have the outward shape for it is not the matter nor outward Lineament but the forme that gives essence and denomination Many learned men as Pindarus Plutarch Pareus and others Plut. in lib. inscript an Brutis ratio insit reduce the causes of these horrid deformities and transfigurations of the humane forme to the promiscuous confusion of the seed of divers Species whence semi-men and semi-beasts do often result wherefore they in a wonderfull manner inveigh against men who neither fearing God nor the Laws become so subject to their lust that they put no difference between themselves and beasts whilest they dare to mingle with them Plin. lib. 7. nat Hist Pliny where he speakes of the Hippocentaure which was borne in Thessalie and after it was dead by the command of Claudius Caesar was brought unto him out of Egypt embalmed in honey seemes to favour this opinion which opinion is more established because upon the dispersing of Nations after the deluge Lust lasciviously running a debauched course through very wickednesse the licentiousnesse of inordinate concupiscence introduced many deformities and defoedations of the Humane forme yet there are many of the Learned that cannot wholly embrace this opinion Since it cannot be according to the Doctrine of Aristotle The causes of monstrous deformities that out of the permixtion of Creatures very discrepant in Species temperature and gestation of the wombe any issue should result wherefore although it is confessed for a truth that monsters want determinate causes because they are effects not intended by Nature but are only procreated by accident yet they are faine to have recourse to other naturall causes Arist Lect. 4. problem 13.14 The Philosopher hath left it upon record that these monstrous depravations of the humane forme are sometimes occasioned through corrupt seed but by corrupt seed he doth not understand seed altogether putrified but only that wherein the virtue of the whole Species doth languish whereupon either the whole Foetus or some parts thereof are produced unlike to the Genitors for when the virtue Formatrix finds the matter of the Foetus rightly disposed then it procreates an issue like to the Generator if otherwise unlike besides this they fetch causes from the Alimentary virtue from hereditary diseases and from monstrous and deformed Parents the narrowness of the place not allowing roome for two seeds to dilate for the forming of two but forcing them to a coalescence but to omit all other vitious dispositions which corrupt the naturall principles destined to generation and conformation Vehement imagination which possesseth the greatest force of hindering the matter of seed is commonly the cause of these monstrosities for even as it happens that a woman with child imprints the image of that she longs for on the Child she goeth with so it may happen that a woman impleat with humane seed if she afterwards lye with a Dog out of the assiduous cogitation and feare of bringing forth a Dog imprints the parts of a Dog upon the fruit in her wombe Whether Bruits may conceive by Men and women by Bruits and then it is not to be said that the off-spring was produced from the Dogs seed since there is no conveniency observed between the humane and canine seed Yet it is not denied that from divers Animals being of a convenient nature and temperament monsters may proceed and in such monstrifique Creatures when the seed of the Male if it be a man is more vigorous in the supernall parts of the foetus then the superiour parts result unto a humane forme and if the seed of the Bruit in the formature of the inferiour parts hath a valid operation then the lower parts of the monster become Belluine It is verily a horrid thing to be spoke that man the Prince of all Creatures and which is more created in the Image of God should flagitiously mingle with a Bruitish Copulation so that a Biformed breed halfe men and halfe beasts are ingendred by the confusion of seed of divers Species of which there have come abominable and promiscuous Creatures to the horrid abasement and confusion of the humane forme the effect whereof although it seeme impossible to Galen yet to Baptista Porta Baptista Potta iâ— Magica natural Vide Wekerum de secretis li. 5. Iacob Rueff lib. 5. de Generat Hom. who hath written of the Art of getting Monsters and hath strange histories of such productions it seemes not impossible although difficult and he annexeth his reasons yet in my opinion Jacobus Rueffus gives the best account of this difficulty who affirmes that Bruites may conceive by men and men likewise by Bruits which he makes good by three reasons first from naturall appetite secondly Bauhin lib. de Hermophrad Kornman lib. de mirac vivorum Delrio disquis Mag. from the provocation of nature by detectation thirdly by the attractive virtue of the Matrix which is alike both in Bruits and Men. The curious and diffident may find the matter of fact confirmed by many examples in Bauhinus Kornmannus and Delrio and therefore we may spare these testimonies that would confirme the possibility of the thing Whether of a man and a beast a true man may be borne And indeed I do not find the thing absolutely denied as impossible but rather that it is questioned whether such a production be a true man or a monster Delrius who is somewhat incredulous in this point saies he is certaine that of a man and a Beast a true man cannot be borne because a Beasts seed is void of that perfection which is required to the mansion place of so noble a soule wherefore if any thing be borne of such a mixture it will be a monster and not a man for such an off spring followes the worser condition of the seed Euseb Neiremberg in Hist Naturae Eusebius Neirembergensis also puts the question whether of seed not humane a true man may arise that is whether by the horrible Copulation of a woman and a beast a true man may be brought forth he thinkes we ought not liberally to beleeve these things neither thinkes he it to be above the power of Nature if the womans seed be efficacious and he puts the other question whether any other womb besides a womans hath been the receptacle of a humane off-spring and he thinkes that if the Issue require the efficacity of both Parents none but the wombe of a woman can lodge a true man adorned with understanding but if the force only of the Male fabricate the Progeny and the woman only is but the shop then he thinkes perchance according to Physitians it will be possible after that hainous coition a man may be cherished in a beasts wombe the Seed of man being before cast therein but if any thing hath been produced in shape like unto man it is never without some gage of an irrationall nature When Nature is impedite many strange transpositions and deformities both in
