mamtc

mamtc

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Hermaphroditus & Brihannala - Cursed drag queens


 Hermaphroditus
He was born as a male child to Hermes and Aphrodite. During his travel to Lycia and Caria, he stopped by a pool where abeautiful nymph Salmacis resided. She immediately fell in love with the boy andtried to seduce him.
But Hermaphroditus rejected her. When he was about to takebath the lust filled Salmaci who hid behind the tree, came out and  forcefully hugged him, kissed him and wished that she should never be parted from him forever. Her wish was granted.
Hermaphroditus lost his masculinity and became a person with both sexes, ie united form of him and Salmaci-first female pedophile. 
The deranged Herma cursed the pool to turn any male who stepped into that to turn like him. His wish was granted too.

Pic from here
Brihannala - This refers to Arjuna's transgender form. During his exile period, Arjuna visited heaven to meet Indra(Zeus), and that time one of the upsaras(valkyries)-Urvasi fell in love with Arjuna and asked him to fulfill her wish. But Arjuna rejected her saying she wasnt his type. The deranged Urvasi cursed him to become "kliba"- person with both male and female parts and behavior, both phycially and mentally. He used his shortterm-curse to become a eunuch for a while, to his advantage during his exile period before the Kulushetra war(Trojan war)

On another lighter note, in Kerala,ie in one of  states in India, almost 90% of population has this naming convention. Every child will have a name formed from dad and mom like ie
Vinmathi- Vinay+Mathikutty
Hermaphroditus - Hermes+Aphrodite.
But I am not saying that state may have larger number of eunuchs.

Moral of the story : Never say "NO" to beautiful women. If you are saying "NO" to a pretty one,it does go without saying that you are indeed a eunuch.

Check more comparison mythology stories here