Suffodit inguina.

When Julius Caesar was stabbed, 23 times, on the Ides of March, at least one of the daggers is supposed to have gone into his groin. He wasn't the last Roman to have his privates attacked. And he wasn't the last primate. In competition for sexual access, gonads are occasionally targeted: canine incisions in monkey and ape scrota are not uncommon; and rumors had a number of Roman emperors--from Caligula and Nero, to Galba, Vitellius, Domitian, Commodus, Caracalla, Elagabalus, to Balbinus, Pupienus and Valerian over the course of the third century crisis--done in with their genitals at risk, or with their genitals cut off.

[Sexual mutilations through ages]. / Les mutilations sexuelles à travers les âges.

Among the ethnic mutilations (volunteer mutilations performed for religious, aesthetic, moral or hygienic purposes), genital mutilation (circumcision, castration, total emasculation, infibulation, excision, etc.) have always fascinated the human mind and are the subject of our historical overview.

The relevance of castration and circumcision to the origins of psychoanalysis: 1. The medical context.

In this paper the author outlines and discusses the origins and the decline of castration and circumcision as a cure for the nervous and psychic disturbances in women and little girls between 1875 and 1905. The author argues that the opposition to this medical practice affected the conception of hysteria, promoting a distinction between sexuality and the genital organs, and the emergence of an enlarged notion of sexuality, during the period from Freud's medical education to the publication of the Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality. The hypothesis is put forward that Freud came directly in contact with the genital theory of the neurosis at the time of his training on the nervous disturbances in children with the paediatrician, Adolf Baginsky, in Berlin, in March 1886. It is hypothesized that this experience provoked in Freud an abhorrence of circumcision 'as a cure or punishment for masturbation', prompting an inner confrontation which resulted in a radical reorganization of the way of thinking about sexuality. It is also suggested that this contributed to Freud developing a capacity to stay with contradictions, something which would become a central quality of the psychoanalytic attitude.

[Castrati--everything to achieve fame]. / Kastraten--alles für den Ruhm.

The phenomenon of castration is wedded to the baroque era. This epoch stands for pure sensual pleasure. Those who could afford it tried to arrange their earthly days to be as enjoyable as possible. A perverse bloom of this ambition was the angel-like voices of the castrati. The supernatural sound of the voice was meant to let the opera visitors escape into another world. High society was almost addicted to those voices. On the other hand nobody showed any interest in the spiritual life of the castrati. Farinelli, Nicolini, and Senesino, three of the most famous castrati, were the first musical superstars of the eighteenth century. Their voices moved the decadent baroque audience to tears and enraptured them to the point of standing ovations. But the price for this fame was high. Only through castration in their early boyhood could this bell-like voice be kept. Because of the sensational success of the castrati, a huge wave of castration swept over Italy. Ambitious parents had their boys castrated, hoping that they would also become famous opera stars. It is estimated that in Italy alone over half a million boys were victims of this mutilating procedure during the eighteenth century. Because castration was officially forbidden it was done"behind closed doors" by untrained barbers and of course was associated with a high morbidity and mortality rate. The height of the castrati ended with the fading eighteenth century. The last castrato, Alessandro Moreschi, was engaged as a chorister and soloist at the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican. He was pensioned off by Pope Pius X in the year 1912 after an official ban on castrated singers was imposed. With that a very impressive part of music history had ended.

Eugenic and sexual folklores and the castration of sex offenders in the Netherlands (1938-1968).

This contribution questions the positive/negative eugenics dichotomy that typifies the historiography on the eugenic movement in the Netherlands and the claim that this movement was mostly marginal because only positive eugenics was pursued. From 1938 to 1968 in the Netherlands, after a decade of debates, 400 sex offenders who had been committed to asylums for the criminally insane were 'voluntarily' and 'therapeutically' castrated. For political reasons debates on castration, meant to create consensus, eliminated any reference to or connotation with eugenics, yet these policies were unthinkable without them. This article shows that thinking about social and sexual problems and their solutions in the 1930s were permeated by eugenic folklore which in turn was informed by sexual folklore. Both eugenic and sexual lore, as common sense, or as ways of knowing, were about individual and collective loss of self control which was referred to with a catch-all phrase: 'hypersexuality'. Although sexual classifications used in diagnosing sex offenders suggested the existence of discrete sexual categories, homosexuality for instance was not seen as a sexual alternative or as an identity but as the extent to which an offender suffered from a form of hypersexuality that threatened the fabric of society.

O manifesto Eugenista / The eugenisty manifest

Este texto tem como objetivo apresentar o marco inaugural da Eugenia no Brasil. Pesquisas sobre a Eugenia ainda estão restritas a determinadas regiões e os exemplos dos Estados Unidos e da América Latina ainda são freqüentemente negligenciados. Rapidamente associada à Alemanha Nazista, desconhecendo-se a existência mundial das idéias e práticas eugenistas, que ignoraram fronteiras ideológicas e geográficas, a Eugenia surgiu com francis Galton (1822-1911) no final do século XIX e disseminou-se por diversos países. Embora o surgimento dos preceitos eugenistas tenha sido em solo europeu, foi nos Estados Unidos, durante a primeira metade do século XX, que a eugenia assumiu uma das formas mais violentas, modificando drasticamente a vida das pessoas. entre 1907 e 1940, vários estados americanos promoveram cerca de 40.000 esterelizações compulsórias. Somente na Califórnia, mais de 15.000 pessoas teriam sofrido cirurgias deste tipo. Diversas leis foram criadas para esterelizar indivíduos classificados como inadequados e incapazes. em 1904, eram fundados os primeiros laboratórios de aprimoramento racial no mundo (AU)

First colored illustration and detailed description of hermaphroditism by a Turkish surgeon, Serefeddin Sabuncuoglu, in the 15th century.

