsible for this decision. As a palace eunuch, the son would be expected and able to support his family.249
In both cultures, castration was a means of gaining employment in the imperial household. At the Eastern Roman imperial court, a great number of eunuchs were employed in domestic and administrative functions, organized within a separate hierarchy and following their distinct career paths. But religious motivation also played a significant role in the West. In the pre-Christian period, followers of the cult of the ancient mother goddess Cybele sometimes voluntarily castrated themselves; in early Christianity, emasculation was practiced to ensure chastity. The “church father” Origen is the most famous example.250 Astonishingly, this model turned out to have no future in the Christian church; emasculation was subsequently condemned. It was the sovereign’s palace that rapidly became the most promising place for eunuchs, whether in China or in imperial Rome.
In addition to being a form of punishment, castration was also a symbol of conquest as well as of revenge in ancient Europe as well as China. Herodotus gives an example in the vendetta between Periander, the tyrant of Corinth, and the Corinthians: He seized 300 sons of noble families in Corcyra, one of the subjugated cities, and they were sent to Sardis to be castrated.251 By severing the symbol of manhood from prisoners of war they were to be made completely subservient. A similar pattern can be found in China. We know the sad story of the young prince of Lou Lan, a walled state on the western border. During the reign of Emperor Wudi, he was taken hostage and castrated. Following the death of the king of Lou Lan in 92 b. c.e., the people of the country requested that the prince be returned to take the throne. The ruler of Han rejected the request, however, for it would have been most embarrassing if the prince’s countrymen had found him to be a eunuch.252 In spite of his noble birth, the prince could not return to his homeland because of his shameful deformity, nor could he enter foreign society. Wudi’s desire to demonstrate complete conquest is evident. In addition to the political uses of castration, it was also part of early Chinese criminal law: death sentences for capital offences could be commuted to castration.253 By contrast, castration never became a standard penalty in Roman law.
2. Court Eunuchs: An Old Chinese Tradition
2.1. Special Skills and Duties
As Ulrike Jungel has shown, the Chinese language offers a number of very detailed expressions for court eunuchs.254 Generally speaking, the term huanguan may refer to any “castrated man” in general or to one who served in the imperial palace in particular.255 In fact, huanguan is the exact and official term to describe those castrated and employed at the imperial court as servants. Guan is the general term for “official” in Chinese. Even an emperor’s servants were officials and therefore some kind of guan. This gives us an indication of their social prestige. Eunuchs were also called siren. In siren, the si means to serve, while ren always stands for “human being" Generally speaking, siren denotes those who serve other people but in our context indicates the eunuch, that is, those who were castrated so that they could serve the households of the emperors. The literal term for eunuch was yanren. But yan, meaning “castration,” was rarely used, except in attempts to slander. For example, officials might use the term yanzei (a castrated thief) to scold a eunuch in a dispute. As we can see, the word’s modern connotation reflects the subject’s history.
One reason for the strong influence of eunuchs on the Son of Heaven was the fact that intimate relations between eunuchs and emperor were established in early childhood. As soon as he was old enough to leave his nurse’s side, an imperial prince would be instructed in speech, table manners, deportment, etiquette, and general knowledge by court eunuchs.256 257 In addition, eunuchs also took an interest in the natural sciences and technology. It was a eunuch who invented paper in 105 c. e.35 As well as the prince’s teachers, eunuchs were also his companions. Even his first sexual experience was often shared with a eunuch.258 Palace eunuchs shared the most intimate moments of an emperor’s life. The imperial prince (or child emperor) was surrounded by eunuchs and by women, mostly his mother and her kinsfolk, and had hardly any contact with more independent men, especially not with men from outside the court: even executive ministers were excluded from close contact. In theory, the emperor reigned supreme. But in practice, because of his seclusion, the Son of Heaven depended almost entirely on his eunuchs—and on the kinsmen of the empress or more usually those of the regent dowager empress.259
Even strong emperors were subject to eunuchs’ influence, especially where the sexual aspects to their duties were involved. Like most Chinese emperors, the famous Wudi, who brought the Han Dynasty to its peak of power, was bisexual; and after the death of his favorite concubine, he turned to a handsome eunuch, named Luan Ta, who was familiar with magic practices. After elevating him in rank and conferring upon him unprecedented honors and prestige (which included making him a landed marquis with the right to collect taxes from hundreds of households), he presented him with a palace, a fine carriage, and countless slaves. He even gave him his daughter as a bride and bestowed on him an official jade seal and the title “General of the Heavenly Way.” Later, bitterly disappointed, Wudi had this eunuch executed for daring to try to deceive the Son of Heaven.
