The Eunuch In Byzantine History And Society

Author : Shaun Tougher
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1135235716
Total Pages : 257 pages
Book Rating : 4.10/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Eunuch in Byzantine History and Society written by Shaun Tougher and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2009-06-02 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The existence of eunuchs was one of the defining features of the Byzantine Empire. Covering the whole span of the history of the empire, from the fourth to the fifteenth centuries AD, Shaun Tougher presents a comprehensive survey of the history and roles of eunuchs, making use of extensive comparative material, such as from China, Persia and the Ottoman Empire, as well as about castrato singers of the eighteenth century of Enlightenment Europe, and self-castrating religious devotees such as the Galli of ancient Rome, early Christians, the Skoptsy of Russia and the Hijras of India. The various roles played by eunuchs are examined. They are not just found as servile attendants; some were powerful political players – such as Chrysaphius who plotted to assassinate Attila the Hun – and others were prominent figures in Orthodoxy as bishops and monks. Furthermore, there is offered an analysis of how society thought about eunuchs, especially their gender identity - were they perceived as men, women, or a third sex? The broad survey of the political and social position of eunuchs in the Byzantine Empire is placed in the context of the history of the eunuch in general. An appendix listing key eunuchs of the Byzantine Empire describing their careers is included, and the text is fully illustrated.

Author : Kathryn M. Ringrose
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
ISBN 13 : 0226720160
Total Pages : 310 pages
Book Rating : 4.66/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Perfect Servant written by Kathryn M. Ringrose and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2007-11-01 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Perfect Servant reevaluates the place of eunuchs in Byzantium. Kathryn Ringrose uses the modern concept of gender as a social construct to identify eunuchs as a distinct gender and to illustrate how gender was defined in the Byzantine world. At the same time she explores the changing role of the eunuch in Byzantium from 600 to 1100. Accepted for generations as a legitimate and functional part of Byzantine civilization, eunuchs were prominent in both the imperial court and the church. They were distinctive in physical appearance, dress, and manner and were considered uniquely suited for important roles in Byzantine life. Transcending conventional notions of male and female, eunuchs lived outside of normal patterns of procreation and inheritance and were assigned a unique capacity for mediating across social and spiritual boundaries. This allowed them to perform tasks from which prominent men and women were constrained, making them, in essence, perfect servants. Written with precision and meticulously researched, The Perfect Servant will immediately take its place as a major study on Byzantium and the history of gender.

Author : Christopher Harris
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 372 pages
Book Rating : 4.43/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Memoirs of a Byzantine Eunuch written by Christopher Harris and published by . This book was released on 2002 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Captured and castrated as a boy, Zeno is sold into slavery in Constantinople. Bought by the greatest scholar of the age, he is soon drawn into a labyrinth of sex, heresy, murder and intrigue. Though the empire is threatened by a heretic uprising and a barbarian invasion, its rulers think only of themselves. In the cruel and glittering city of Constantinople, a ruthless general, a bisexual boy-emperor, a worldly patriarch, a peasant usurper and a half-Viking empress all vie for power. Unknown to them, the real power lies elsewhere, among the devious and decadent eunuchs of the palace. Zeno conspires, deceives, manipulates and murders, his divided loyalties leading him deeper into danger until he is forced to betray those he loves.

Author : Shaun Tougher
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1135235708
Total Pages : 359 pages
Book Rating : 4.03/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Eunuch in Byzantine History and Society written by Shaun Tougher and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2009-06-02 with total page 359 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The existence of eunuchs was one of the defining features of the Byzantine Empire. Covering the whole span of the history of the empire, from the fourth to the fifteenth centuries AD, Shaun Tougher presents a comprehensive survey of the history and roles of eunuchs, making use of extensive comparative material, such as from China, Persia and the Ottoman Empire, as well as about castrato singers of the eighteenth century of Enlightenment Europe, and self-castrating religious devotees such as the Galli of ancient Rome, early Christians, the Skoptsy of Russia and the Hijras of India. The various roles played by eunuchs are examined. They are not just found as servile attendants; some were powerful political players – such as Chrysaphius who plotted to assassinate Attila the Hun – and others were prominent figures in Orthodoxy as bishops and monks. Furthermore, there is offered an analysis of how society thought about eunuchs, especially their gender identity - were they perceived as men, women, or a third sex? The broad survey of the political and social position of eunuchs in the Byzantine Empire is placed in the context of the history of the eunuch in general. An appendix listing key eunuchs of the Byzantine Empire describing their careers is included, and the text is fully illustrated.

