MISCELLANEOUS SURGICAL ANOMALIES. 6 page

such ideas have prevailed, but from the earliest times they have had

their influence upon educated minds. In the East, particularly in

India, the doctrines of Buddhism, that the soul should be without fear,

that it could not be destroyed, and that the flesh was only its

resting-place, the soul several times being reincarnated, brought about

great indifference to bodily injuries and death. In the history of the

Brahmans there was a sect of philosophers called the Gymnosophists, who

had the extremest indifference to life. To them incarnation was a

positive fact, and death was simply a change of residence. One of these

philosophers, Calanus, was burned in the presence of Alexander; and,

according to Plutarch, three centuries later another Gymnosophist named

Jarmenochegra, was similarly burned before Augustus. Since this time,

according to Brierre de Boismont, the suicides from indifference to

life in this mystic country are counted by the thousands. Penetrating

Japan the same sentiment, according to report, made it common in the

earlier history of that country to see ships on its coasts, filled with

fanatics who, by voluntary dismantling, submerged the vessels little by

little, the whole multitude sinking into the sea while chanting praises

to their idols. The same doctrines produced the same result in China.

According to Brucker it is well known that among the 500 philosophers

of the college of Confucius, there were many who disdained to survive

the loss of their books (burned by order of the savage Emperor

Chi-Koung-ti), and throwing themselves into the sea, they disappeared

under the waves. According to Brierre de Boismont, voluntary mutilation

or death was very rare among the Chaldeans, the Persians, or the

Hebrews, their precepts being different from those mentioned. The

Hebrews in particular had an aversion to self-murder, and during a

period in their history of 4000 years there were only eight or ten

suicides recorded. Josephus shows what a marked influence on suicides

the invasion of the Romans among the Hebrews had.

In Africa, as in India, there were Gymnosophists. In Egypt Sesostris,

the grandest king of the country, having lost his eyesight in his old

age, calmly and deliberately killed himself. About the time of Mark

Anthony and Cleopatra, particularly after the battle of Actium, suicide

was in great favor in Egypt. In fact a great number of persons formed

an academy called The Synapothanoumenes, who had for their object the

idea of dying together. In Western Europe, as shown in the ceremonies

of the Druids, we find among the Celts a propensity for suicide and an

indifference to self-torture. The Gauls were similarly minded,

believing in the dogma of immortality and eternal repose. They thought

little of bodily cares and ills. In Greece and Rome there was always an

apology for suicide and death in the books of the philosophers. "Nil

igitur mors est, ad nos neque pertinet hilum; quando quidem natura

animi mortalis habetur!" cries Lucretius. With the advent of

Christianity, condemning as it did the barbarous customs of

self-mutilation and self-murder, these practices seem to disappear

gradually; but stoicism and indifference to pain were exhibited in

martyrdom. Toward the middle ages, when fanaticism was at its height

and the mental malady of demoniacal possession was prevalent, there was

something of a reversion to the old customs. In the East the Juggernaut

procession was still in vogue, but this was suppressed by civilized

authorities; outside of a few minor customs still prevalent among our

own people we must to-day look to the savage tribes for the

perpetuation of such practices.

In an excellent article on the evolution of ceremonial institutions

Herbert Spencer mentions the Fuegians, Veddahs, Andamanese, Dyaks,

Todas, Gonds, Santals, Bodos, and Dhimals, Mishmis, Kamchadales, and

Snake Indians, as among people who form societies to practice simple

mutilations in slight forms. Mutilations in somewhat graver forms, but

still in moderation, are practiced by the Tasmanians, Tamaese, the

people of New Guinea, Karens, Nagas, Ostiaks, Eskimos, Chinooks,

Comanches, and Chippewas. What might be called mixed or compound

mutilations are practiced by the New Zealanders, East Africans, Kondes,

Kukas, and Calmucks. Among those practising simple but severe

mutilations are the New Caledonians, the Bushmen, and some indigenous

Australians. Those tribes having for their customs the practice of

compound major mutilations are the Fiji Islanders, Sandwich Islanders,

Tahitians, Tongans, Samoans, Javanese, Sumatrans, natives of Malagasy,

Hottentots, Damaras, Bechuanas, Kaffirs, the Congo people, the Coast

Negroes, Inland Negroes, Dahomeans, Ashantees, Fulahs, Abyssinians,

Arabs, and Dakotas. Spencer has evidently made a most extensive and

comprehensive study of this subject, and his paper is a most valuable

contribution to the subject. In the preparation of this section we have

frequently quoted from it.

