castration

(ka′strā·shən)

(medicine) Removing, or inhibiting the function or development of, the ovaries or testes.

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Castration means removal of the testicles (testes). Sperm (spermatozoa) are made within the seminiferous tubules, which account for most of the volume of the testes. The male hormone, testosterone, is made by the ‘Leydig cells’ (named after a nineteenth-century German microscopist) which lie between the seminiferous tubules.

Because the testicles make spermatozoa and testosterone, their removal results not only in sterility but also in loss of testosterone-dependent characteristics, including sex drive and the more typically male aggressive competitive drive in life. Historically in some societies, these effects were deliberately achieved in the creation of eunuchs, who would pose no sexual threat when employed to serve, for example, the women in a Turkish harem or a Chinese palace. Castrated boys retain their unbroken voice, and the history of the ‘castrati’ is told below. Castrated men tend to put on weight and are more liable to heart attacks.

In medical practice castration is sometimes used in the treatment of prostate cancer. This is because prostate cancer grows in response to testosterone and most of the cancer cells die when deprived of it. The main benefit of castration for an elderly man with prostate cancer is that he does not have to remember to take any medication. Occasionally castration is necessary to treat testicular cancer when it involves both testicles; in this situation male hormone can be replaced by implants or patches and the typical eunuchoid characteristics can be avoided.

The term ‘castration’ is traditionally applied only to the male, but it is sometimes used also to refer to the removal of the ovaries in the female. The term ‘chemical castration’ may also be used to describe the hormonal suppression of the function of the testes, which mimics their removal.

Social and historical aspects

Castration was undertaken in earlier times because of the powerful, magical association with the genitalia. Thus the castration of the enemy or the enemy's corpse in some societies was a means of transferring the power of the male warrior to the victor. Slaves in ancient Rome and the Ottoman Empire could be castrated. Their castrated nature reflected their low social status.

Beginning in 1550-60 the practice of castration for musical purposes appears in Ferrara and Rome. In the musical tradition of the early modern period in Europe, the castration of young male singers provided a higher-pitched voice to sing soprano roles. The prohibition against women's voices in the Church had led to the attempt to create male parallels to women's voices. In the secular sphere, these voices became equally central to Italian opera in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, indeed the term ‘musico’ came to be an eighteenth-century euphemism for castrato. From the late seventeenth century the central male operatic role (primo uomo) in opera seria was sung by a castrato. The quality of the castrato's voice was unique. Castrati were considered to have ‘natural’ voices, as opposed to males who sang falsetto (whose studied voices were considered to be artificial). Many, such as the eighteenth-century castrati, Nicolo Grimaldi (‘Nicolini’) and Carlo Brosche (‘Farinelli’), became extraordinarily famous in their own times. Beginning in the eighteenth century (at the height of their fame) there was a concerted attack on the practice and under the rule of the Jacobins in Italy (1796) the practice was banned, albeit temporarily. The last such castrato, Alessandro Moreschi, died in the early twentieth century and an acoustic recording exists of his voice (made in 1902-3).

With the discovery in the 1830s that an implanted testis could produce an internal secretion, a ‘scientific’ basis for the magical thinking about the relationship of sexuality and power was established. Thus in the course of the nineteenth century ovariectomies were performed as therapy for pathologies such as ‘hysteria’. (The analogous procedure was the use of male circumcision as a surgical intervention for ‘masturbatory insanity’.) The famed cultural critic Max Nordau wrote his medical dissertation in Paris on the topic of De la castration de la femme under the aegis of the neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot in 1882. In the late twentieth century, ‘chemical castration’ has become discussed as a punishment for sexually oriented crimes such as serial rape and paedophilia.