Author : Elizabeth James
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1135105472
Total Pages : 234 pages
Book Rating : 4.71/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Women, Men and Eunuchs written by Elizabeth James and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-01-11 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The collected papers in this volume present a unique introduction both to the history of women, of men and eunuchs, or the third sex, in Byzantium and to the various theoretical and methodological approaches through which the topic can be examined. The contributors use evidence from both texts and images to give a wide-ranging picture of the place of women and Byzantine society and the perceptions of women held by that society. Women, Men and Eunuchs offers a unique and valuable exploration of the issue of gender in Byzantium, which will fascinate anyone interested in ancient and medieval history and gender studies.

Author : Roland Betancourt
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 069117945X
Total Pages : 288 pages
Book Rating : 4.52/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Byzantine Intersectionality written by Roland Betancourt and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-10-06 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Intersectionality, a term coined in 1989, is rapidly increasing in importance within the academy, as well as in broader civic conversations. It describes the study of overlapping or intersecting social identities such as race, gender, ethnicity, nationality, and sexual orientation alongside related systems of oppression, domination, and discrimination. Together, these frameworks are used to understand how systematic injustice or social inequality occurs. In this book, Roland Betancourt examines the presence of marginalized identities and intersectionality in the medieval era. He reveals the fascinating, little-examined conversations in medieval thought and visual culture around matters of sexual and reproductive consent, bullying, non-monogamous marriages, homosocial and homoerotic relationships, trans and non-binary gender identifications, representations of disability, and the oppression of minorities. In contrast to contemporary expectations of the medieval world, this book looks at these problems from the Byzantine Empire and its neighbors in the eastern mediterranean through sources ranging from late antiquity and early Christianity up to the early modern period. In each of five chapters, Betancourt provides short, carefully scaled narratives used to illuminate nuanced and surprising takes on now-familiar subjects by medieval thinkers and artists. For example, Betancourt examines depictions of sexual consent in images of the Virgin; the origins of sexual shaming and bullying in the story of Empress Theodora; early beginnings of trans history as told in the lives of saints who lived portions of their lives within different genders; and the ways in which medieval authors understood and depicted disabilities. Deeply researched, this is a groundbreaking new look at medieval culture for a new generation of scholars"--

Author : Judith Herrin
Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691153213
Total Pages : 350 pages
Book Rating : 4.16/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Unrivalled Influence written by Judith Herrin and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-03-11 with total page 350 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explores the exceptional roles that women played in the vibrant cultural and political life of medieval Byzantium. Drawing on a diverse range of sources, this title focuses on the importance of marriage in imperial statecraft, the tense coexistence of empresses in the imperial court, and the critical relationships of mothers and daughters.

Author : Shaun Tougher
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1441174419
Total Pages : 232 pages
Book Rating : 4.13/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Roman Castrati written by Shaun Tougher and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2020-11-12 with total page 232 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Eunuchs tend to be associated with eastern courts, popularly perceived as harem personnel. However, the Roman empire was also distinguished by eunuchs – they existed as slaves, court officials, religious figures and free men. This book is the first to be devoted to the range of Roman eunuchs. Across seven chapters (spanning the third century BC to the sixth century AD), Shaun Tougher examines the history of Roman eunuchs, focusing on key texts and specific individuals. Subjects met include the Galli (the self-castrating devotees of the goddess the Great Mother), Terence's comedy The Eunuch (the earliest surviving Latin text to use the word 'eunuch'), Sporus and Earinus the eunuch favourites of the emperors Nero and Domitian, the 'Ethiopian eunuch' of the Acts of the Apostles (an early convert to Christianity), Favorinus of Arles (a superstar intersex philosopher), the Grand Chamberlain Eutropius (the only eunuch ever to be consul), and Narses the eunuch general who defeated the Ostrogoths and restored Italy to Roman rule. A key theme of the chapters is gender, inescapable when studying castrated males. Ultimately this book is as much about the eunuch in the Roman imagination as it is the reality of the eunuch in the Roman empire.

Author : George H. Junne
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN 13 : 0857728938
Total Pages : 386 pages
Book Rating : 4.37/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book The Black Eunuchs of the Ottoman Empire written by George H. Junne and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2016-06-22 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Chief Black Eunuch, appointed personally by the Sultan, had both the ear of the leader of a vast Islamic Empire and held power over a network of spies and informers, including eunuchs and slaves throughout Constantinople and beyond. The story of these remarkable individuals, who rose from difficult beginnings to become amongst the most powerful people in the Ottoman Empire, is rarely told. George Junne places their stories in the context of the wider history of African slavery, and places them at the centre of Ottoman history. The Black Eunuchs of the Ottoman Empire marks a new direction in the study of courtly politics and power in Constantinople.

Author :
Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004413146
Total Pages : 474 pages
Book Rating : 4.46/5 ( download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!

Download or read book Ottoman War and Peace written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2020-01-13 with total page 474 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Blending micro and macro approaches, the volume covers topics from the sixteenth to twentieth centuries related to the Ottoman military and warfare, biography and intellectual history, and inter-imperial and cross-cultural relations.