or unlaboured or without Rythme and elegancy as worke enchased in the hilâ—s of Swords which sometimes appeares but is sometimes obscured by the very splendor of utility Which conceit doth not well please Platerus for saith he Plat. in quaest Phys quaest 8. if it was produced for an Elegancy why do women then want it in adorning whom Nature seemes to have been most studious and yet she would have them beardlesse which if it sometimes but lightly manifest it selfe in them makes them most ugly others conceive one use of the Beard was for a muniment and to cover the Barball parts on which they grow but why the mans Chin rather than the womans should be covered Hofman confesseth he seeth not Yet Zonardus is of opinion that the Beard was not only intended for an ornament but for an operiment and Adjutor to the Maxillae because with their villosity they defend the Maxillary Nerves from being hurt by the too great frigidity of the aire which granted would much aggravate their Crime who shave these parts The Beard the sign of a man But Ulmus who hath sufficiently vindicated the honesty of Nature in this matter in his learned book intituled De fine Barbae Humanae I would he had gone through the worke or that I had seene his Tract De recta Hominis figura if he liv'd to write it He I say is of opinion that the proper end of the Beard is differing from those above-named and that it serves not for ornament nor age nor Sex nor for a covering nor for purgament but for another end to wit serve to the Office of the Humane soule And that Nature gave to mankind a Beard that it might remaine as an Index in the Face of the Masculine generative faculty and of that either crumpent and progredient or consumed at least next to consumption Plater in quaest Phys quaest 8. Of the same judgement is Platerus who hath a little dilated his thoughts upon this Subject For men then to labour to extirpate so honest and necessary a work as the Beard is is a practicall blasphemy most inexpiable against Nature and God the Author of Nature whose worke the Beard is The Beard being the signe of a man by which he appeares a man for it is more ancient than Eve and the sign of a better Nature to violate then that which is a sign of virile Nature is an impiety against the Law of Nature And since it is confessed that man is the Image of God and the Beard the forme of a man certainly so many of us as acknowledge and profess to represent this Image of the Protoplastes God without the high crime of impiety cannot leave off or eradicate our Beard or with Depilatories burn up and depopulate the Genitall matter thereof but we must renounce that and account it for a sport so fondly to evirate our selves An act not only done against the reclamation of the Law of Nature but repugnant to the consent of the Learned of all Nations who with one mouth pronounce a Beard comly for a grave constant just and honest man Nay Lovers of a Beard even the Turkes whom we account even but Barbarians herein do more homage to Nature who if a man have a faire long Beard they reverence him and only he is a wise man and an honourable Personage but if they have no Beard at all if they be young they call them Bardasses that is Sodomiticall Boyes Purchas Pilgr 2. lib. 8. but if they be men grown and have no Beards they call them Fooles and men of no credit and some of them refuse to buy and sell with such and say they have no wit and that they will not beleeve them And therefore they weare their Beard at full length Idem eadem the marke of their affected gravity and token of freedome Therefore the Aghas of the Great Turke who are most commonly Graves description of the Grand Sign Court five and thirty or forty yeares of age before they are sent abroad because they come out of the Seraglio with their Beards shaven they are fain to stay within doores for some daies to let them grow that they may be fit to come amongst other great men and as soon as their Beards are grown they go abroad and begin their visits Such Beard-haters as are before spoken of Barclay's ship of Fooles are by Barclay clapt aboard the Ship of Fooles Tempore quae fuerant ignominiosa vetusto Atque scelesta nimis jam nostra aetate probantur A multis Ritusque novi servantur honore Laudis erat quondà m barbatos esse parentes Atque supercilium mento gestare pudico Socratis exemplo Barbam nutrire solebant Cultores sophiae quorum sapientia mundum Deseruit Celsas Jovis conscendit ad arces Long Beards affected Sed nunc irrepsit morum corrupta libido Manavitque nefas vitae subdolus usus Ecce pudet mulâ—os Barbam nutrire severam Sed vellunt toto Excreâ—os de corpore pilos Ut servare cutem molleus corpusque supinum Possint stultum casus ductare per omnes There are some Nations that are mad in nourishing their Beards Bocat de Flu. Gargaro for in the Islands in the River Gargarus which the Itchnophagi inhabit they wear their beards down unto their knees Steph. Ritter Cosmogr pros These seem to be descended of the Long O Bards a people of Germany which were so called à longis bardis that is their Bipennine and long Beards and your European Galatians seeme to have the same extraction Jo. Bohem. de rit gent. lib. 3. for the Noblemen among them although they shave their Cheeks yet they so nourish the Beard that they cover their bodies whereby it happens that when any one eates Formal Beards affected his Beard is replinished with food and when they drinke the drinke seems to be carried down as by a Channell Strange affectations of old had the Graecians in the formality of a Beard it being reputed the solemne signe of a Philosopher and some have been and are so affected with the cut of their Beards that there have been Cases invented to preserve their formality Guzman I remember plaies upon a formall Doctor for such a practicall absurdity girding at the cut of his Beard for he saith that the fashion of his Beard was just for all the world like those upon your Flemmish Jugs and that a nights he puts it in a presse made of two thin Trenchers scrued wonderfully close that no Gitterne can be closer shut up in its Case that it may come forth the next morning with even corners bearing in grosse the forme of a broome narrow above and broad beneath his Mustachoes Ruler-wise straight and levell as a line and all the other haires as just and as even as a privet hedge newly cut answering each other in a uniforme manner having the point thereof in forme of a
