Jim Beaux
03-19-2009, 09:50 AM
"Only two memories brought tears to Sun Yaoting's eyes in old age -- the day his father cut off his genitals, and the day his family threw away the pickled remains that should have made him a whole man again at death.
China's last eunuch was tormented and impoverished in youth, punished in revolutionary China for his role as the "Emperor's slave" but finally feted and valued, largely for outlasting his peers to become a unique relic, a piece of "living history."
...
He died in 1996, in an old temple that had become his home, and his biography was finally published in English this year."
The full story is quite revealing. It becomes clear that Sun Yaoting was not castrated but rather he was emasculated by his father. Find out why at http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE52E06H20090315
China's last eunuch was tormented and impoverished in youth, punished in revolutionary China for his role as the "Emperor's slave" but finally feted and valued, largely for outlasting his peers to become a unique relic, a piece of "living history."
...
He died in 1996, in an old temple that had become his home, and his biography was finally published in English this year."
The full story is quite revealing. It becomes clear that Sun Yaoting was not castrated but rather he was emasculated by his father. Find out why at http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE52E06H20090315