The practice of self-bleeding has its origin in other mutilations,

although the Aztecs shed human blood in the worship of the sun. The

Samoiedes have a custom of drinking the blood of warm animals. Those of

the Fijians who were cannibals drank the warm blood of their victims.

Among the Amaponda Kaffirs there are horrible accounts of kindred

savage customs. Spencer quotes:--"It is usual for the ruling chief on

his accession to be washed in the blood of a near relative, generally a

brother, who is put to death for the occasion." During a Samoan

marriage-ceremony the friends of the bride "took up stones and beat

themselves until their heads were bruised and bleeding." In Australia a

novitiate at the ceremony of manhood drank a mouthful of blood from the

veins of the warrior who was to be his sponsor.

At the death of their kings the Lacedemonians met in large numbers and

tore the flesh from their foreheads with pins and needles. It is said

that when Odin was near his death he ordered himself to be marked with

a spear; and Niort, one of his successors, followed the example of his

predecessor. Shakespeare speaks of "such as boast and show their

scars." In the olden times it was not uncommon for a noble soldier to

make public exhibition of his scars with the greatest pride; in fact,

on the battlefield they invited the reception of superficial

disfiguring injuries, and to-day some students of the learned

universities of Germany seem prouder of the possession of scars

received in a duel of honor than in awards for scholastic attainments.

Lichtenstein tells of priests among the Bechuanas who made long cuts

from the thigh to the knee of each warrior who slew an enemy in battle.

Among some tribes of the Kaffirs a kindred custom was practiced; and

among the Damaras, for every wild animal a young man destroyed his

father made four incisions on the front of his son's body. Speaking of

certain Congo people, Tuckey says that they scar themselves principally

with the idea of rendering themselves agreeable to the women of their

tribe. Among the Itzaex Indians of Yucatan, a race with particularly

handsome features, some are marked with scarred lines, inflicted as

signs of courage.

Cosmetic Mutilations.--In modern times there have been individuals

expert in removing facial deformities, and by operations of various

kinds producing pleasing dimples or other artificial signs of beauty.

We have seen an apparatus advertised to be worn on the nose during the

night for the purpose of correcting a disagreeable contour of this

organ. A medical description of the artificial manufacture of dimples

is as follows:--"The modus operandi was to make a puncture in the skin

where the dimple was required, which would not be noticed when healed,

and, with a very delicate instrument, remove a portion of the muscle.

Inflammation was then excited in the skin over the subcutaneous pit,

and in a few days the wound, if such it may be called, was healed, and

a charming dimple was the result." It is quite possible that some of

our modern operators have overstepped the bounds of necessity, and

performed unjustifiable plastic operations to satisfy the vanity of

their patients.

Dobrizhoffer says of the Abipones that boys of seven pierce their

little arms in imitation of their parents. Among some of the indigenous

Australians it is quite customary for ridged and linear scars to be

self-inflicted. In Tanna the people produce elevated scars on the arms

and chests. Bancroft recites that family-marks of this nature existed

among the Cuebas of Central America, refusal being tantamount to

rebellion. Schomburgk tells that among the Arawaks, after a Mariquawi

dance, so great is their zeal for honorable scars, the blood will run

down their swollen calves, and strips of skin and muscle hang from the

mangled limbs. Similar practices rendered it necessary for the United

States Government to stop some of the ceremonial dances of the Indians

under their surveillance.

A peculiar custom among savages is the amputation of a finger as a

sacrifice to a deity. In the tribe of the Dakotas the relatives of a

dead chief pacified his spirit by amputating a finger. In a similar

way, during his initiation, the young Mandan warrior, "holding up the

little finger of his left hand to the Great Spirit," ... "expresses his

willingness to give it as a sacrifice, and he lays it on the dried

buffalo skull, when another chops it off near the hand with a blow of

the hatchet." According to Mariner the natives of Tonga cut off a

portion of the little finger as a sacrifice to the gods for the

recovery of a superior sick relative. The Australians have a custom of

cutting off the last joint of the little finger of females as a token

of submission to powerful beings alive and dead. A Hottentot widow who

marries a second time must have the distal joint of her little finger

cut off; another joint is removed each time she remarries.

Among the mutilations submitted to on the death of a king or chief in

the Sandwich Islands, Cook mentions in his "Voyages" the custom of

knocking out from one to four front teeth.

Among the Australian tribes the age of virility and the transition into

manhood is celebrated by ceremonial customs, in which the novices are

subjected to minor mutilations. A sharp bone is used for lancing their

gums, while the throw-stick is used for knocking out a tooth.

