Patrizia Ritarossi
Department of Experimental Medicine, History of Medicine Section, "La Sapienza" University, Rome
Keywords:
Uterus , Women's illness
Abstract
The occidental culture has always underlined a particular interpretation of the sexual differnece; according to thism the woman belongs to materiality and, in the same time, to the magic world. This conception of the woman like a powerful creature and the conseguent fear of the uterus, the organ holder of the feminility, was very spread in the educated and popular traditions adn goes on until today within the folklore. The Madre is called the uterus, that popular idea considers a self moving being ( the ancient medicine based the concept of hysteria on this, too) a formless animal with many limbs; so, in this way, moving sending out branches, it can cause illness in the female organism, that is the result of this free movement in the vital spaces.
