We find, in the Pandect, a law of Adrian, which denounces death to the physicians who should make an eunuch, either by castration or by bruising the testes. By the same law, the possessions of those who suffered castration were confiscated. Origen ought certainly to have been punished, who submitted to this operation, from the rigid interpretation of that passage in St. Matthew, which says, There be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake.

Things changed in the reigns of succeeding emperors, who adopted the luxury of Asia; especially in the lower empire of Constantinople, where eunuchs became patriarchs and generals of armies.

In these our own times, it is the custom at Rome to castrate young children, to render them worthy of being musicians to his Holiness; so that Castrato and Musico del Papa are synonimous. It is not long since you might have seen at Naples, written in great letters over the doors of certain barbers, Qui si castrano mar avigliosamente i puti: here boys are castrated in the best manner.