Castrato
type of male singer who is castrated in order to maintain a high voice
A castrato (Italian; pl.: castrati) is a male singer who underwent castration before puberty in order to retain a singing voice equivalent to that of a soprano, mezzo-soprano, or contralto. The voice can also occur in one who, due to an endocrinological condition, never reaches sexual maturity.
Castration before puberty (or in its early stages) prevents the larynx from being transformed by the normal physiological events of puberty. As a result, the vocal range of prepubescence (shared by both sexes) is largely retained, and the voice develops into adulthood in a unique way. Prepubescent castration for this purpose diminished greatly in the late 18th century.
Methods of castration used to terminate the onset of puberty varied. Methods involved using opium to medically induce a coma, then submerging the boy into an ice or milk bath where the procedure of either twisting the testicles until they atrophied, or complete removal via surgical cutting was performed. However, the complete removal of the testicles was not a widely performed technique. The procedure was usually done to boys around the age of 8–10; recovery time from the procedure took around two weeks. The means by which future singers were prepared could lead to premature death.
The public source identifies “Castrato” as type of male singer who is castrated in order to maintain a high voice. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Castrato, type and male.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q210970. The Library of Congress control number is sh85020751. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank.
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This entry incorporates text from “Castrato” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.