noble Secretary who before marriage was endowed with great Breasts which notwithstanding at the first time of her impregnation did increase and rise to a greater nay even a most horrid bulke and they alwaies after her conception did so encrease that they were wont to hang down even unto her knees at which strange case â—â—lmuthus stood amazed when her husband shewed her Breasts unto him to be cured The chiefe use of the Breasts wondring at the matter which otherwise useth to be collected towards the Child in the wombe making together the Belly tumid that so great quantity should ascend upwards or creepe to the Breasts whence he observed that there is not only a consent between the Veines of the Wombe and Breast but a conflux also But although Nature forced thereto against her will prevaricates in the shape of the Breasts and Divine Providence hath gone beyond the Rules to which she hath necessarily constrained us it is not to give us a dispensation from them they are blows of his Divine hand which we ought not to imitate but admire as extraordinary examples and markes of an expresse and particular avowing of the severall kinds of wonders which for a testimony of his omnipotency he affordeth us beyond our orders or forces which it is folly and impiety to go about to represent and which we ought not to follow but contemplate with admiration and meditate with astonishment being Acts of his Personage and not of ours Another thing discommendable in some of these Nations is that they take these loathsome lovely long Breasts to be a goodly thing and that they go naked to shew them for a bravery the chiefe use of the Breasts being the generation of milke that they may be ashamed who for nicity and delicacy do forfeit this principall use of these excellent parts and make them only Stales or Bawds of Lust as too many Ladies amongst us do who by opening these common shops of temptation invite the eyes of easie Chapmen to cheapen that flesh which seemes to lye exposed as upon an open Stall to be sould The Breasts accounted shamefull parts To whose Udders I could wish some severe Cato could present a good wholesome morall Hedgehog to make them shut up shop and translate their Masques from their Face to their Breasts More innocent are the Maldives in the other harmelesse extreame Purch Pilgr 1. lib. 9. who count the Breasts shamefull parts not to be spoken of who carefully hide them and to speake of them they account it very lascivious and dishonest the Maids go naked untill their Breasts begin to beare out and encrease and then they think it a thing needfull to cover them holding as great a shame to shew them as their Privities The most Noble Virgins of Secota in Florida also are more modest than ours De Bry Hist Ind. who for the most part apply their hand to their shoulders so covering their Breasts in signe of Virgin modesty being naked in all the rest of their body There being good reason in Nature why women should have a modest regard of them and not so openly expose them because the consent between the Breasts and Wombe is very great in so much as the only contrectation of them provoketh Lust Another and that no small aggravation of their offence against Nature is that these women should so love to have great Dugs that they strive to have their Children suck over their shoulders for this is a device contrary to the intention of Nature as plainly appeares by the scituation of the Breasts as we have shewed in our Vox Corporis or Morall Anatomy of the Body Sutable to this absurdity is the Custome of the Turkish women Helyn who carry not their Children in their armes as we do Very little Breasts affected but astride on their shoulders But more conceited is the Fashion of the Matrons of Dasamonque in Florida who have a strange manner of carrying their Children plainly diverse from ours For we as a gesture more conformable to the hint of Nature carry ours in our armes before our Breast they taking hold of the right hand of the Child beare them on their back De Bry Hist Ind. embracing the Child 's left-heele with their left-hand by a way as wonderfull and forreign as it is averse to Nature Purch Pilgr 3. lib. 2. More commendable are the women of Uraba who do mightily affect little Breasts and use all the Art they can devise to have them so Allowable is the use of those Cosmetiques which are contrived by Art to restraine the exuberancy of the over-grown Breasts and reduce them to their naturall proportion which in the corrective part of medicine is performed by refrigerating repercussive medicaments which drive backward the matter to the profundity and excellently advancing the naturall heat compell it to enter into the depth of the Body and so meeting with the Aliment afar off prevents its passage io the more superficiall parts and so consequently prohibits the undecent augmentation of the Breasts Yet the practice of some Indian women to avoid the deformity of sagging Breasts is no way allowed who having Teats that become loose and hanging use therefore abortions with a certaine herb because they will not have this deformity and when they fall the principall women beare them up with Bars of Gold As if the Breasts of women were intended only for ornament Doe you thinke saith Phaverinus Men with great Breasts Phaver in Aul. Gell. that Nature hath given women their swelling paps as so many more beautifull Warts not for the nourishing of Children but for the adorning of the Breast for so many prodigious women endeavour to dry and dam up that most sacred Fountaine of the body and feeder of mankind as if it should despoile them of the ensigns of Beauty of which not the Vulgar but the Learned complaine that the greatest part of women an ancient crime put forth their Children to be Nursed from whence there follows the frequent infirmities of mens Bodies together with a shortning of the age and a diminution in their stature The same or not much differing folly are they guilty of who use strange counterfeit sleights to abortiate the fruit of their Body that the smoothnesse of the Belly be not winkled and enfeebled with the weight of the burthen and the labour of Child-birth a thing deserving all hate and detestation that a man in his very originall whiles he is framed whiles he is enlived should be put to death under the very hands and in the Shop of Nature In Aegypt the men have greater Breasts than the biggest of our women for Prosp Alpin lib. de med Egypt c. 9. Prosper Alpinus writes that they grow so fat by their course of Diet that he never saw in any Country so many extreame fat men as he observed in Grand Cairo and he reports that most of them are so fat that they have Breasts
