The workes of that famous chirurgion Ambrose Parey translated out of Latin and compared with the French. by Tho: Johnson. Whereunto are added three tractates our of Adrianus Spigelius of the veines, arteries, & nerves, with large figures. Also a table of the bookes and chapters.

CHAP. IV. Of Hermophrodites, or Scrats.

ANd here also we must speak of Hermophrodites, because they draw the cause of their ge∣neration and conformation from the abundance of seed, and are called so, because they are of both sexes, the woman yeelding as much seed as the man. For hereupon it com∣meth to pass that the forming facultie (which alwaies endeavors to produce something like it self) doth labor both the matters almost with equal force, and is the cause that one bodie is of both sexes.

Yet some make four differences of Hermophrodites; the first of which is the male Hermo∣phrodite, who is a perfect and absolute male, and hath only a slit in the Perinaeum not perforated, and from which neither urine nor seed doth flow. The second is the female, which besides her natural privitie, hath a fleshie and skinnie similitude of a mans yard, but unapt for erection and e∣jaculation of seed, and wanteth the cod and stones; the third difference is of those, which albeit they bear the express figures of members belonging to both sexes, commonly set the one against the other, yet are found unapt for generation, the one of them only serving for making of water: the fourth difference is of those who are able in both sexes, & throughly perform the part of both man and woman, because they have the genitals of both sexes complete and perfect, and also the right brest like a man, and the left like a woman: the laws command those to chuse the sex which they

will use, and in which they will remain and live, judgeing them to death if they be found to have departed from the sex they made choice of; for some are thought to have abu∣sed both, and promiscuously to have had their pleasure with men and women. There are signs by which the Physicians may discern whether the Hermophrodites are able in the male or female sex, or whether they are impotent in both: these signs are most apparent in the privities and face; for if the matrix be exact in all its demensions, and so perforated that it may admit a mans yard, if the courses flow that way, if the hair of the head be long, slender and soft, and to conclude, if to this tender habit of the body a timid and weak condition of the minde be added, the fe∣male sex is predominant, and they are plainly to be judged women. But if they have the Perinae∣um and fundament full of hairs, (the which in women are commonly without any) if they have a a yard of a convenient largeness, if it stand well and readily, and yeeld seed, the male sex hath the preheminence, and they are to be judged men. But if the conformation of both the genitals be alike in figure, quantity, and efficacy, it is thought to be equally able in both sexes: although by the opinion of Aristotle, those who have double genitals, the one of the male, the other of the female, the one of them is alwaies perfect, the other imperfect.

[illustration]

The figure of Hermophrodite twins cleaving together with their backs.

Anno Dom. 1486. in the Palatinate, at the village Robach, near Heidelberg, there were twins, both Hermophrodites, born with their backs sticking together.

[illustration]

The effigies of an Hermophrodite having four hands and feet.

The same day the Venetians and Geneses en∣tred into league, there was a monster born in Italy having four arms and feet, and but one head; it lived a little after it was baptized. James Ruef a Helvetian Cirurgian saith he saw the like, but which besides had the privities of both sexes, whose figure I have therefore set forth, Pag. 647.

Notes

• Lib. 4. de gener. anim. cap. 5.