In psychoanalysis castration is the fantasy of loss of the penis by the female or the anxiety about actual loss by the male. In the development of this concept of castration and penis envy, there was a powerful association of castration with the origins of anti-Semitism in the act of circumcision. In Sigmund Freud's, An outline of psychoanalysis, which occupied his final months of life, Freud again returns to the ‘meaning’ of psychoanalysis in an extended footnote concerning the anxiety which the young boy feels when threatened with castration by his mother, a castration which is to be implemented by the father because of the child's masturbatory activity:

Castration has a place too in the Oedipus legend, for the blinding with which Oedipus punishes himself after the discovery of his crime is, by the evidence of dreams, a symbolic substitute for castration. The possibility cannot be excluded that a phylogenetic memory trace may contribute to the extraordinary terrifying effect of the threat — a memory trace from the pre-history of the primal family, when the jealous father actually robbed his son of his genitals if the latter became troublesome to him as a rival with a woman. The custom of circumcision, another symbolic substitute for castration, can only be understood as an expression of submission to the father's will. (cf. the puberty rites of primitive peoples.) No investigation has yet been made of the form taken by the events described above among peoples and in civilizations which do not suppress masturbation in children. (Standard Edition 23: 190.)

Two factors enter into this discussion: first, again, the theme of the unknown — here the unknown world of an unrepressed sexuality — and second, the universal claims of the phylogenetic model. It is this primary biological model which dominated Freud's biological thinking (as it did most of his contemporaries). Linked to this was the general acceptance of the view that acquired characteristics were inherited (the Lamarckian model). Indeed, Freud's biological model for this was a standard one for most late nineteenth-century biological scientists and physicians. The double model played itself out not only in the realm of the physical development of the genotype, but also in the construction of psychology of the group. It is in the real, phylogenetic experience of earlier generations that the psyche is formed, and it is in such group experience that the psychic development of each of us is mirrored. Employing Freud's theoretical matrix, Arnold Zweig in the 1930s noted that the Jewish prisoners in Rome had very low status because they had been vanquished and because ‘they bore the sign of circumcision which was associated in the eyes of the people with castration’. Powerlessness and circumcision are linked because of the involuntary nature of castration in Roman society and because of its association with the status of the slave. This is quoted in the standard German Jewish Encyclopedia of the 1920s. Such a ‘Jewish’ view echoes those such as Conrad Rieger's that male Jews have a peculiar pathological construction such as a ‘loss or absence of the testicles’. Both make the male less than a full-fledged man; a castrated man.

— Tim Hargreave, Sander L. Gilman

Bibliography

Barbier, P. (1996). The world of the castrati: the history of an extraordinary operatic phenomenon, (trans. Margaret Crosland). Souvenir, London.
Cheney, V. T. (1995). A brief history of castration. Crucial Concepts, Ozone Park, NY.
Gilman, S. L. (1993). The case of Sigmund Freud: medicine and identity at the fin de siècle. The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore

Castration in humans

The practice of castration has its roots before recorded human history.^[1] Castration was frequently used in certain cultures of Europe, the Middle East, India, Africa and China, for religious or social reasons. After battles in some cases, winners castrated their captives or the corpses of the defeated to symbolise their victory and 'seize' their power. Castrated men — eunuchs — were often admitted to special social classes and were used particularly to staff bureaucracies and palace households: in particular, the harem. Castration also figured in a number of religious castration cults. Other religions, for example Judaism and Islam, were strongly opposed to the practice. The Leviticus Holiness code, for example, specifically excludes eunuchs or any males with defective genitals from the priesthood, just as castrated animals are excluded from sacrifice.

Eunuchs in China have been known to usurp power in many eras of Chinese history, most notably in the Later Han, late Tang and late Ming Dynasties. There are similar recorded Middle Eastern events.

In ancient times, castration often involved the total removal of all the male genitalia. This involved great danger of death due to bleeding or infection and, in some states, such as the Byzantine Empire, was seen as the same as a death sentence. Removal of only the testicles had much less risk.

In China, castration of a male who entered the caste of eunuchs during imperial times involved the removal of the whole genitalia, that is, the removal of the testes, penis, and scrotum. The removed organs were returned to the eunuch to be interred with him when he died so that, upon rebirth, he could become a whole man again. The penis, testicles, and scrotum were euphemistically termed bǎo (寶) in Mandarin Chinese, which literally means 'precious treasure'. These were preserved in alcohol and kept in a pottery jar by the eunuch. ^[2]

Medical

Testicular cancer is generally treated by surgical removal of the cancerous testicle(s) (orchiectomy), often followed by radiation or chemotherapy. Unless both testicles are cancerous, only one is removed.