Most stories about Chinese palace eunuchs come from the 23 standard Dynastic Histories.260 But historiography was the monopoly of the Confucian scholars that dominated Chinese officialdom. Court eunuchs and Confucian-trained officials competed for political influence in the palace. As personal attendants of the sovereign, the eunuchs always had his ear and so were in a better position than even the most powerful minister to curry favor, exercise influence, and accumulate wealth. The view of the historiographers is deeply influenced by the resentments of the office-holding ruling class toward their despised rivals. What is more, the emperor often used eunuchs to balance the power of Confucian civil servants. A generally negative view of eunuchs was the result. A key story, the tale of Zhao Gao, the first genuinely powerful eunuch in Chinese history, provides a perfect example of this slanted vision.
2.2. The First Famous Eunuch of China: The Tale of Zhao Gao
During the Qin Dynasty (221-206 b. c.e.), more eunuchs were employed to serve the ambitious empire builder Qin Shihuangdi, who was believed to have kept more than three thousand concubines in his palace and established a new agency called Zhongchangshi for the sole purpose of managing the ever increasing number of court eunuchs. In 210 b. c.e. the emperor died on a routine inspection tour. Immediately, concerns were raised about who should succeed him to the throne, and an attendant eunuch by the name of Zhao Gao suggested that the news of the emperor’s death be kept from the public and even from the emperor’s eldest son and heir apparent Fu Su, until troops could safely be moved to the capital city Xianyang. Secretly, Zhao Gao, together with the emperor’s youngest son Hu Hai, ordered the construction of a special coffin to slow down the decomposition of the emperor’s corpse and to conceal its odor. They pitched a tent for the emperor and brought in meals as if the emperor were still alive. In the meantime, the eunuch Zhao Gao, the Prime Minister Li Si, and the emperor’s youngest son successfully plotted to kill Fu Su, the heir apparent, and to make Hu Hai the next emperor of the Qin Dynasty. Zhao Gao was promoted to head the eunuch agency Zhongchangshi. On his recommendation, the young emperor ordered all of his father’s consorts who had not given birth to sons to follow the dead emperor to the grave; all the artisans who had worked on the terracotta figurines and the tomb went the same way. After winning the young emperor’s confidence, Zhao Gao felt that the Prime Minister Li Si knew more than he was supposed to about their secrets and had now become the biggest threat to the new court. With the young emperor on his side, Zhao Gao replaced Li Si while callously but methodically purging Li’s associates. However, popular discontent mounted and within only a few months, rebellions broke out all over the empire. During the early autumn of 206 b. c.e., when the rebels began to march into the Wei river valley, Zhao Gao murdered the Second Emperor Hu Hai. But a month later, the army led by Liu Bang, founder of the Han Dynasty, crushed the Qin defenders. Zhao Gao, the first really powerful eunuch in Chinese history, eventually became a casualty of this conflict.261
A eunuch who installed a puppet emperor must have been a nightmare for all officials. Zhao Gao was forever identified with usurpation, political intrigues, and murders. The story was reported primarily by the Han historians Sima Qian and Jia Yi, both of whom lived in the second century b. c.e. As Confucians, they opposed Legalism, the First Emperor’s official philosophy that supported the idea of centralized total power.262 They consequently portrayed Qin Shihuangdi as a murderer and oppressor who failed to rule with humanity and righteousness. But the vivid rivalry between officials and eunuchs at the palace also shaped the historians’ views on Zhao Gao. Their account witnesses the emergence of the stereotypical role that eunuchs came to play in Chinese historiography (as well as in the histories of other empires263), that of a scapegoat for an emperor’s deeds. The grand eunuch Zhao Gao, who was the shadowy figure behind the emperor, was then singled out to share the blame of the First Emperor’s many offensive policies. And forever after, his despised name would be held up to Chinese emperors as a dire warning against granting eunuchs any influence over them.