Cerrahiyyetü'l-Haniyye (Imperial Surgery), written by the surgeon Serefeddin Sabuncuoglu in the 15 century, is the first illustrated surgical book in Turkish-Islamic literature containing human figures. Sabuncuoglu had begun a new era by demonstrating for the first time the application of many surgical methods on human beings, with illustrations in the style of miniatures in his handwritten work. This was a first in medical history, and, owing to this property, Sabuncuoglu's book was one of the most important original works of that period. In this study in which we aim to examine Sabuncuoglu's surgical book, in particular with regard to the disease of hermaphroditism, we first demonstrated the historical development of the subject through general sources. From sources concerning Sabuncuoglu, we gathered information on his life and works. Then, examining the information on hermaphroditism in Sabuncuoglu's work, we discussed this information in light of our current knowledge.

[Eugenics in neurology and psychiatry in Hungary between the two World Wars]. / Eugenikai törekvések az ideg--és elmegyógyászatban Magyarországon a két világháború között.

Eugenics became an organized movement in Hungary in 1914 with the establishment of the Section of Eugenics within the Association of Social Sciences (Társádalomtudományi Egyesület). Its secretary, the prominent biologist István Apáthy jr., defined the aims and the place of eugenics within the sanitation as well as the necessary steps of organization which should be taken in Hungary. It was especially some Hungarian psychiatrists: Márk Goldberger, Lajos Naményi, Gyula Donáth and László Benedek, the Hungarian Representative of the Committee of International Eugenical Organisations who after World War I urged eugenical law which envisaged voluntary sterilization. According to the opponents of eliminative eugenics--like Károly Csörsz, one of the first distinguished medical geneticists in Hungary--sterilization had not been scientifically based yet, because the ways and the probability of heredity of nervous and mental diseases, except for Huntington chorea, had not been explored yet. The outstanding neurologist, Karl Schaffer also opposed the sterilization bill worked out by Professor Benedek, so it was rejected by the National Council of Public Health in 1932 and was not discussed by the Hungarian Parliament either. In spite of its illegality, some sterilizations were executed, for example with the consent and the request of parents in the case of mentally retarded female to stop her reproduction. Only positive eugenics was legally supported by the marriage advisory bureau in the capital, but the interest in it was rather limited in interwar Hungary.

[Urological pathology in the memoires and critiques of the Literary Meetings of the San Carlos Royal College in Madrid (1788-1834)]. / Patología urológica en las memorias y censuras de las Juntas Literarias del Real Colegio de San Carlos de Madrid (1788-1834).

OBJECTIVE: The urologic cases presented for discussion to the Board of the San Carlos Royal College of Surgery (Madrid), created in 1787 by royal decree of King Carlos III for the education and training of surgeons attending the general population, are reviewed. Their contents and the stage of the art of urology in that period are analyzed. METHODS: 303 records in the archives of the Faculty of Medicine of the Complutensis University of Madrid, presented to the Board of the San Carlos Royal College of Surgery for discussion at their regular meetings on Thursday, during the period spanning 1788-1834, were reviewed. A complete list of urologic cases and a transcription of the description of a bladder procedure are presented. RESULTS: 69 urologic cases were found. Lithiasis was the most common, followed by voiding disorders that encompass all urethrovesical conditions. Complications, such as fistula and abscess, account for a large part of the cases reported, followed by testicular and scrotal pathology (basically hydrolece), veneral disease and their complications of stricture and infection. The surgical techniques mainly comprised lithotomy (with analysis of the different perineal approaches), bladder punction for retention, urethrotomy, circumcision and surgical treatment of hydrocele by castration or punction. CONCLUSIONS: The urologic cases reviewed by the Board of the San Carlos Royal College of Surgery were basically those of the most common conditions of that period, mainly lithiasis and voiding disorders arising from urethrovesical conditions and their complications, as well as diseases of the male genitalia. The surgical techniques focussed mainly on the description of stone removal by the perineal approach and castration or punction for hydrocele. The reports and reviews followed the principles of galenic and hippocratic medicine. The impact of European advancements were only observed in the latter stages. Undoubtedly, these records and reviews have made an outstanding contribution to the 18th and early 19th century Spanish medical literature.

[The classical healer as a castrator. The involvement of doctors in castration practices of the Graeco-Roman world]. / De antieke genezer als castrator. De betrokkenheid van medici bij castratiepraktijen in de Grieks-Romeinse oudheid.

The elimination of the testicles of boys and men, what we call castration, was frequently practised in Graeco-Roman antiquity. Probably it was sometimes done by laymen, but certainly also sometimes carried out by doctors. This article provides an overview of classical texts concerning castration practices in which doctors were involved, and explores the background of these specific castration practices. It appears that doctors not only cooperated in several practices that were (thought to be) beneficial for their patients, but also in the involuntary castration of healthly slave boys, mostly for the benefit of slave-owners, and hardly to the advantage of their patients.