{"title":"Blood, Milk, and Breastbleeding","authors":"Montserrat Cabré, F. Salmón","doi":"10.2307/j.ctvzgb78b.8","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"In humoral physiology the pregnant body was considered capable of\n transforming menstrual blood into nourishment for the foetus. After\n childbirth, blood became breast milk. However, this harmonic continuum\n was threatened when the maternal body was unable to transform blood\n into milk: in the Hippocratic aphorism 5.40, when blood cannot be transformed\n in the breasts of women, it indicates madness. We analyse medieval\n interpretations of this condition through the commentaries of university\n masters who examined this textual and clinical reality. We discuss how\n humoral physiology – an extremely flexible system of thought – could\n only conceive of maternal bleeding breasts with recourse to madness.\n Disharmony in the maternal body not only disrupted the physiological\n routine but also the symbolic function of mothering.","PeriodicalId":237056,"journal":{"name":"Gender, Health, and Healing, 1250-1550","volume":"51 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2020-03-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Gender, Health, and Healing, 1250-1550","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvzgb78b.8","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
In humoral physiology the pregnant body was considered capable of
transforming menstrual blood into nourishment for the foetus. After
childbirth, blood became breast milk. However, this harmonic continuum
was threatened when the maternal body was unable to transform blood
into milk: in the Hippocratic aphorism 5.40, when blood cannot be transformed
in the breasts of women, it indicates madness. We analyse medieval
interpretations of this condition through the commentaries of university
masters who examined this textual and clinical reality. We discuss how
humoral physiology – an extremely flexible system of thought – could
only conceive of maternal bleeding breasts with recourse to madness.
Disharmony in the maternal body not only disrupted the physiological
routine but also the symbolic function of mothering.