Sometimes, in addition to this crude dentistry, the youth is required

to submit to cruel gashes cut upon his back and shoulders, and should

he flinch or utter any cry of pain he is always thereafter classed with

women. Haygarth writes of a semi-domesticated Australian who said one

day, with a look of importance, that he must go away for a few days, as

he had grown to man's estate, and it was high time he had his teeth

knocked out. It is an obligatory rite among various African tribes to

lose two or more of their front teeth. A tradition among certain

Peruvians was that the Conqueror Huayna Coapae made a law that they and

their descendants should have three front teeth pulled out in each jaw.

Cieza speaks of another tradition requiring the extraction of the teeth

of children by their fathers as a very acceptable service to their

gods. The Damaras knock out a wedge-shaped gap between two of their

front teeth; and the natives of Sierra Leone file or chip their teeth

after the same fashion.

Depilatory customs are very ancient, and although minor in extent are

still to be considered under the heading of mutilations. The giving of

hair to the dead as a custom, has been perpetuated through many tribes

and nations. In Euripides we find Electra admonishing Helen for sparing

her locks, and thereby defrauding the dead. Alexander the Great shaved

his locks in mourning for his friend, Hephaestion, and it was supposed

that his death was hastened by the sun's heat on his bare head after

his hat blew off at Babylon. Both the Dakota Indians and the Caribs

maintain the custom of sacrificing hair to the dead. In Peru the custom

was varied by pulling out eyelashes and eyebrows and presenting them to

the sun, the hills, etc. It is said this custom is still in

continuance. When Clovis was visited by the Bishop of Toulouse he gave

him a hair from his beard and was imitated by his followers. In the

Arthurian legends we find "Then went Arthur to Caerleon; and thither

came messages from King Ryons who said, 'even kings have done me

homage, and with their beards I have trimmed a mantle. Send me now thy

beard, for there lacks yet one to the finishing of the mantle.'" The

association between short hair and slavery arose from the custom of

taking hair from the slain. It existed among the Greeks and Romans, and

was well known among the indigenous tribes of this continent. Among the

Shoshones he who took the most scalps gained the most glory.

In speaking of the prisoners of the Chicimecs Bancroft says they were

often scalped while yet alive, and the bloody trophies placed on the

heads of their tormentors. In this manner we readily see that long hair

among the indigenous tribes and various Orientals, Ottomans, Greeks,

Franks, Goths, etc., was considered a sign of respect and honor. The

respect and preservation of the Chinese queue is well known in the

present day. Wishing to divide their brother's kingdom, Clothair and

Childebert consulted whether to cut off the hair of their nephews, the

rightful successors, so as to reduce them to the rank of subjects, or

to kill them. The gods of various people, especially the greater gods,

were distinguished by their long beards and flowing locks. In all

pictures Thor and Samson were both given long hair, and the belief in

strength and honor from long hair is proverbial. Hercules is always

pictured with curls. According to Goldzhier, long locks of hair and a

long beard are mythologic attributes of the sun. The sun's rays are

compared to long locks or hairs on the face of the sun. When the sun

sets and leaves his place to the darkness, or when the powerful summer

sun is succeeded by the weak rays of the winter sun, then Samson's long

locks, through which alone his strength remains, are cut off by the

treachery of his deceitful concubine Delilah (the languishing,

according to the meaning of the name). The beaming Apollo was,

moreover, called the "Unshaven;" and Minos cannot conquer the solar

hero, Nisos, until the latter loses his golden hair. In Arabic

"Shams-on" means the sun, and Samson had seven locks of hair, the

number of the planetary bodies. In view of the foregoing facts it seems

quite possible that the majority of depilatory processes on the scalp

originated in sun-worship, and through various phases and changes in

religions were perpetuated to the Middle Ages. Charles Martel sent

Pepin, his son, to Luithprand, king of the Lombards, that he might cut

his first locks, and by this ceremony hold for the future the place of

his illustrious father. To make peace with Alaric, Clovis became his

adopted son by offering his beard to be cut. Among the Caribs the hair

constituted their chief pride, and it was considered unequivocal proof

of the sincerity of their sorrow, when on the death of a relative they

cut their hair short. Among the Hebrews shaving of the head was a

funeral rite, and among the Greeks and Romans the hair was cut short in

mourning, either for a relative or for a celebrated personage.

According to Krehl the Arabs also had such customs. Spencer mentions

that during an eruption in Hawaii, "King Kamahameha cut off part of his

own hair" ... "and threw it into the torrent (of lava)."