3. Women and Eunuchs: A “Natural” Alliance
The evils of the eunuch system have been the subject of much debate in Chinese historiography. The root cause was sought in the extensive system of concubinage in the Imperial Palace. In the case of China, it is easy to see how this conclusion may be reached; nevertheless, a comparative approach to this phenomenon indicates that this need not have been the true reason. Although Europe had abandoned polygamy centuries earlier, eunuchs rose to power at the Eastern Roman court. At the same time, there is no denying that women and eunuchs shared a special connection and common interests in China as well as in Europe.
In all the dynasties succeeding the Qin ruler, court eunuchs continued to grow in number and influence and, ultimately, became an important part of China’s apparatus of imperial rule. At first, they suffered a setback under the founder of the Han Dynasty, Gaozu. Fully aware of the damage done by one eunuch in the Qin dynasty, he kept these palace servants under tight control. Eunuchs are seldom mentioned in the histories of his reign. Instead, he gradually developed a bureaucracy based on Confucian principles. The eunuchs’ comeback started with Gaozu’s wife, empress Lu. After Gaozu was succeeded by his meek, sensitive son Hui in 195 b. c.e., his mother—now empress dowager—came into her own as his regent. Young Huidi was said to sit on the throne “with folded hands and unruffled garments” while his mother ran the government.264 During daily audiences with officials, she remained discreetly concealed behind a screen or curtain. She upheld the custom that denied uncastrated men close contact with imperial women. Thus, it was her eunuchs who transmitted state memoranda from the ministers, delivered her imperial decrees, and granted or denied access to her presence; in return, she endowed most of her eunuchs with generous land grants, including tax revenues.265
The story of empress dowager Lu’s rule should be seen not only as an explanation for the rise of eunuchs at the imperial court, but also as a plea against women in power by the Confucian historiographers. Moreover, they were suspicious of complicity between eunuchs and women. Thus, under her male successor Wendi, matters supposedly took a turn for the better, although the eunuchs did of course remain.266 It is evident that Confucian Chinese historiographers considered both women and eunuchs to have been an evil influence on the throne.
Traditionally, the number of imperial women was high because every ruler kept a large number of concubines in addition to his empress. As a member of an influential family who had entered the palace as a wife or concubine, a woman faced two crucial duties: apart from giving birth to a son, she was expected to promote the male members of her family to influential positions in the palace. Yet it would have been difficult for a newcomer to gain access to the emperor because even the most intimate aspects of the emperor’s life were subject to etiquette and protocol, which were tightly regimented by the eunuchs. They not only organized but also participated in the nocturnal activities of the ruler. There was an office that dealt exclusively with the intimate relations between the emperor and empress and his other wives and concubines. When the emperor engaged in intimate relations with the empress, the date was recorded so as to prove legitimacy in the case of conception. Furthermore, every occasion on which he spent time with one of his concubines was recorded by this office.267
Castrated men were considered the perfect servants and guardians for women. According to Zhouli (“Book of the Rites of the Zhou Dynasty”), the king invested one queen, three madams, nine concubines, twenty-seven varied ranks of consorts, and eighty-one court ladies for duties in the Inner Court. In conjunction with this system, the Zhou king also employed castrated men to supervise the royal chambers and guard his harem.268 There was constant competition among the women to give birth to a son and be the emperor’s favorite. Eunuchs were always closely in touch with the other informal centers of power in the palace: the emperor’s wives, consorts, and concubines.
In the Zhou Dynasty, the number of women around the throne reportedly totaled 120. In the following centuries, the number of concubines seems to have increased steadily. Wudi was said to have acquired several thousands of beautiful women for his harem, which came to be filled to capacity. Following the emperor’s example, the custom to have as many concubines as possible soon became widespread among both fiefholders and wealthy officials.269 And as the number of concubines grew, so did the number of eunuchs.