of Lydia as the report goes was the first that made women Eunuches whom he used instead of Male Eunuches after whose examples the women of Egypt were sometimes spaded Giges is accused of the same trespasse against Nature by Hesychius and Suidas The end might be the same in spading women as men both being made thereby impotent and so consequently apt to envy others The Danger of spading women and lesse subject to be corrupted with their passions Julius Alex. lib. 22. cap. 14. Salubr in annot ad Gal. pag. 122. Reiner Reineceius Tom. 3. Hist de Lydorum orig imper p. 82. Athen. Voscius lib. 17. de orig progressu Idolat fol. 1081 And it seemes Iulius Alexandrinus could never find that this was a received Custome in any Nation yet he had read in divers Authors of many Castrated to abate their untamed Lust But that end which the first inventors of this shamefull deed propounded to themselves was as is supposed to prolong their youth and that they might perpetually use and enjoy them in a flourishing condition of body It is an Anatomicall Question An mulier Castrati possit and it appeares de facto to have been done but concerning the manner of operation there ariseth a greater difficulty Whether they castrated women by drawing out their wombe or by avulsion of their Testicles Both waies it is certaine that women will be brought into great danger of life for although Sows may be spaded yet with the like security it cannot be administred in women by reason of the seat wherein they are placed and the society they have with other parts For he must necessarily cut both the Flankes who would Castrate a woman Cardan Dialog Tâ—tim inscript a worke full of desperate hazzard yet it may be done with little or no danger if it be attempted with an Artfull hand And a Friend of mine told me he knew a maid in Northampton-shire that was thus spaded by a Sow-gelder and escaping the danger grew thereupon very fat A Gentleman who undertooke since in some company to tell me this Story againe said that he was present at the Assizes of Northampton when this Sow-gelder was arraigned for this Fact I doubt there is some mistake in the Scene A maid spaded a new way for by another Information of a Justice than was there it was in Lincolne-shire and the Fact done upon Lincolne Heath and that was not his first Fact so that his first attempt might be upon the Northampton maid this last maids name was Margaret Brigstock but the Judges were much confounded how to give Sentence upon an Act against which they had no Law for although the Castration of men was Fellony by the Law yet there was nothing enacted against spading of women and well might they be ignorant of such a Case when Platerus the great Physitian professeth he remembreth not that ever he read or heard of such an attempt This Clearke for that was his name was hanged for this last Fact but not by a Law but for robbing her of two penniworth of Apples which she had in her Apron But it is more dangerous to pluck out the Wombe although this succeeded well to a certaine Sow-gelder who suspecting his Daughter guilty of Adultery violently extracting the Wombe spaded her after the manner of Cattle that afterwards she might be unfit for bearing of Children Vuierus lib. 4. de praestig Demon cap. 2. as Vuierus witnesseth And we read that this Iohannes ab Essen Sow-gelder-Generall to the Clivensian Duke was deservedly punished by the Prince with a pecuniary mulct for that villanous deed But Riolanus supposeth that as they button up the Naturals of Mares which they would not have horsed to wit with Iron rings trajected in order Dalechamp in not is ad lib. 12. Athenaei Deipnosoph wherewith their Naturals are shut up so women of old were spaded for so Dalechampius interprets the ancient Castration of women Circumcision where first practised after which manner as he heares the jealous Italians secure their Wives from the admittance of any Rivall Circumcision a strange and smart invention of man is a very ancient device practised to the diminution of the naturall comelinesse of this part Joh. Bohem. de rit gent. lib. 1. The Egyptians as the Greeks are perswaded were the first that circumcised their virilities confessing they were Circumcised for cleannesse because it was better to be cleane than comely or beautifull Coelius Rhod. Caelius saith they were wont to Circumcise their New-borne Infants conceiving it not a little to conduce to the commodities of life thinking that the filth and corruption of their bodies was thereby taken away Grimston of their manners And it is thought that perchance the Egyptian Priests and other Flamines of the naturall Law used Circumcision as a certaine signe of Piety as Orus Apollo insinuates saying that a Cynocephalus was a note of Sacrifice because he was borne Circumcised others thinke they used it as a note of religious cleannesse and that the Egyptian Priests who were bound to shave all their body every three daies to the end they might not carry any filthinesse into the Temple and Sacrifice so they did cut the Fore-skin to be more neat and that it was more seemly to be without filthinesse than in any other sort whatsoever Veslingus in Synt. Anatom Veslingus thinks they were necessitated to do this to a naturall end for the prepuce in the Egyptian and Arabian little Children grows out often so beyond measure 〈◊〉 Christians and by much encreasing is so attenuated that they are constrained no lesse for feare of a Phimosis than by the prescript of Religion to cut off part thereof so over-carefull sometimes is Nature in providing for a decent covering of this shamefull part That the Egyptians used Circumcision appeareth by Philo Judaeus They mocke saith he at our Circumcision which was in great honour with other Nations especially the Egyptians Philo Judaeus and there was some cause why it was a Custome with them unlesse we would condemne the easinesse of a Noble and most ancient Nation since it is not likely that they would rashly Circumcise so many Millions and ordaine the torment of Mutilation of the dearest pledges in their body At this day the Copties Sands Travels lib. 2. called commonly and corruptly Coftes who are the true Egyptians the name signifieth privation in regard as some will have it of their Circumcision notwithstanding they are Christians they are Circumcised whereof they now begin to be ashamed saying that in the Country they are thereunto compelled by the Moores in Cities where secure from violence they use it not doing it rather in that it is an ancient Custome of their Nation mentioned by Herodotus than out of Religion The Colchians Ethiopians Trogloditians Syrians and Phaenicians were of the same Cut. Grimston of their manners The Iucatans used Circumcision but not all in generall