The Tonga regarded the pubic hairs as under the special care of the

devil, and with great ceremony made haste to remove them. The female

inhabitants of some portions of the coast of Guinea remove the pubic

hairs as fast as they appear. A curious custom of Mohammedan ladies

after marriage is to rid themselves of the hirsute appendages of the

pubes. Depilatory ointments are employed, consisting of equal parts of

slaked lime and arsenic made into a paste with rose-water. It is said

that this important ceremony is not essential in virgins. One of the

ceremonies of assuming the toga virilis among the indigenous

Australians consists in submitting to having each particular hair

plucked singly from the body, the candidate being required not to

display evidences of pain during the operation. Formerly the Japanese

women at marriage blackened their teeth and shaved or pulled out their

eyebrows.

The custom of boring the ear is very old, mention of it being made in

Exodus xxi., 5 and 6, in which we find that if a Hebrew servant served

for six years, his freedom was optional, but if he plainly said that he

loved his master, and his wife and children, and did not desire to

leave their house, the master should bring him before the judges; and

according to the passage in Exodus, "he shall also bring him to the

door or unto the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through

with an awl; and he shall serve him forever." All the Burmese, says

Sangermano, without exception, have the custom of boring their ears.

The days when the operations were performed were kept as festivals. The

ludicrous custom of piercing the ears for the wearing of ornaments,

typical of savagery and found in all indigenous African tribes, is

universally prevalent among our own people.

The extremists in this custom are the Botocudos, who represent the most

cruel and ferocious of the Brazilian tribes, and who especially cherish

a love for cannibalism. They have a fondness for disfiguring themselves

by inserting in the lower parts of their ears and in their under lips

variously shaped pieces of wood ornaments called peleles, causing

enormous protrusion of the under lip and a repulsive wide mouth, as

shown in Figure 230.

Tattooing is a peculiar custom originating in various ways. The

materials used are vermilion, indigo, carbon, or gunpowder. At one time

this custom was used in the East to indicate caste and citizenship.

Both sexes of the Sandwich Islanders have a peculiar tattooed mark

indicative of their tribe or district. Among the Uapes, one tribe, the

Tucanoes, have three vertical blue lines. Among other people tattooed

marks indicated servility, and Boyle says the Kyans, Pakatans, and

Kermowits alone, among the Borneo people, practised tattooing, and adds

that these races are the least esteemed for bravery. Of the Fijians the

women alone are tattooed, possibly as a method of adornment.

The tattooing of the people of Otaheite, seen by Cook, was surmised by

him to have a religious significance, as it presented in many instances

"squares, circles, crescents, and ill-designed representations of men

and dogs." Every one of these people was tattooed upon reaching

majority. According to Carl Bock, among the Dyaks of Borneo all of the

married women were tattooed on the hands and feet, and sometimes on the

thighs. The decoration is one of the privileges of matrimony, and is

not permitted to unmarried girls. Andrew Lang says of the Australian

tribes that the Wingong or the Totem of each man is indicated by a

tattooed representation of it on his flesh. The celebrated American

traveler, Carpenter, remarks that on his visit to a great prison in

Burmah, which contains more than 3000 men, he saw 6000 tattooed legs.

The origin of the custom he was unable to find out, but in Burmah

tattooing was a sign of manhood, and professional tattooers go about

with books of designs, each design warding off some danger. Bourke

quotes that among the Apaches-Yumas of Arizona the married women are

distinguished by several blue lines running from the lower lip to the

chin; and he remarks that when a young woman of this tribe is anxious

to become a mother she tattoos the figure of a child on her forehead.

After they marry Mojave girls tattoo the chin with vertical blue lines;

and when an Eskimo wife has her face tattooed with lamp-black she is

regarded as a matron in society. The Polynesians have carried this

dermal art to an extent which is unequaled by any other people, and it

is universally practiced among them. Quoted by Burke, Sullivan states

that the custom of tattooing continued in England and Ireland down to

the seventh century. This was the tattooing with the woad. Fletcher

remarks that at one time, about the famous shrine of Our Lady of

Loretto, were seen professional tattooers, who for a small sum of money

would produce a design commemorative of the pilgrim's visit to the

shrine. A like profitable industry is pursued in Jerusalem.