Organized eunuch power took off under the Eastern Han Dynasty. Again, women’s ambitions seem to have been responsible.270 In this period, the eunuch agency Zhongchangshi was reconstituted, which made it possible for high-ranking castrated courtiers to gain access to the emperor and the empress. Six dowager empresses successively promoted Zhongchangshi eunuchs to powerful positions, unwittingly sowing the seeds for the dynasty’s downfall—according to Confucian historiographers, that is. In 135 c. e., the eunuchs were permitted to adopt sons, and their power grew with their wealth as some of them owned large agricultural lands. Early in 189 c. e., emperor Lingdi died at the age of thirty-two, and because his son, the new emperor Shao, was only thirteen years old, the empress dowager—by the name of He—took over the helm of the state. She immediately promoted her older brother He Jin, who had earlier fought the “Yellow Turban” rebels, to be the Grand Commandant and appointed twelve grand eunuchs to manage the Inner Court Zhongchangshi. He Jin, however, sided with the bureaucrats and put his sister, the empress dowager, under pressure to remove the eunuchs, charging them with rampant corruption and abuses of power.271
The final showdown came in September of 189 c. e. when the eunuch Qu Mu slew the Grand Commandant He Jin during a court audience. He Jin’s deputies in turn brought their troops to the capital Luoyang and killed more than two thousand eunuchs in retribution. The chief eunuch Zhang Rang took the teen-aged Emperor Shao and the Empress Dowager He and fled northward toward the Yellow River. But after being surrounded by his enemies, Zhang Rang jumped into the river and drowned himself, while his patron and protector He was forced to take poison. The Emperor Shao was then deposed and succeeded by his eight-year-old half-brother, the emperor Xiandi. But that was the beginning of the end of the dynasty.272
4. Women and Eunuchs in Imperial Rome
It is useful to compare the function of eunuchs in China with practices in ancient Rome, and in particular to try to identify differences and similarities in their alliances with women in the pursuit of influence and power. However, since the development of the role played by Roman eunuchs is slightly different from what we find in Chinese historiography, it is important to start by considering the history and structure of female power in Rome in general, as well as the precursors to the court eunuchs, the freedmen.
4.1. Women and Political Power in Rome
For several reasons, the situation of Roman women differed substantively from that of their Chinese counterparts. Formal monogamy was a principle that had never been seriously questioned in the Greco-Roman world. Indeed, by the end of the Republic, Rome had already developed unusual rights for women. Upon emancipatio, a woman was able to live independently from a father or a husband and settle her own affairs.273 Even so, the right to hold office had never been extended to the female half of the population. A woman seeking influence on politics had to pursue this goal by influencing a man behind the scenes. Our sources seem to become more sensitive to the issue of female political influence with the creation of the Principate. From Augustus’s reign onward, the women of the ruling family attracted a great deal of attention from historical writers and were commonly suspected of manipulating their husbands and sons, if necessary through the use of criminal methods. This tradition commences with Augustus’s wife and Tiberius’s mother Livia and reaches its first peak with Agrippina the Younger. Both women managed to establish their sons (by previous husbands) as heirs to the throne. As emperors, Tiberius and Nero are both portrayed as suffering under their mothers’ intrigues.274
Agrippina was the sister of the notorious Caligula and the daughter of the consistently popular Germanicus, and hence a direct descendant of the founder of the Principate, Augustus. She already had a son, Lucius Domitius Ahenobarbus Nero, when she became the emperor Claudius’s fourth wife in 49 c. e. His decision to marry her was based on dynastic considerations. As Antony Barrett has argued, “Claudius would need a wife, not for sex or companionship, . . . but because he needed a political ally to help him keep at bay the forces still threatening to topple his principate. . . . He had tried to seek links with the noble houses and they had failed. He must have realized. . . that the only effective security would come from a union within the imperial house.”275 Apart from this, Suetonius claims that Claudius’s decision making had always been influenced by his wives and freed-men.276 What is more, because of her descent, Agrippina might have become a danger to Claudius if she married into another house, an argument ascribed to the influential freedman and confidant Pallas.277 Family ties were already close: Claudius was Agrippina’s uncle. Almost immediately after the marriage, she betrothed her son to Claudius’s daughter Octavia and, one year later, in 50 c. e., she received the title of “Augusta.” She was the first wife of a living emperor to share in the distinction of this title.278 Moreover, she received another important distinction, that of participation in the daily salutatio. When courtiers and clients paid homage to the emperor, as they did every morning, they would henceforth do the same to her.279 She even managed to be present during meetings of the Senate, “whose meetings were specially convened in the Palatium, so that she could station herself at a newly-added door in their rear, shut off by a curtain thick enough to conceal her from view but not to debar her from hearing.”280
