Lazzi Shysi is the storied daughter of the great bimo Asu Lazzi and the one woman remembered in Nuosu tradition to have practiced the hereditary priesthood. Because bimo knowledge passes exclusively down the male line, and women are barred from touching the ritual instruments, she could only serve by dressing in men's clothing. Having learned the highest arts from her father, she is said to have understood the most powerful and complicated classics, to have suppressed demons and banished ghosts, and to have rescued people from disaster. Her true identity was at last exposed because both of her ears were pierced, whereas Nuosu men pierce only the left earlobe, and she was forced to give up her practice. She survives as the singular exception invoked whenever the question of women and the bimo vocation is raised.