Either surgical removal of both testicles or chemical castration may be carried out in the case of prostate cancer ^[3], as hormone testosterone-depletion treatment to slow down the cancer. Similarly, testosterone-depletion treatment (either surgical removal of both testicles or chemical castration) is used to greatly reduce sexual drive or interest in those with sexual drives, obsessions, or behaviors, or any combination of those that may be considered deviant. Castration in humans has been proposed, and sometimes used, as a method of birth control in certain poorer regions.

Male-to-female transsexuals often undergo orchiectomy, as do some other transgendered people. Orchiectomy may be performed as a part of more general sex reassignment surgery, either before or during other procedures, but it may also be performed on someone who does not desire, or cannot afford, further surgery.

As punishment

Involuntary castration also appears in the history of warfare, sometimes used by one side to torture or demoralize their enemies. It was also practiced to extinguish opposing male lineages and thus allow the victor to sexually possess the defeated group's women.

Tamerlane was recorded to have castrated Armenian prisoners of war who had fought as allies of the Ottoman Sultan Bayezid I, while others were buried alive.^{[citation needed]}

Edward Gibbon's famous work Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire reports castration of defeated foes at the hands of the Normans. Castration has also been used in modern conflicts, as the Janjaweed militiamen currently (as of 2005) attacking citizens of the Darfur region in Sudan, often castrating villagers and leaving them to bleed to death ^[4].

Sima Qian, the famous Chinese Historian, was castrated by order of the Emperor of China for dissent.

Another famous victim of castration was the medieval French philosopher, scholar, teacher, and (later) monk Pierre Abélard, castrated by relatives of his lover, Héloïse.

Bishop Wimund, a 12th century English adventurer and invader of the Scottish coast, was also castrated.

Chemical castration was Alan Turing's punishment when he was convicted of "acts of gross indecency" (homosexual acts) in 1952; it resulted indirectly in his suicide.

As a preventative measure

"Voluntary" chemical or surgical castration has been in practice in many countries—reports are available from American, Scandinavian, and European countries, in particular, for the past eighty-plus years (chemical for the last thirty or so years)—as an option for treatment for people who have broken laws of a sexual nature, allowing them to return to the community from otherwise lengthy detentions^{[citation needed]}. The effectiveness and ethics of this treatment are heavily debated.

A temporary chemical castration has been studied and developed as a preventive measure and punishment for several repeated sex crimes, such as rape or other sexually related violence.^[5]^[6]

Physical castration appears to be highly effective as, historically, it results in a 20-year re-offense rate of less than 2.3% vs. 80% in the untreated control group, according to a large 1963 study involving a total of 1036 sex offenders by the German researcher A. Langelüddeke, among others ^[7], much lower than what was otherwise expected. Compare to overall sex offender recidivism rates.

In modern times, the Czech Republic practices castrating convicted sex offenders. According to the reports compiled by Council of Europe, a human-rights forum, the central European country castrated at least 94 prisoners in the 10 years up to April 2008. The Czech Republic defends this procedure as voluntary and effective.^[8] According to Dr. Martin Holly, director of the Psychiatric Hospital Bohnice in Prague, none of the nearly 100 sex offenders who had been physically castrated had committed further offenses.^[9] One serial offender stated that being castrated was the "best decision" he ever made: "On the one hand you have to protect the potential victims and on the other hand I wanted to be protected from myself, I wanted to live like a normal person."^[10] Don Grubin, a professor at Newcastle University's Institute of Neuroscience who also runs a chemical castration program backed by the U.K.'s Ministry of Justice, was initially opposed to physical castration, however, after visiting the Czech Republic, he agreed that form of castration might be of benefit to some sex offenders.^[10]^[11]

Sexual

Castration play is one of many fetishes within the BDSM community although it is not as well known by the mainstream. In castration play, one simulates the after effects of castration without going all the way to castration.