As a woman, Agrippina was unable to hold office, but the Roman Principate was never actually an office and not even a clearly defined legal position. The Principate was built on wealth, the clientelae, the loyalty of the troops, and the fame of Augustus. Under these circumstances, why was a woman not to play an official role as long as she was legitimated by her Julian background? In any case, Agrippina did not seek to rule by herself; instead, she intended to exercise influence through her son Nero. In February 50 c. e. Claudius adopted Nero, although he did have a younger son of his own, Britannicus. Nero had been built up as heir apparent when in 54 c. e. Claudius seemed to change his mind and put Britannicus in the limelight. Agrippina acted immediately and poisoned her husband. With the help of Agrippina’s followers Burrus, Prefect of the Guard, and Seneca, the seventeen-year-old Nero succeeded his adoptive father. In fact, the shadow regiment of Agrippina, Seneca, and Burrus, supported by the influential freed-men who ran the palace’s secretariats (they were the heads of the administration of the emperor’s household and estates) had taken over. During the following years, Agrippina exercised her ambitions without any attempt to disguise them: her son “allowed his mother the greatest influence over all matters private and public.”281 But the estrangement between mother and son had already begun. Her ally, the freedman Pallas, head of the most important secretariat a rationibus, was the first target: he was forced to resign as overseer of the imperial finances very soon after Nero’s accession. Finally, in 59 c. e., Nero ordered his mother killed. The reason he gave was that Agrippina had been striving for consortium imperii, “participation in government,” and that she had hoped that the Praetorian Guard, as well as the people and the Senate, would swear allegiance to a woman, which was considered shameful.282
4.2. Forerunners of the Court Eunuchs: Freedmen in the Roman Palace Administration
It was Claudius who concentrated power among the administrators at his palace to provide a counterweight to his political rivals, the senators. Although the rise of the freedmen had already begun under Augustus,283 their influence significantly increased under Caligula. Some imperial freedmen were already performing duties of a magistrate and in emergencies were even entrusted with official posts. In 32 c. e. the freedman Hiberius held the Prefecture of Egypt for some months; in 48 c. e. Narcissus was made Prefect of the Guard for one day.284 When Claudius succeeded Caligula in 41 c. e., he was backed by the Praetorian Guard and the palace freedmen but not by the Senate, which had been debating whether to abolish the Principate altogether.285 The guardsmen and freedmen depended on this specific form of a monarchy for their livelihood, which turned them into Claudius’s allies right from the beginning. The imperial freedmen were foreigners of humble origin but highly educated; most of them were Greek and therefore barred from holding office at that time. Despised by the nobility and entirely dependent on Claudius, their loyalty belonged to him alone. This implied a submissiveness that many aristocrats might still resist. Claudius extended the secretariats in his household, which were already staffed by slaves and ex-slaves, and enhanced the status of the most trusted freedmen. Pallas and Callistus, already influential under Caligula, as well as Polybius and Narcissus were the most important heads of these offices.286 As head of the secretariat a rationibus, the fiscal administration, Pallas occupied a key position. Narcissus, the proximus ab epistulis, was responsible for correspondence and served as a private secretary. The department a libellis was in charge of petitions, headed by Polybius and then Callistus. A studiis, a cognitionibus supported jurisdiction.287 These Claudian freedmen were notorious for their avarice: they accumulated legendary wealth, which became the most prominent symbol of their influence.288
To attain her extraordinary position and establish her son as Claudius’s successor, Agrippina also relied on the help of freedmen. Pallas had been Agrippina’s ally and later acted in favor of Nero.289 In 62 c. e., however, Nero ordered his execution in order to seize his wealth.290 Narcissus had favored a different noblewoman to become Claudius’s consort. In October 54 c. e., Agrippina arranged his execution at Messalina’s grave.291 To freedmen, it seems, “senatorial government had no more to offer. . . than it had to women, and this tended to create solidarity among them, for all their natural rivalry"292 We may conclude that they shared successes and failures on the behind-the-scenes battlefield of dynastic politics. The historian Suetonius repeatedly emphasizes that Claudius depended entirely on his wives and freedmen and therefore considers them as the true architects of most of his policies (Life of Claudius 25.6, 29.1).
