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WOman is a creature bringing usually but one at a birth: but the 〈…〉〈…〉 been some who have brought forth two, some three, some fou•…•… sixe, or more at one birth. Empedocles thought that the abund•…•…e of seed was the cause of such numerous births: the Stoikes affirm•…•…e di∣vers cells or partitions of the wombe to be the cause: for the se•…•… being
variously parted into these partitions, and the conception divided, there are more children brought forth; no otherwise than in rivers, the water beating against the rockes, is turned into divers circles or rounds. But Aristotle saith there is no reason to think so, for in women that parting of the womb into cells, as in dogs and sowes, * 1.1 taketh no place; for womens wombes have but one cavity, parted into two recesses, the right & left, nothing comming between, except by chance distinguished by a cer∣tain line; for often twins lye in the same side of the womb. Aristotles opinion is, that a woman cannot bring forth more than five children at one birth. The maide of Au∣gustus Caesar brought forth five at a birth, & a short while after, she & her children di∣ed. In the yeer 1554. at Bearn in Switzerland, the wife of Dr. John Gelinger brought forth five children at one birth, three boies and two girles. Albucrasis, affirmes a wo∣man to have bin the mother of seven children at one birth; & another, who by some externall injury did abort, brought forth fifteene perfectly shaped in all their parts. Pliny reports that it was extant in the writings of Physitians, that twelve children were borne at one birth; and that there was another in Peloponnesus which foure se∣verall * 1.2 times was delivered of five children at one birth, and that the greater part of those children lived. It is reported by Dalechampius that Bonaventura the slave of one Savill, a Gentleman of Sena, at one time brought forth seven children, of which four were baptized. In our time, between Sarte and Maine, in the parish of Seaux, not far from Chambellay, there is a family and noble house called Maldemeure; the wife of the Lord of Maldemeure, the first yeere she was married brought forth twinnes, the second yeere she had three children, the third yeere foure, the fourth yeere five, the fift yeere sixe, and of that birth she died: of those sixe one is yet alive, and is Lord of Maldemeure. In the valley of Beaufort, in the county of Anjou, a young woman the daughter of Mace Channiere, when at one perfect birth shee had brought forth one child, the tenth day following she fell in labour of another, but could not be de∣livered untill it was pulled from her by force, and was the death of the mother. Mar∣tin Cromerus the author of the Polish history, writeth that one Margaret, a woman * 1.3 sprung from a noble and antient family neere Cracovia, and wife to Count Virbosla∣us, brought forth at one birth thirty five live children, upon the twentieth day of Ja∣nuary, in the yeere 1296. Franciscus Picus Mirandula writeth that one Dorothy an Italian had twenty children at two births, at the first nine, and at the second eleven, and that she was so bigge, that she was forced to beare up her belly, which lay upon her knees, with a broad and large scarfe tyed about her necke, as you may see by the following figure.
And they are to bee reprehended here againe, who affirme the cause of numerous births to consist in the variety of the cells of the wombe, for they feigne a womans wombe to have seven cells or partitions, three on the right side for males, three on the left side for females, and one in the midst for Hermaphrodites or Scrats: and this untruth hath gon so far, that there have bnene some that affirmed every of these seven cells to have bin divided into ten partitions, into which the seed disper∣sed, doth bring forth a divers and numerous encrease, according to the variety of the cells furnished with the matter of seed; which though it may seeme to have been the opinion of Hippocrates, in his book De natura Pueri, notwithstanding it is repugnant to reason, and to those things which are manifestly apparent to the eyes and senses.
The opinion of Aristotle is more probable, who saith twinnes and more at one birth, are begot and brought forth by the same cause that the sixt finger groweth on * 1.4 the hand, that is, by the abundant plenty of the seed, which is greater and more co∣pious than can bee all taken up in the naturall framing of one body: for if it all be forced into one, it maketh one with the parts encreased more than is fit, eith•…•… greatnesse or number; but if it bee, as it were, cloven into divers parts, it ca•…•… more than one at one birth.
4. de gen. anim. cap. 4.
Lib. 7. cap. 11. Cap. 3.
The ninth book of the Polish history.
Lib. 4. de gen. anim. cap. 4.