Phallic Question

[Cheexsta]

To the original question - to my knowledge, circumcision was more of a Jewish thing, and I think it's pretty safe to say that the Greeks didn't like it. I know I keep bringing him up, but one of Antiochus IV's anti-Jewish laws was to ban circumcision...so it was a pretty direct attack on Judaism.

Also, IIRC the Ptolemies eventually accepted Egyptian eunuchs into the court but only begrudgingly.

[The Persian Cataphract]

Iranians did not normally practice circumcision; Only Medean and Persian Jews paid any regard for the brith mila tradition. An overwhelming majority saw it as an unncessary practice, ranging from the Mandaeans, all the way to Mithraists and Zoroastrians. Today, only Jews and muslims undergo circumcision in Iran, which has pretty much been the case for a long time. The practice of making eunuchs however is a completely different story, and involves castration.

[antisocialmunky]

Circumcision was one of those things that originated by people who were traced back to decendents of the ancient Hebrew patriarchs such as the Edomites and Moabites who are traced back to Esau and Isaac. It also became known in Egypt at some point in time. However it wasn't done by other peoples.

In first century Christianity, the practice was dropped because it was only a requirement for physical Jews under the Mosaic Law and Christianity was opened to everyone. Therefore they didn't force people to do it anymore though it didn't matter if someone did it to themselves by choice.

[Centurion Crastinus]

Can anybody answer the eunich question?

[Elthore]

about the fire thing: Homo erectus invented fire and passed the knowledge on to both homo sapiens and neanderthals. The former eventually became homo sapien sapien, which is what we all are.

[Elthore]

We became wiser. Brain capacity increased, as well as some other physical features. This is pretty recent at 40,000 years ago.

[Centurion Crastinus]

What happened to the neanderthals and homo erectus?

[Sakkura]

What happened to the neanderthals and homo erectus?

They became extinct.

[Megalos]

What happened to the neanderthals and homo erectus?

Neanderthals are thought to have been wiped out by homo sapiens.

[Sakkura]

Why do we have 2 sapiens at the end of homo now?

Because we differentiate between ourselves (homo sapiens sapiens) and other possible (sub)species such as homo sapiens idaltu or homo sapiens steinheimensis.

[Cyclops]

IIRC fro ancient times there was circumcision in Europe and the mid east but not widespread. Definitely not just a Jewish practice though.

Eunuchs seem to be found in eastern court settings in ancient literature, eg Herodotus. They also appear in Byzantium but succesfull casration requires a certain level of medical ability or the death rate is too high, so i can't imagine they were terribkly common.

If you're castrating officials to make them trustworthy (ie no kids = no nepotism) then you need a fairly sophisticated wealthy society (eg Imperial China or the Persian Empire).

The Arabian Nights seems to suggest the Eunuch was a more common figutre in Islamic society from the sophisticated court setting to less wealthy or civilised areas.

If you're just hacking off balls so your womenfolk's slaves don't get her up the duff then the subject is more expendable so more folks from more backgrounds will do it.

[sgsandor]

I would think that because Greeks did not allow women to be in the theater that would have something along the lines of castrati (boys who where castrated (by the removal of their testicles) to keep their voices high) I know there where a few in Byzantine Greece (400 ADish?).
I know the Turkish sultans castrated many P.O.W.s (by cutting off the penis, inserting some kind of tube in the urethra so that the hole would not close). The last castrati died 1922 (his name was Moreschi and you can find him on Wiki). So you see these practice had to start somewhere and I thought the EB historians and EB board members here could help me out here.
Listen if you think it is cruel or mutilation that is fine, your opinion is yours. Please respect that others may not hold that same view. As I always respect all of you and we all have one common theme (that we love EB) so with that in mind if anyone has any answers I would really love to hear about them.

[Tellos Athenaios]

I would think that because Greeks did not allow women to be in the theater that would have something along the lines of castrati (boys who where castrated (by the removal of their testicles) to keep their voices high)

The idea that women weren't allowed in the theatre seems to be as outdated as the Victorian British Empire - in fact there's hardly any basis for this idea at all. There is some counter-evidence, though:

-there's a statement which says that some women spontainously had a miscariage after/during one of the songs in Aischylos' Eumenids.
-there's a statement about women hanging themselves out of shame after having been to the the comedy.

[Cyclops]

Damn the obsession with the wang . Can anyone tell me though why in particular there is and or was such and obsession with Mr. Dong in the east ?

Not just in the east.

Ithyphallic statues and images are found all over the world, India, Peru, Egypt, Hellas, Ireland, Papua etc.

"Mr Happy" is some strong magic, makes a guy feel ten foot tall, makes most women happy too, so its an obvious symbol for strength and protection as well as fertility.

Messing with Mr happy is obviously some heavy voodoo too. "How far will you go for your God?" asks Moses. "Are you willing to give Mr Happy a trim?". Imagine the look on the first guys face when he went into the tent and saw what Moses was doing with the sharp rock.

The idea that women weren't allowed in the theatre seems to be as outdated as the Victorian British Empire - in fact there's hardly any basis for this idea at all. There is some counter-evidence, though:

-there's a statement which says that some women spontainously had a miscariage after/during one of the songs in Aischylos' Eumenids.
-there's a statement about women hanging themselves out of shame after having been to the the comedy.

Yep, if there's a law against something, its usually because someone is doing it.

I think laws controlling women are related to eunuchs. You build a stratified society and one obvious stratum is "those without penises" (ie a "member's only" politcal structure).

Some societies also have a "physical perfection" culture, I don't mean the Gynmasium culture of hellas but the idea in the myth of Lugh or the Mahabharata that a King had to be physically entire, no blindness, no disability. Castration was a bar to rule as well as a guarantee of "no bastards behind my back".