In the present context, it is essential to note that the high-ranking freedmen of the early emperors were the forerunners of the court eunuchs. When they were replaced by freeborn administrators from the “equestrian” order, they had already paved the way for men with a humble background from outside the empire: eunuchs finally rose to positions of influence in late antiquity and in the Byzantine period. As Barbara Levick notes, “If freedmen were safe to have as confidants, because they were excluded from formal politics, eunuchs were safer still.”293
4.3. The Power of Eunuchs in Roman Late Antiquity
In Rome, castration was considered something to be an eastern custom that had become a synonym for decadence.294 Nevertheless, under the new order established by Diocletian and Constantine, eunuchs became a highly influential group at Roman courts in the fourth and fifth centuries c. e., especially in the eastern part of the empire, where elaborate ceremonies governed the emperor’s secluded life.295
The key characteristics of Roman eunuchs were the same as in China, or at least resembled them closely.296 Proximity to the emperor and assurance of his favor were the sole firm basis of the court eunuchs’ power. As servants of the cubiculum (the imperial bed-chamber), they were closely connected with the emperor’s intimate sphere. They controlled access to his audiences and derived material gain from this privilege: thus, they exacted fees for audiences and, by the fifth century, took a sizable commission from everyone who was appointed to public office. Much like Claudius’s freedmen, court eunuchs were notorious for their greed and wealth. Yet their provenance and physical deficiency ensured that they remained outsiders to Roman society, without a formal base or allies. Rulers viewed this as a decisive benefit. Since they could not be assimilated into the formal aristocracy, they not only acted as a counterweight to aristocracy and magistrates but also, as Keith Hopkins has pointed out, as “lubricants” for the system.297 They absorbed criticism that might otherwise have been directed against the emperor. Palace intrigues of malicious eunuchs were conveniently blamed for perceived ills. Despite harsh criticism of the eunuch power system, both emperors who attempted to abolish it, Julian (361-363 c. e.) and Maximus (455 c. e.), failed to establish an effective alternative and the system survived.
One of the empire’s most influential positions had become a domain of the eunuchs: the Grand Chamberlain (praepositus sacri cubiculi), chief of the chamberlains (cubicularii) and, in the course of time, an increasing number of other groups of castrated domestic servants.298 In the established order of precedence of the Eastern empire, the Grand Chamberlain, a eunuch and ex-slave, held the fourth rank in the realm after Praetorian Prefects, the Prefect of the City, and the Masters of the Soldiers.299 300 His tenure continued at the emperor’s pleasure and often lasted longer than the three years thought to be normal for Praetorian Prefects. Some of them became famous. Eusebius, a former slave, was praepositus sacri cubiculi of the emperor Constantius II (337-361 c. e.) and played an active part in contemporary politics. He was sentenced to death by Constantius’s successor, the ascetic emperor Julian (361-363 c. e.).78 Eutropius, a former slave, probably of Armenian origin, had been made a eunuch in his earliest infancy. He had already won the confidence of the emperor Theodosius and became Grand Chamberlain of Theodosius’s son, the emperor Arcadius (395-408 c. e.)—and the rival of empress Aelia Eudoxia. The Grand Chamberlain, who had originally promoted the emperor’s marriage with the beautiful Eudoxia, who was herself partly of foreign origin, and the Praetorian Prefect Rufinus can be considered the true rulers during the reign of the child-emperor Arcadius.301 Finally, Eutropius was sentenced to death. As Chrysaorius exclaimed: “If you have a eunuch, kill him; if you haven’t, buy one and kill him!”302
The Grand Chamberlain in particular, and the corps of eunuchs in general, expanded their power well beyond the formal confines of palace administration. This had further consequences: eunuchs came to be chosen for special tasks outside the palace. Invested with imperial authority and high rank, eunuchs were sent on special missions. Thus, Eusebius was sent to quell an incipient revolt in the army of Gaul by bribing the rebel leaders.303 The emperor Theodosius dispatched Eutropius to consult a holy hermit in Egypt about the outcome of his conflict with the usurper Eugenius.304
