The workes of that famous chirurgion Ambrose Parey translated out of Latine and compared with the French. by Th: Johnson

CHAP. XLIX. Of womens monethly fluxe or courses.

USually they call the fluxe of bloud, that issueth from the secret parts of * 1.1 women, monethly flowers or courses, because it happeneth to them every month so long as they are in health. There bee some which call them termes, because they returne at their usuall time. Many of the French men call it sepmaines, because in such as sit much, and are gi∣ven to plentifull feeding, it endureth almost for the space of seven dayes. Some call them purgations, because that by this fluxe all a womans body is purged of su∣per fluous humours. There bee some also that call those fluxes the flowers, because that as in plants the flower buddeth out before the fruits, so in women kinde this flux goeth before the issue, or the conception thereof.

For the courses flow not before a woman bee able to conceive: for how should the seede being cast into the wombe have his nourishment and encrease, and how should the child have his nourishment when it is formed of the seed, if this necessary humour were wanting in the wombe? yet it may bee some women may conceive * 1.2 without this fluxe of the courses: but that is in such as have so much of the humour gathered together, as is wont to remaine in those which are purged, although it bee not so great a quantity that it may flow out, as it is recorded by Aristotle. But as it is in some very great, and in some very little, so it is in some seldome, and in some very often.

There are some that are purged twice, and some thrice in a moneth, but it is al∣together

in those who have a great liver, large veines, and are filled and fed with many and greatly nourishing meats, which sit idely at home all day, which having * 1.3 slept all night, doe notwithstanding lye in bed sleeping a great part of the day also, which live in a hot, moyst, rainie and southerly ayre, which use warme bathes of sweet waters and gentle frictions, which use and are greatly delighted with carnall copulation: in these and such like women the courses flow more frequently and a∣bundantly.

But contrariwise, in those that have small and obscure veines, in those that have * 1.4 their bodies more furnished and bigge either with flesh or with fat, are more seldome purged, and also more sparingly, because that the superfluous quantity of bloud useth to goe into the habit of the body. Also tender, delicate and faire women are lesse purged than those that are browne and endued with a more compact flesh, be∣cause that by the rarity of their bodies, they suffer a greater wasting or dissipation of their substance by transpiration. Moreover, they are not so greatly purged with this kind of purgation, which have some other solemne or accustomed evacuation in any other place of their body, as by the nose or hemorrhoids.

And as concerning their age, old women are purged when the Moone is old, and * 1.5 young women when the Moone is new, as it is thought. I thinke the cause thereof is, for that the Moone ruleth moyst bodies, for by the variable motion thereof the Sea floweth and ebbeth, and bones, marrow and plants abound with their genitall humour.

Therefore young people which have much bloud, and more fluxible, and their bodies more fluxible, are soone moved unto a fluxe, although it bee even in the first quarter of the Moones risingor increasing: but the humours of old women, because * 1.6 they wax stiffe as it were with cold, & are not so abundant, and have more dense bo∣dies and straighter vessels, are not so apt to a fluxe, nor do they so easily flow, except it bee in the full of the Moon, or else in the decrease; that is to say, because the bloud that is gathered in the full of the Moon falls from the body even of its own weight, for that by reason of the decreasing or wane of the Moone this time of the month is more cold and moyst.

Notes

• * 1.1

  The reason of the names of the monthly flux of women.
• * 1.2

  What women do conceive this flux not appea∣ring at all.
• * 1.3

  What women have this men∣struall flux of∣ten, abundantly & for a longer space than o∣thers.
• * 1.4

  What women have t•••• fluxe more seldome, lesse, and a far more shorrtime than others.
• * 1.5

  Why young wo∣men are purged in the new of the Moone.
• * 1.6

  Why old wo∣men are purged in the wane of the Moone.