may see what a hand the lust and folly of a man hath in this Hemophraditicall Transformation or Androginall mixture Those who in old time were called by the name of Androgyni were reputed then for prodigious wonders Howbeit as Pliny notes Plin. Nat. Hist lib. 7. cap. 3. Aul. Gel. l 9. c. 4 Isidor lib. 11. cap. 3. Jul. Obseq lib. prodig in his time men tooke delight and pleasure in them M. Messala C. Livius Consuls in Umbria there was a Semi-man almost twelve yeares old by the command of the Aruspices slaine L. Meteblus and Q. Fabius Maximus Consuls there was an Hermophradite borne at Luna Idem by command of the Southsayers cast into the sea P. Africanus C. Fulvius Consuls Idem in the Country of Ferretinnum there was an Hermophradite horne and carried unto the River Gn. Domitius Cajus Fannius Consuls Idem in Foro Vessonum another borne and cast into the Sea L. Aurelius and L. Caecilius Consuls Idem about Rome there was another Hermophradite some eight yeares old found and carried unto the sea L. Caecilius L. Aurelius Consuls Idem there was another about ten yeares old found at Saturnia and drowned in the Sea Q. Metellus Tullius Didius Consuls Idem another was carried from Rome and drowned in the Sea A course taken to prevent Courses Cn. Cornelius Lentulus P. Licinius Consuls there was an Androgynus found Idem and carried to the Sea Beyond the Nasamones and their neighbours confining upon them the Matchlies there be found ordinarily Hermophradites called Androgyni of a double nature and resembling both Sexes Male and Female who have carnall knowledge one of another interchangeably by turnes as Caliphanes doth report Cited by Pliny Nat. Hist lib. 7. Aristotle saith moreover that on the right side of their breast they have a little teat or nipple like a man but on the left side they have a full pap or dug like a woman Montuus de Med. Thoresi lib. 1. cap. 6. I knew saith Montuus an Hermophradite who was accounted for a woman and was married to a man to whom she bore some sons and daughters notwithstanding he was wont to lye with his maids and get them with child This is remarkable Anno 1461. in a certaine City of Scotland there was an Hermophrodite maid got her Masters Daughter with child who lay in the same bed with her Veinrichius Com. de Monstris pag. 7. facie aversa being accused of the Fact before the Judges she dyed being put into the ground alive The Tovopinambaultian women of Brasill in in America Purch Pilgr 4. lib. 7. never have their Flowers not liking that purgation it is thought they divert that flux by some meanes unknown to us for the Maids of twelve yeares old have their sides cut by their mothers from the armehole down unto the knee with the very sharpe tuske of a certaine beast the young Girles gnashing with their Teeth through the extremity of the paine some conjecture they prevent their monthly flux by this remedy Women affecting streightnesse Concerning the nature of the Menstruall bloud there hath been and yet is hard hold and many opinions among Physicians All agree that this bloud is an excrement for like a superfluity it is every month driven forth the Wombe but many would have it an unprofitable excrement and of a noxious and hurtfull quality but I am of the contrary opinion to wit that it is naturall and profitable and that it is in its own nature laudable and pure bloud and no way offensive unto the woman but only in the quantity thereof as is by some evicted by the Authority of the Ancients and by invincible and demonstrative arguments So that the impurity of the Courses is not so great as some would have it the menstruall bloud being only abundant in women and hath no other fault at all in sound bodies and is but abusively call'd an excrement Unthankefull therefore are those Tovopinambaultian women to Nature who seeme to abhor so signall a benefit of hers in endeavouring to divert the ordinary course of Nature More respective to Nature are the women of Iucaia who when the Menstrua begin to come Petr. Mart. Decad. 7. as if they were to be brought to a man to be married the Parents invite the Neighbours to a banquet and use all signes and tokens of joyfulnesse In the Kingdome of Monomotapa the maids are not to be married till their Menstrua or naturall purgations testifie their ability for conception Holyn Geogr. The women of Vraba have a most streight and narrow neck of their wombe Consal Ovied Hist Iud. Spigel Hum. corp Fabr. l. 1. that they very hardly admit a man A quaere about womens streightnesse which Spigelius thinks happens to them by Art and not by any benefit of Nature since it is known that they much affect such a streightnesse the men of that Countrey as it is likely delighting in none but such who have that accommodation It may be a Quare whether these women owe not somewhat of this strictnesse to the indulgent artifice of their Midwives And whether their Navils were not cut shorter at the birth to make them forsooth modester and their wombes narrower according to the conceit and practice of the European Midwives I confesse Spigelius and all our Modern Writers jeere at this and he makes himselfe merry with this opinion for saith he if it were in the power of women to make the Privities greater or lesser by cutting off the Navell string in sober sadnesse all women labouring with child would complaine of Midwives and that deservedly too because they left not a great part of their Navell string when they were borne that so their Privities being large they might be delivered with the more ease Yet Mizaldus orders it to be cut long in Female children because the Instruments of Generation follow the proportion of it and therefore if it be cut too short in a Female it will be a hinderance to her having of children Taisnier the famous Chiromancer and Astrologer affirmes the same thing The generall conceit of the Italians in this matter causeth the same industrious affectation of Art in your Italian Dames It being a familiar and common thing with the Italian Curtezans with astringent Pessaries by Art to make the neck of their wombe as streight as they list And honest Matrons Mischiefes ensuing affected streightnesse to satisfie the wanton curiosities of their Husbands use the same Art who have many times proved very unhappy in the miserable and dangerous effect of that Artifice and have dearly paid for their foolish officiousnesse with a sad bitternesse of experience too late repenting them of trying of such a conclusion as shuts up the gate of birth themselves with their dead-borne children thereby perishing together Nor is this Artifice altogether unknown unto the women of other Countries Observ med Decad. 3.