Keith Hopkins suggests that the consistent use of eunuchs as court chamberlains and their repeated exercise of power were probably associated with the elaboration of court ritual, which can approximately be dated to the end of the third century c. e. The capture of the Persian king’s harem by Galerius in 298 c. e. may also have led to a proliferation of eunuchs at the Roman court.305 Roman eunuchs were not linked to women’s quarters for the simple reason that they did not exist in the same form as in China. Nonetheless, the Roman ruling class seems to have adopted certain habits from the east. Cassius Dio already notes that a contemporary praetorian prefect under Septimius Severus had a hundred free Romans castrated so that only eunuchs would wait on his daughter.306 Emperor Julian’s pretext for the dismissal of the eunuchs was that he was celibate and thus had no use for eunuchs. However, it is more likely that he abstained from pomp and luxury to demonstrate that he was not subject to the same influences as his predecessor Constantius.307 As servants, eunuchs did manage to obtain access to the empresses’ and other women’s quarters.308 Because they shared the intimate sphere of the ruler, there seems to have been a latent complicity between the Grand Chamberlain with his cubicularii and the empress. But this, of course, could just as well result in bitter rivalries.
5. Conclusions
A comparative approach to the power of eunuchs in Rome and China reveals a number of structural similarities. Isolation, as a correlate of absolute power, reinforced by ruler-worship and court ritual, laid the foundations for the political power of eunuchs in both empires. Control over physical access to the ruler ensured influence. As mediators between the sovereign and his subjects as well as the females at his court, eunuchs satisfied a divine emperor’s need for information and human contact.309 Although this made them extremely powerful, their condition lowered their social status to the extent that the ruler would not perceive them as rivals: they would always remain completely dependent upon him. Eunuchs were unpopular in both societies. They represented a despised group that was only able to exist inside the court and under the emperor’s protection. Their authority as individuals was a function of the emperor’s patronage. In both empires, they could only exist in the shadow of their ruler.
Eunuchs may not have shared a common interest with any of the emperor’s subjects or any man in particular, but they quite clearly cooperated with another group that had no presence outside the palace: the emperor’s wife, consorts, and concubines. This common interest ultimately seems to have enabled them to gain influence through the bed-chamber, instrumentalizing their intimate relations with the ruler and his dependency on them as a weapon against the officials they were competing against. Both groups had to face and attempt to deal with exclusion from many rights and, at least in China, formal power—and, as a consequence, discrimination. But there is more to the power structures than this.
The phallus has always been seen as symbol—and used as an instrument—of power. This perspective guides us toward an explanation of the phenomenon of eunuchs and their role in power relations in antiquity. What made eunuchs so special? Why did castration change everything for the person affected? Men’s identity is primarily based on their genitals, whereas women’s identity has traditionally been tied to their fathers or husbands and sons. Valuing men more than women and considering one’s own sex inferior has deep roots in women’s education. This means that women’s ego and self-consciousness were supposed to depend entirely on men, or rather on the family, and on the appreciation they received for giving birth to sons.310 This encouraged submissiveness and facilitated their integration into the strictly patriarchal structures of Chinese and Roman society. Social background made little difference. In fact, the few women who broke out of anonymity and gained political influence did so as mothers of sons and on their behalf, often acting as their regents.
When a man had lost his genitals he found himself in a similar situation as women did. He still had his birth family but needed a new point of reference for his future life. As he was no longer accepted by other men,311 the eunuch had become dependent on patriarchal structures similar to those faced by women. By committing themselves entirely to their master—with both body and soul— eunuchs were seen as the perfect servants in both China and Rome.
World History