For religious reasons

In Europe, when women were not permitted to sing in church or cathedral choirs in the Roman Catholic Church, boys were sometimes castrated to prevent their voices breaking at puberty and to develop a special high voice. The first documents mentioning castrati are Italian church records from the 1550s.^[12] In the baroque music era these singers were highly appreciated by Opera composers as well. Famous castrati include Farinelli, Senesino, Carestini, and Caffarelli. Joseph Haydn was almost castrated. The last castrato was Alessandro Moreschi (1858-1922) who served in the Sistine Chapel Choir.^[13] However, in the late 1800s, the Roman Catholic Church, which had always considered castration to be mutilation of the body and therefore a severe sin, officially condemned the production of castrati; their castrations had been performed clandestinely in contravention of Church law.^{[citation needed]}

A number of religious cults have included castration as a central theme of their practice. These include:

The cult of Cybele, in which devotees castrated themselves in ecstatic emulation of Attis: see Gallus.
Some followers of early Christianity considered castration as an acceptable way to counter sinful desires of the flesh. Origen is reported by Eusebius^[14] to have castrated himself based on his reading of the Gospel of Matthew 19:12, although there is some doubt concerning this story (Schaff^{[citation needed]} considers the account genuine but cites Baur et al.^{[citation needed]} in opposition) and Origen himself argues against such literal interpretations of other passages from Matthew in his First Principles.
Boston Corbett was likewise inspired by this same verse 19:12 to castrate himself (Corbett was the 19th-century American soldier who is generally believed to have fired the shot that killed John Wilkes Booth.)
Bishop Melito of Sardis (d. ca 180) was a eunuch, according to the church history of Eusebius of Caesarea, though, significantly the word "virgin" was substituted in Rufino's Latin translation of Eusebius.
Skoptsy
Heaven's Gate

While Deuteronomy 23:1 expels castrated men from the assembly of Israel, Isaiah 56:3, gives a much more accepting view of eunuchs, and in Acts 8:34-39, a eunuch is baptized.

Chemical

Main article: Chemical castration

In the case of chemical castration, ongoing regular injections of anti-androgens are required.

Chemical castration seems to have a greater effect on bone density than physical castration. Since the development of teriparatide, this severe bone loss has been able to be reversed in nearly every case. At this time there is a limitation on the use of this medication to 24 months until the long-term use is better evaluated.

With the advent of chemical castration, physical castration is not generally recommended by the medical community unless medically necessary or desired.

Medical consequences

A subject of castration who is castrated before the onset of puberty will retain a high voice, non-muscular build, and small genitals. They may well be taller than average, as the production of sex hormones in puberty—particularly testosterone—stops long bone growth. The person may not develop pubic hair and will have a small sex drive or none at all. Castrations after the onset of puberty will typically reduce the sex drive considerably or eliminate it altogether. Also castrated people are automatically sterile, because the testes (for males) and ovaries (for females) produce sex cells needed for sexual reproduction. Once removed the subject is infertile. The voice does not change. Some castrates report mood changes, such as depression or a more serene outlook on life. Body strength and muscle mass can decrease somewhat. Body hair sometimes may decrease. Castration prevents male pattern baldness if it is done before hair is lost; however, castration will not restore hair growth after hair has already been lost due to male pattern baldness. ^[15] Castration eliminates the risk of testicular cancer.

Historically, eunuchs who additionally underwent a penectomy reportedly suffered from urinary incontinence associated with the removal of the penis, and they had their own specialist doctors. ^[16]

Without Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT), typical symptoms (similar to those experienced by menopausal women) include hot flashes; gradual bone-density loss, resulting in osteopenia or osteoporosis; potential weight gain or redistribution of body fat to the hips/chest. Replacement of testosterone in the form of gel, patches, or injections can largely reverse these effects, although breast enlargement has also been reported as a possible side effect of testosterone usage ^[17].

Castration in psychoanalysis and literary theory

The concept of castration plays an important role in psychoanalysis; see, e.g., castration anxiety.

Castration also plays an important role in psychoanalytically-influenced literary theory, for example Harold Bloom's The Anxiety of Influence. Poetry can also be seen as castrating, with male poets either being castrated through being outdone by their male predecessors (as in Bloom), or male poets (and even mere readers) being castrated by the force of the female sublime as conveyed to them through poetry (as in Maxwell). Catherine Maxwell identifies Philomela as being castrated by Tereus when he rapes and mutilates her.

Castration in veterinary practice

Castration is commonly performed on domestic animals not intended for breeding. Domestic animals are usually castrated in order to avoid unwanted or uncontrolled reproduction; to reduce or prevent other manifestations of sexual behaviour such as territorial behaviour or aggression (eg. fighting between groups of entire (uncastrated) males of a species); or to reduce other consequences of sexual behaviour that may make animal husbandry more difficult, such as boundary/fence/enclosure destruction when attempting to get to nearby females of the species.