Universal tattooing in some of the Eastern countries is used as a means

of criminal punishment, the survival of the persecuted individual being

immaterial to the torturers, as he would be branded for life and

ostracized if he recovered. Illustrative of this O'Connell tells of a

case in Hebra's clinic. The patient, a man five feet nine inches in

height, was completely tattooed from head to foot with all sorts of

devices, such as elephants, birds, lions, etc., and across his

forehead, dragons. Not a square of even a quarter inch had been exempt

from the process. According to his tale this man had been a leader of a

band of Greek robbers, organized to invade Chinese Tartary, and,

together with an American and a Spaniard, was ordered by the ruler of

the invaded province to be branded in this manner as a criminal. It

took three months' continuous work to carry out this sentence, during

which his comrades succumbed to the terrible agonies. During the

entire day for this extended period indigo was pricked in this

unfortunate man's skin. Accounts such as this have been appropriated by

exhibitionists, who have caused themselves to be tattooed merely for

mercenary purposes. The accompanying illustration represents the

appearance of a "tattooed man" who exhibited himself. He claimed that

his tattooing was done by electricity. The design showing on his back

is a copy of a picture of the Virgin Mary surrounded by 31 angels.

The custom of tattooing the arms, chest, or back is quite prevalent,

and particularly among sailors and soldiers. The sequences of this

custom are sometimes quite serious. Syphilis has been frequently

contracted in this manner, and Maury and Dulles have collected 15 cases

of syphilis acquired in tattooing. Cheinisse reports the case of a

young blacksmith who had the emblems of his trade tattooed upon his

right forearm. At the end of forty days small, red, scaly elevations

appeared at five different points in the tattooed area. These broke

down and formed ulcers. When examined these ulcers presented the

peculiarities of chancres, and there was upon the body of the patient a

well-marked syphilitic roseola. It was ascertained that during the

tattooing the operator had moistened the ink with his own saliva.

Hutchinson exhibited drawings and photographs showing the condition of

the arms of two boys suffering from tuberculosis of the skin, who had

been inoculated in the process of tattooing. The tattooing was done by

the brother of one of the lads who was in the last stages of phthisis,

and who used his own saliva to mix the pigment. The cases were under

the care of Murray of Tottenham, by whom they had been previously

reported. Williams has reported the case of a militiamen of seventeen

who, three days after an extensive tattooing of the left forearm,

complained of pain, swelling, and tenderness of the left wrist. A day

later acute left-sided pneumonia developed, but rapidly subsided. The

left shoulder, knee, and ankle were successively involved in the

inflammation, and a cardiac bruit developed. Finally chorea developed

as a complication, limited for a time to the left side, but shortly

spreading to the right, where rheumatic inflammation was attacking the

joints. The last, however, quickly subsided, leaving a general, though

mild chorea and a permanently damaged heart.

Infibulation of the male and female external genital organs for the

prevention of sexual congress is a very ancient custom. The Romans

infibulated their singers to prevent coitus, and consequent change in

the voice, and pursued the same practice with their actors and dancers.

According to Celsus, Mercurialis, and others, the gladiators were

infibulated to guard against the loss of vigor by sexual excesses. In

an old Italian work there is a figure of an infibulated musician--a

little bronze statue representing a lean individual tortured or

deformed by carrying an enormous ring through the end of the penis. In

one of his pleasantries Martial says of these infibulated singers that

they sometimes break their rings and fail to place them back--"et cujus

refibulavit turgidum faber peruem." Heinsius considers Agamemnon

cautious when he left Demodocus near Clytemnestra, as he remarks that

Demodocus was infibulated. For such purposes as the foregoing

infibulation offered a more humane method than castration.

Infibulation by a ring in the prepuce was used to prevent premature

copulation, and was in time to be removed, but in some cases its

function was the preservation of perpetual chastity. Among some of the

religious mendicants in India there were some who were condemned to a

life of chastity, and, in the hotter climates, where nudity was the

custom, these persons traveled about exposing an enormous preputial

ring, which was looked upon with adoration by devout women. It is said

these holy persons were in some places so venerated that people came on

their knees, and bowing below the ring, asked forgiveness--possibly for

sexual excesses.

Rhodius mentions the usage of infibulation in antiquity, and Fabricius

d'Aquapendente remarks that infibulation was usually practiced in

females for the preservation of chastity. No Roman maiden was able to

preserve her virginity during participation in the celebrations in the

Temples of Venus, the debauches of Venus and Mars, etc., wherein vice

was authorized by divine injunction; for this reason the lips of the

vagina were closed by rings of iron, copper, or silver, so joined as to

hinder coitus, but not prevent evacuation. Different sized rings were

used for those of different ages. Although this device provided against

the coitus, the maiden was not free from the assaults of the Lesbians.

During the Middle Ages, in place of infibulation, chastity-girdles were

used, and in the Italian girdles, such as the one exhibited in the

Date: 2014-12-29; view: 723