cas 5. in Schol. Hachstetterus narrat Ancillam quandam sponsant procul dubio ut sponso virgo quae non erat appareret balnco in quo radices consolidae majoris decortae erant usam fuisse in quod cum hera inscia insedisset Ei ita orificium pudendi coarctatum fuit ut Maritus uxorem claustrum virginale recepisse miraretur Et Nicolus Florentinus refert se vidisse mulierem quae post partum cùm obstetrices adhibuissent medicamenta valdè astringentia ita clausa reddita fuit ut non potuerit coitum exercere Et cum Sennerto loqui hoc institutum ut in scortis culpandum ita in honestis mulieribus non reprehendendum si ipsis hoc vitium post partum accidat potest enim cervicis uteri amplitudo causa sterilitatis esse interdum procidentiae uteri praeterea vitium hoc mulieres viris ingratas reddit et hic quastio resolvitur An Sinûs muliebris adstrictio angustia certum virginitatis signum sit Quod negandum The women of Siam are contrary minded Herb. Travels both in their opinions and practice for to see a Virgin there at Virgins yeares is as a black Swan in regard in their green yeares they give the too forward Maids a virulent drinke whose virtue vice rather is by a strange efficacy to distend their Muliebria so capaciously Where they sew up their Females that the Bels which the men weare in their Yards with rope-ring too easily may enter Purch Pilgr 2. lib. 9. The Maracatos within the Land of Brava have a fashion to sew up the Females especially their Slaves being young to make them unable for Conception which makes these Slaves sell dearer for their Chastity and for better confidence their Mistresses put in them Among the Peguans there are some that sew up the privy member of their Female Children as soone as they are borne leaving them but a little hole to avoid their urine and when she marrieth the husband cutteth it open and maketh it as great and as little as he will which they with a certaine ointment or salve can quickly heale Lindscot Travels lib. 1. c. 17. Lindscoten saw one of these women in Goa whom the Chirurgion of his Master in the Arch-Bishops house did cut open Men would judge saith he all these things to be Fables yet they are most true for I do not only know it by the daily traffique of the Portugals out of India thither but also by the Peguans themselves whereof many dwell in India some of them being Christians which tell it and confesse it for a truth as also the neernesse of place and neigbourhood maketh it sufficiently known Helyn Ethiop Infer The people of Quilea of the Province of Zanziber in Ethiopia Inferiour have among them the same strange fashion which may be mentioned rather for variety than decency They use when they have any Female Children born unto them to sew up the privy passages of Nature Virginity secured leaving only a small passage for the Urine Thus sewed they carefully keep them at home untill they come to marriageable age then they give them to their neighbours for Wives And of what ranck or condition she be which is found by her Husband to want the signe of her perpetuall Virginity is with all kind of ignominy and digrace sent home unto her Parents and by them as opprobriously received And it seemes they confide in no evidence but their own ocular Chirurgery here Petrus Bembo saies Pet. Bembo Lib. Hist Venet. they give their Daughters in marriage thus sewed but first that care is left unto and lies upon the Bridegroome to cut and divide with an Iron Instrument the conglutinated lips of the neck of the wombe In so great honour with those Barbarians in marrying a wife is the certaine assurance of incorrupt Virginity who little trusting to the fraile inclosure of Nature do secure with more strong guards the fortresse of Virginity Had these people known the famous Liniment of Paracelsus which but smeared upon the opening of the mouth in a moment forsooth will contract and conglutinate that Orifice they would it may be have stood in little need of needle and thread and such dolorous punctures for sewing up this suspected passage It should seeme these people are loath to trust the security of Nature More cruelly jealous of their Daughters than the Venetians are of their Wives on whom they hang a padlock And surely they have a slight opinion of Hymen and either know it not or are not willing to confide in it whereas the Jews were no way doubtfull of it And Spigelius and many other Anatomists could by ocular experience satisfie them concerning Natures constant provision to preserve virginal integrity The practice of Irish women for easie Delivery Certainly these Nations would have been well pleased if Nature had produced all their Females imperforated and the Orifice of their wombs closed and sealed up or the Hymen so thick and fleshy that it streightned the passages of Nature that it needed incision an evill which holds proportion in men when the Prepuce grows unto the Nut. It is thought that the Irish women are wont to breake the Os pubis or share-bone of their Female children as soone as they are borne to make them have more easie labour when they come to child-bearing And it is well known that your Irish women have very quick and easie deliverance in Child-birth I confesse I could not in a long time by any enquiry receive full satisfaction concerning this practical endeavour of the Irish nor discover any thing thereof in Books Yet I encline to beleeve the Report because it is an Invention somewhat rationable Yet since the first impression of this Book I have been assured of this practice by a Gentlewoman who was present at an Irish womans Labour in Ireland For in the conformation of the share and Hanch-bone there appears a singular benefit of Nature conferr'd upon women who providing with all Art for the paines of Child bed would have the closing of the Share-bone loosed for the facility of Birth and therefore the Cartilagineous coupling of the Share-bone is in women more soft and in women with Child a little before their delivery more thick embued with an unctious humour Touch also and sight-do manifestly perceive the divulsion of the Share-bone for if you lift up one Leg of a woman lately delivered The practice of Irish women examined you shall perceive the spine of the Share-bone to rise up in the other The truth of this thing may be confirmed by Authority for to omit the well known opinion of Hippocrates Alex. Benedict lib 5. Anat. c. 3. Gorraeus Com. in Hippoc de natura pueri Aetius Tetra 4. Serm 4. cap. 22. Jacob. Carpus in sua Anat. Sylvius in Isagoge Anatom Aristotle Riolanus Schola Anatomica and Avicen many others do witnesse of the bones of the Ilium and