Male horses are usually castrated (gelded) using emasculators, because stallions are rather aggressive and troublesome. The same applies to male mules, although they are sterile. Male cattle are castrated to improve muscling and docility for use as oxen.

Breeding individuals are kept entire and used for breeding: they may fetch higher prices when sold.

Livestock may be castrated when used for food in order to increase growth or weight or both of individual male animals and because of the undesirable taste and odor of the meat from sexually mature males. In domestic pigs the taint is caused by androstenone and skatole concentrations stored in the fat tissues of the animal after sexual maturity.^[18] It is released when the fat is heated and has a distinct odor and flavor that is widely considered unpalatable to consumers.^[19] Consequently, in commercial meat production, male pigs are either castrated shortly after birth or slaughtered before they reach sexual maturity.^[19] Recent research in Brazil has shown that castration of pigs is unnecessary because most pigs do not have the 'boar taint'. This is due to many breeds of pigs simply not having the heredity for the boar taint and the fact that pigs are normally slaughtered at a young market weight.^[20]

In the case of pets, castration is usually called neutering, and is encouraged to prevent overpopulation of the community by unwanted animals, and to reduced certain diseases such as prostate disease and testicular cancer in male dogs (oophorectomy in female pets is often called spaying). Testicular cancer is rare in dogs, but prostate problems are somewhat common in unaltered male dogs when they get older. Neutered individuals have a much lower risk of developing prostate problems in comparison. Unaltered male cats are more likely to develop an obstruction in their urethra, preventing them from urinating to some degree; however neutering does not seem to make much difference statistically because many neutered toms also have the problem. A specialized vocabulary has arisen for neutered animals of given species:

Barrow (pig)
Bullock (cattle)
Capon (chicken)
Gelding (horse)
Gib (cat, ferret)
Havier (deer)
Lapin (rabbit)
Stag (cattle, sheep)
Steer (cattle)
Wether (sheep, goat)

An incompletely castrated male in livestock species (horse and cattle) is known as a rig.

Methods of veterinary castration include instant surgical removal, the use of an elastrator tool to secure a band around the testicles that disrupts the blood supply, the use of a Burdizzo tool or emasculators to crush the spermatic cords and disrupt the blood supply, pharmacological injections and implants and immunological techniques to inoculate the animal against its own sexual hormones.

Certain animals, like horses and swine, are usually surgically treated with a scrotal castration (which can be done with the animal standing while sedated and after local anaesthetic has been applied), while others, like dogs and cats, are anaesthetised and recumbent when surgically castrated with a pre-scrotal incision in the case of dogs, or a pre-scrotal or scrotal incision used for cats.

In veterinary practice an "open" castration refers to a castration in which the inguinal tunic is incised and not sutured. A "closed" castration refers to when the procedure is performed so that the inguinal tunic is sutured together after incision.

Miscellaneous

Orthodox Judaism^[21] and Islam^{[citation needed]} forbid the castration of either humans or animals. In ancient Judaism, castrated animals were deemed unfit for sacrifice in the Temple (Lv. 22:24); Castrated members of the priestly caste were forbidden to enter certain parts of the Temple, to approach the altar, or to make sacrifices, although they could eat their share of the offerings (Lv. 21:16–24).
Some parasitic nematodes chemically castrate their hosts, see microphallus.

External links

Castration Through the Ages
Questions often asked about castration by Sherry
The Journal of Clinical Endrocrinology and Metabolism
Organization for Animal Dignity Animal Protection Organization against castration
Neutering NOT Org Website arguing against the castration of domestic animals
Eunuch.org Website for eunuchs and people with castration fetishes/fantasies. Includes a database of erotic stories, discussion forums, and more.
Elastrator
Boar taint in pigs selected for components of efficient lean growth rate

Bibliography

Susan Elliott, Cutting Too Close for Comfort: Paul's Letter to the Galatians in Its Anatolian Cultic Context Reviews in Review of Biblical Literature [1]
Travis Nygard and Alec Sonsteby. “Castration.” In The Cultural Encyclopedia of the Body, edited by Victoria Pitts, pages 502-507. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2008.

