The customary male and female genders were not
the only ones known in ancient Egypt; indeed, most premodern, non-Western
cultures have "third genders" of some sort. Other genders were
recognized and described in the ancient Mediterrranean world, often using
categories based on mythological precedents. Hermaphrodites, eunuchs, androgynous
and asexual beings were all examples of the kinds of permanent gender categories
understood by ancient peoples. Gender categories could also be less permanent
or innate: Late Antique Christian writers from Egypt warned of the dangers
of male transvestism while ambivalently approving women who disguised themselves
as male monks and, through ascetic practice, defeminized their bodies into
a transitional gender category between male and female. Evidence for "other"
gender categories in the Pharaonic period is predominantly textual and mostly
ambiguous or debatable. The coming of Greek and Roman culture brought new
gender categories, and the arrival of Christianity introduced still more.
The University of Michigan excavations at the Roman period Egyptian sites of Karanis and Terenouthis uncovered a number of figurines provisionally identified as representations of hermaphrodites. Biologically, hermaphrodites are born with both male and female sexual characteristics; more common are pseudo-hermaphrodites, who are biologically categorized as either male or female but have secondary characteristics of the opposite biological sex. In the ancient world the birth of hermaphrodites and pseudo-hermaphrodites was, like that of other genetic anomalies, considered unlucky. In Graeco-Roman art they were depicted with a female face, full breasts and hips, and male genitals. They occur in both comic and erotic contexts and were frequently used as decorative devices. In Egypt the iconography of hermaphrodites appears to be a Greek import.