Pecten are opened or seperated to wit the joynts relaxed not exarticulated but justly said to be loosed because that great distention seemes to be quaedam species solutae continuitatis and this is naturally although at other times they are most strongly bound together But there is little need of witnesses inso manifest a businesse experience only to whom the best appeale is made in this Anatomicall controversie may make it credible to whom Physitians think they are bound to give more respect than unto Reason for Riolanus affirmes that he thrice in the presence of Physitians and Chirurgions saw the Cartilage which holds together the bones of the share loosed and relaxed a fingers breadth but that which makes somewhat more to this purpose Fernel lib. 6. Pathologiae Aethius Tetra 4. Serm. 4.6.22 Fernelius among the causes of a difficult birth reckons the more firme compaction of the share-bones when they cannot be dilated in the Birth Now if upon this account the Irish women obtaine a more than ordinary faculty of dispatch in Child-birth it is likely the force they use to their Female Infants as soone as they are borne may relax the Ligaments and move the tender Share-bones to a competent Dilation that may prove afterwards productive of such an effect And it may be the women of the Conarins Corumbins and other Provinces of India who scarce travel at all they are so soon delivered from the paine and perill of Child-birth if they do not rather receive the benefit from the temper of the Climates and the favourable indulgence of the Genius of the Place use some such kind of Artifice conducible to this end Nations with great privy members although the report of their practice hath not yet arrived at our eares As for the matter of Fact taking it for granted it pretends to work a mitigation in that pronounced woe in Dolore paries but this is not the only way that man hath endeavoured to ease himselfe of those inconveniences his transgression hath entailed upon him Purch Pilgr 2. lib. 7. They of Guinea have a great privy member much surpassing our Country-men whereof they make great account Richard Jobs Golden Trade I read in Jobsons discovery of the River Gambra and the Golden Trade of the Aethiopians of a Town called Cassan which is the Kings Seat and by the name of which Towne he holds his Title King of Cassan seated upon the Rivers side of Gambra The Inhabitants of which Towne and parts thereabout being Subjects to the Great King of Cantare and of Bursall By a conjecturall Geography I take this Cassan to be that which Cardan calls Cassena a Region in Affrica and although I read nothing here concerning their great Noses yet I meet with a strange report touching the magnitude of that part which answers to the Nose His discourse runs after this manner Undoubtedly these people originally sprung from the race of Canaan the Son of Ham who discovered his Father Noahs Secrets for which Noah awaking cursed Canaan as our holy Scripture testifieth the Curse as by Schoolemen hath been disputed extended to this ensuing Race in laying hold upon the same place where the originall cause began Men with members like Asses whereof these people are witnesses who are furnished with such members as are after a sort burthensome unto them whereby their women being once conceived with Child so soone as it is perfectly discerned accompanies the man no longer because he shall not destroy what is conceived to the losse of that and danger of the Bearer neither untill she hath brought up the Child to a full and fitting time to be weaned which every woman doth to her own Child is she allowed in that Nature the mans society so that many times it falls he hath not a wife to lye withall and therefore hath allowance of other women for necessities sake which may seem not over-strange unto us in that our Holy Writ doth make mention thereof as you may read in the 23 Chapter of the Prophet Ezekiel where Ierusalem and Samaria being called by the name of two Sisters Ahola and Aholiba being charged with Fornication are in the twentieth verse of the same Chapter said to doat upon those people whose Members were as the members of Asses and whose Issue was like the issue of Horses therein right and amply explaining these people The Turks who as I heare by a Traveller are Mentulatiores and these would have made brave Companions for Heliogabalus that extreame luxurious Emperour Lamprid in vita ejus who gathered together a number of these well weaponed men whom he called Nasatos Vasatos Onobolos id est Mentulatiores whom he made use of to satisfie his inordinate Lust. As for the virile member it is of such length and magnitude as the necessity of the kind requireth for procreation Magnitude membri virilis conformed according to the Law of Nature in one of a just age Quando erigitur obtinet sex uncias longitudine quatuor in Perepheria Although it varies much according to the race of Families and course of Life for there are certaine Families and as you see Nations who have an ill or a good report according to this very thing And how much frequent coition conferreth to the accession of its augmentation they daily are advised of who more often or with more alacrity descend into venerean encounters and indeed the length and thickness thereof varies in respect of the particular creature or individuum because it is formed according to the proportion of the members yet sometimes it is larger in a little man because of the abundance of the proportion of Fathers seed of which it is framed for the Seed falleth from every part of a mans body and carrieth in it power of generating that part from whence it sell But it may be these Guineans tamper not with Nature but have this prerogative from the subtle indulgency of their Midwives For it is thought it will be longer if the Navel-strings be not close knit by the Midwives when the Child is new-borne and that because of a Ligament which commeth to the Navill from the bottome of the bladder which they call Urachos for the straighter that is tyed to the Navell the more the blaâ—der and the parts adjoyning are drawn upward Yet Spigelius saies he cannot well conceive in his mind how this can be done But for the matter of practice he reports that upon this conceit Midwives leaves longer part of the Navell-string of a Male than they do of a Female because in Males they would have the Instrument of Generation long Whether the Navell appeared in our prototype that so they may not be cowards in the Schooles of Venus Now if the supposition be true we are all at the mercy of the Midwives for our sufficiencie In which operation Authors make much adoe and Midwives at present can scarce agree about the place The distance the Navell-string should