Notes

^ "On Target, July 27 2003". On Target (newsletter). Target Health, Inc.. 2003-07-27. http://www.targethealth.com/ontarget/2003/07272003.htm. Retrieved on 2007-04-30. Section II: HISTORY OF MEDICINE
^ The eunuchs of the Chinese court
^ MaleCare.com
^ In Darfur, My Camera Was Not Nearly Enough
^ Katherine Amlin. "Chemical Castration: The Benefits and Disadvantages Intrinsic to Injecting Male Pedophiliacs with Depo-Provera". http://serendip.brynmawr.edu/biology/b103/f02/web1/kamlin.html. Retrieved on 2007-06-13.
^ "'Chemical castration' OK'd for Montana inmates". N.Y. Times News Service. 1997. http://archive.southcoasttoday.com/daily/04-97/04-27-97/a09wn032.htm. Retrieved on 2007-06-13.
^ http://www.brainphysics.com/research/ocpara_bradford99.html "THE PARAPHILIAS, OBSESSIVE COMPULSIVE SPECTRUM DISORDER, AND THE TREATMENT OF SEXUALLY DEVIANT BEHAVIORS" by J. M. W. Bradford
^ Council of Europe report on the Czech Republic
^ Europeans Debate Castration of Sex Offenders
^ ^a ^b Whitehead, Tom (2009-05-20). "Sex offences advisor backs castration". The Daily Telegraph. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/lawandorder/5351019/Sex-offences-advisor-backs-castration.html. Retrieved on 2009-05-30.
^ "Cutting the numbers reoffending?". Channel 4. 2009-05-20. http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/world/europe/cutting%20the%20numbers%20reoffending%20%20/3158772. Retrieved on 2009-05-30.
^ John Rosselli, "Castrato" article in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, 2001.
^ "All Mouth and No Trousers" from The Guardian, Aug 5 2002.
^ NPNF2-01. Eusebius Pamphilius: Church History, Life of Constantine, Oration in Praise of Constantine
^ Hamilton JB. Effect of castration in adolescent and young adult males upon further changes in the proportion of bare and hairy scalp. J Clin Endocrinol metab 1960; 20:1309-1315.
^ http://www.medspe.fr/site/templates/template.php?identifiant_article=2166&surlignage=2&PHPSESSID=bd0a2427de5e5665b9c541ca8a6ecc71
^ http://www.healthandage.com/public/health-center/28/article/3047/gm=20!gid2=2824 "HRT for Men Is Risky, Too" by Robert W. Griffith, MD.
^ Genetics of Boar Taint: Implications for the Future Use of Intact Males
^ ^a ^b Genetic Inhibition of Boar Odor in Meat
^ Sugar Mountain Farm: To Cut or Not?
^ Leviticus 22:24, Talmud Shabbos 110b

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Castration

Urogenital surgical and other procedures (ICD-9-CM V3 55-71)

Urinary system

Kidney	Nephrostomy · Nephrotomy · Nephrectomy · Kidney transplantation · Nephropexy

Ureter	Ureteroscopy · Ureterostomy · Urinary diversion · Ureterosigmoidostomy

Urinary bladder	Cystoscopy · Cystometry · Cystectomy (Suprapubic cystostomy)

Urethra	Urethropexy

Male
reproductive system

Prostate	Prostatectomy (Transurethral resection of the prostate)

Vas deferens	Vasectomy · Vasovasostomy

Penis	Circumcision · Penectomy · Penile prosthesis · Preputioplasty

Testes	Castration (Inguinal orchiectomy)

Female
reproductive system
(gynecological surgery)

Ovary	Oophorectomy

Fallopian tubes	Tubal ligation · Salpingectomy

Uterus	Hysterotomy · Hysteroscopy · Pelvic exenteration · Hysterectomy · Vacuum aspiration

Vagina	Colposcopy · Culdocentesis · Hymenotomy · Vaginectomy

Vulva	Female genital cutting · Vulvectomy

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castration

Contents

Castration in humans

Medical

As punishment

As a preventative measure

Sexual

For religious reasons

Chemical

Medical consequences

Castration in psychoanalysis and literary theory

Castration in veterinary practice

Miscellaneous

See also

External links

Bibliography

Notes