burdachs"
of the Washington tribes serve as masculine hetarae to the chiefs and
medicine men, though this has not been definitely determined. Dr. Holder
described a typical "bote" of the Absaroke tribe in the New York Medical
Journal, 1889. This androgyne, in many respects, resembled the mujerados
of the Pueblo Indians, and probably served a like purpose in his tribe.

According to Ross, a Konyaga woman, when she has a good-looking boy,
dresses him in girl's clothes and brings him up as a female. When he
arrives at a suitable age he is sent to wait on the priests of the tribe
and is introduced by them into the sacred mysteries of their cult; in
fact, he becomes a masculine hetara.

When we read of such things we feel pretty much as Herodotus felt when
he saw the naked women of Mendes submitting themselves openly {~GREEK
SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} {~GREEK SMALL
LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER
IOTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER DELTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK
SMALL LETTER IOTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER XI~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER
IOTA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~} {~GREEK SMALL LETTER ALPHA~}{~GREEK
SMALL LETTER NU~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER THETA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER
RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER OMEGA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER PI~}{~GREEK SMALL
LETTER OMEGA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER NU~} [Transliteration: es epideixin
anthropon] to the embraces of the sacred goat.[J] To the Greek historian
this act was simply horrible ({~GREEK SMALL LETTER TAU~}{~GREEK SMALL
LETTER EPSILON~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER RHO~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER
ALPHA~}{~GREEK SMALL LETTER FINAL SIGMA~} [Transliteration: teras]); and
yet these Egyptians experienced no repugnance whatever. To them it
represented the incarnation of the deity, and was, therefore, a sacred
and holy action, just as masculine hetarism is regarded as a holy
profession among the Konyagas. Phallic hetarism is one of the sacraments
of the Konyaga church, and, as such, it is held in all that reverence
and awe with which the savage devotee endows the mysteries of his
faith.[K]

[J] Herodotus: _Euterpe_, 46.

[K] Masculine hetarism is still in vogue among many primitive
peoples, and is distinctly a religious rite. "The Kanats of New
Caledonia frequently assemble at night in a cabin to give
themselves up to this kind of debauchery.... In the whole of
America, from north to south, similar customs have existed or still