Where Eunuches who have religious women in keeping because they shall not be loved have also their noses and lips cut off 357 Eunuches by a totall deprivation of their Genitals why first made 359 Where such Eunuches are in great request 360 Stories of many that have castrated themselves 356 357 358 359 This kind of operation very improper for Physitians and why 359 That Castration is high treason against Nature ibid. What deformity Castration introduces upon the body of man 363 In what cases a dispensation may be granted for Eunuches 362 Who was the first that made women Eunuches 363 Whether women may be castrated 364 The manner of operation and danger thereof ibid. A History of a maid spaded in Lincolneshire 364 365 Another History of one spaded a new way ibid. Riolanus his opinion of the ancient way of operation ibid. What Nations Circumcise the Prepuce of their Yard 366 The naturall ends they propounded therein ibid. Where women have the office of excising men 372 The reasons alleadged for the Judaicall Circumcision 368 379 That they who were Circumcised might make themselves uncircumcised ibid. Who was first thought to have practised this 369 The cure of a prepuce made short by Circumcision ibid. The manner of Circumcision with the modern Jewes ibid. Mahometan Circumcision 370 The difference of the Mahometans and Jews Circumcision 371 The manner of Circumcision at Ginney and Binney 372 A History of Circumcision at Ginney 373 Priviledges affected in Circumcision 374 The inconveniences of Circumcision 377 The injury of Circumcision ib. 378 That one may be born circumcised by nature 368 369 The naturall uses of the prepuce according to Anatomists 376 The pretences of those who use circumcision for a naturall end exploded 377 The danger of judaicall circumcision 379 380 That circumcision is directly against the honesty of Nature 379 That if there had not been some figurative meaning in Circumcision it would have been a most absurd and unreasonable thing For if God would have had onely the foreskin cut off he had from the beginning made man without a prepuce 379 Circumcised Christians 367 In what cases for a naturall end circumcision is onely permitted 362 A new way of Circumcising men by way of strangulation 376 Where women are Circumcised 380 The originall and reason of this invention 381 Where women excise themselves not from a notion of religion but as an ornament ibid. The error sin of this custome 380 How this Circumcision of a woman is done ibid. 381 Men with Members like Asses and where they have a great privy member in great esteem 389 399 Supposed to be nourished by art ibid. The just length and magnitude of the virile member when it is conform'd according to the law of Nature 400 Midwives supposed to be the cause either of the length or shortnes of the virile member according as they knit the navell string 400 401 The Anatomicall reason given thereof with the opinion of Spigelius 400 That whatsoever augmentation of parts is gained by Art besides the will and ordinary allowance of Nature it is commonly attended by some inconveniences 401 The reason of the inconveniences which follow the magnitude and the foule immoderate longitude of the Organ of generation 402 403 Where they use to binde up the Fore-skin of their Privities with a little cord and unty it not but to make water or when they use the act of Generation 381 An expostulation of this unnaturall restraint 382 Men whose Members hang down to their shanks 403 Pygmaei magno veretro 404 Where they adorne their Genitals with pretious stones 383 Where they deprive their secret parts of that which nature intended to make them more secret 383 How this is done and upon what pretence 383 384 Where women never have their flowers 390 By what meanes they prevent their monthly Flux ibid. Their ingratitude to Nature taxed for endeavouring to dâ—vert the ordinary course of Nature 391 Nations commended as more respective to nature in this particular 391 Where the women have a most streight and narrow neck of their wombe that they very hardly admit a Man 392 That this happens to them by art not by any benefit of Nature ibid. Where this art is familiarly and commonly practised 392 393 The miserable and dangerous effects of this artifice 393 Where the virgins use art to distend their Muliebria most capaciously 393 Where they to use sew up the private passage of Nature in their Female child leaving a small passage for their urine 394 39â— Where the Midwives are wont to breake that membrane as unprofitable which Anatomists call Hymen 384 How they doe it ibid. The prodigious conceit of Nero who must needs have a boy cut and made forsooth a woman 407 The naturall change of women into men confuted by demonstration of Anatomy and Nature vindicated from being guilty of any such practicall Metamorphosis 405 That men to be changed into women is very rare 407 Nations of Hermophrodites who have the generative parts of both sexes 386 390 Hereticks that thought the first man was an Hermaphrodite 386 Their opinion confuted by Scripture ibid. and 387 The kindes of Hermophrodites ibid. That those who in old time were called by the name of Androgyni were reputed for prodigious Monsters 389 Ancient Records of such Hermaphrodites ibid. The causes of Hermophrodites 390 S Shoulders HIgh-huff Shoulders where in fashion and naturall 280 Where their shoulders are higher then their Heads ibid. Some concurrent affectation suspected in these Nations ibid. Broad shoulders where in request and indeavoured or imitated by art 281 The inconveniences of broad shoulders and why Platonick Men are not affected by women ibid. Narrow and contracted shoulders where affected 282 With what art they of old affected this composure of the Shoulders ibid. This affectation of drawing the shoulder-points too neer noted and condemned ibid. Where the Noble Virgins Right Shoulders are higher and bigger then the left 283 The cause thereof enquired ibid. Crook-back'd Nations 284 T Teeth VVHere red Teeth are accounted a great beauty 217 By what industry they attain unto this Dentall bravery ibid. Where the principall women take a pride in black Teeth 217 218 Black Teeth where a singular beauty 218 219 Where so greatly affected that the blacker they are the more beautifull they are esteemed and worthy of greater honour ibid. How they make them black ibid. Where they polish their black teeth which makes them shew like polish'd Ebony 219 Where they colour their Teeth red and black 217 How they colour them so ibid. Where the men and women in a foolish pride black their Teeth because Dogs Teeth forsooth are white 219 Where the women guild their Teeth 221 White Teeth the true naturall beauty ibid. They condemned that alter the native candor of the Teeth ibid. Nations commended that are carefull to preserve the naturall beauty of the Teeth ibid. Their artifice whereby they make them look like polished Ivory