HERMAPHRODITE, is generally understood to
signify a human creature possessed of both sexes, or who has the parts of generation both of male and female. The term however is applied also to other animals, and even to plants.—The word is formed of the Greek Ἑρμαφροδίτης, a compound of Ἑρμης, Mercury, and Ἀφροδίτη, Venus; q. d. a mixture of Mercury and Venus, i. e. of male and female. For it is to be observed, Hermaphroditus was originally a proper name, applied by the heathen mythologists to a fabulous deity, whom some represent as a son of Hermes, Mercury, and Aphrodite, Venus: and who, being desperately in love with the nymph Salmasis, obtained of the gods to have his body and hers united into one. Others say, that the god Hermaphroditus was conceived as a composition of Mercury and Venus; to exhibit the union between eloquence, or rather commerce, whereof Mercury was god, with pleasure, whereof Venus was the proper deity. Lastly, others think this junction intended to show that Venus (pleasure) was of both sexes; as, in effect, the poet Calvus calls Venus a god.
Pollentemque Deum Venerem.
As also Virgil, Æneid, lib. ii.
Discedo, ac ducente Deo flammam inter et hostes
Expeditor.
M. Spon observes, Hesychius calls Venus Aphroditos; and Theophrastus affirms, that Aphroditos, or Venus, is Hermaphroditus; and that in the island of Cyprus she has a statue, which represents her with a beard like a man.—The Greeks also call hermaphrodites, ἀνδρῶν, androgyni, q. d. men-women. See the article ANDROGYNES.
In a treatise by Mr Hunter, in the 69th volume of the Philosophical Transactions, hermaphrodites are divided into natural and unnatural or monstrous. The first belongs to the more simple orders of animals, of which there are a much greater number than of the more perfect. The unnatural takes place in every tribe of animals having distinct sexes, but is more common in some than in others. The human species, our author imagines, has the fewest; never having seen them in that species, nor in dogs; but in the horse, sheep, and black cattle, they are very frequent.
From Mr Hunter's account, however, it does not appear that such a creature as a perfect hermaphrodite has ever existed. All the hermaphrodites which he had the opportunity of seeing had the appearance of females, and were generally sired as such. In the horse they are very frequent; and in the most perfect of this kind he ever saw, the testicles had come down out of the abdomen into the place where the udder should have been, and appeared like an udder, not so pendulous as the scrotum in the male of such animals. There were also two nipples, of which horses have no perfect form; being blended in them with the sheath or prepuce, of which there was none here. The external female parts were exactly similar to those of a perfect female; but instead of a common-sized clitoris, there was one about five or six inches long; which when erect, stood almost directly backwards.
A foal also very similar to the above was killed, and the following appearances were observed on dissection. The testicles were not come down as in the former, possibly
possibly because the creature was too young. It had also two nipples; but there was no penis passing round the pubes to the belly, as in the perfect male aſs. The external female parts were ſimilar to thoſe of the ſhe-aſs. Within the entrance of the vagina was placed the clitoris; but much longer than that of a true female, being about five inches long. The vagina was open a little farther than the opening of the urethra into it, and then became obliterated: from thence, up to the fundus of the uterus, there was no canal. At the fundus of the common uterus it was hollow, or had a cavity in it, and then divided into two, viz. a right and a left, called the horns of the uterus, which were also pervious. Beyond the termination of the two horns were placed the ovaria, as in the true female; but the Fallopian tubes could not be found.—From the broad ligaments, to the edges of which the horns of the uterus and ovaria were attached, there paſſed towards each groin a part ſimilar to the round ligaments in the female, which were continued into the rings of the abdominal muscles; but with this difference, that there were continued with them a proceſs or theca of the peritoneum, ſimilar to the tunica vaginalis communis in the male aſs; and in theſe theca were found the teſticles, but no vasa deferentia could be obſerved paſſing from them.
In moſt ſpecies of animals, the production of hermaphrodites appears to be the effect of chance; but in the black cattle it ſeems to be an eſtabliſhed principle of their propagation. It is a well known fact, and, as far as has yet been diſcovered, appears to be univerſal, that when a cow brings forth two calves, one of them a bull, and the other a cow to appearance, the cow is unfit for propagation, but the bull-calf becomes a very proper bull. They are known not to breed; they do not ſhow the leaſt inclination for the bull, nor does the bull ever take the leaſt notice of them. Among the country people in England, this kind of calf is called a free-martin; and this ſingularity is juſt as well known among the farmers as either cow or bull. When they are preſerved, it is for the purpoſes of an ox or ſpayed heifer; viz. to yoke with the oxen, or fatten for the table. They are much larger than either the bull or the cow, and the horns grow longer and bigger, being very ſimilar to thoſe of an ox. The bellow of a free-martin is alſo ſimilar to that of an ox, and the meat is ſimilar to that of the ox or ſpayed heifer, viz. much finer in the fibre than either the bull or cow; and they are more ſuſceptible of growing fat with good food. By ſome they are ſuppoſed to exceed the ox and heifer in delicacy of taſte, and bear a higher price at market; this, however, does not always hold, and Mr Hunter gives an inſtance of the contrary. The Romans, who called the bull taurus, ſpoke alſo of tauræ in the feminine gender different from cows. Stephens obſerves, that it was thought they meant by this word barren cows, who obtained the name becauſe they did not conceive any more than bulls. He alſo quotes a paſſage from Columella, lib. vi. cap. 22. "And, like the tauræ, which occupy the place of fertile cows, ſhould be rejected or ſent away." He likewiſe quotes Varro, De ruſtica, lib. ii. cap. 5. "The cow which is barren is called tauræ." From which we may reaſonably conjecture, that the Romans had not the idea of the circumſtances of their production.
Of theſe creatures Mr Hunter diſſected three, and the following appearances were obſerved in the moſt perfect of them.—The external parts were rather ſmaller than in the cow. The vagina paſſed on as in the cow to the opening of the urethra, and then it began to conſtract into a ſmall canal, which paſſed on to the division of the uterus into the two horns; each horn paſſing along the edge of the broad ligament laterally towards the ovaria. At the termination of theſe horns were placed both the ovaria and teſticles, both of which were nearly about the ſize of a ſmall nutmeg. No Fallopian tubes could be found. To the teſticles were vasa deferentia, but imperfect. The left one did not come near the teſticle; the right only came cloſe to it, but did not terminate in the body called epididymis. They were both pervious, and opened into the vagina near the opening of the urethra.—On the poſterior ſurface of the bladder, or between the uterus and bladder, were the two bags called the veſiculae ſeminales in the male, but much ſmaller than what they are in the bull: the ducts opened along with the vasa deferentia.
Concerning hermaphrodites of the human ſpecies, much has been written, and many laws enacted about them in different nations; but the exiſtence of them is ſtill diſputed. Dr Parſons has given us a treatiſe on the ſubject, in which he endeavours to explode the notion as a vulgar error. According to him, all the hermaphrodites that have appeared, were only women whoſe clitoris from ſome cauſe or other was overgrown; and, in particular, that this was the caſe with an Angola woman ſhown at London as an hermaphrodite ſome time ago.
Among the reptile tribe, indeed, ſuch as worms, ſnails, leeches, &c. hermaphrodites are very frequent. In the memoirs of the French academy, we have an account of this very extraordinary kind of hermaphrodites, which not only have both ſexes, but do the office of both at the ſame time. Such are earth-worms, round-tailed worms found in the inſtincts of men and horſes, land-snails, and thoſe of fresh-waters, and all the ſorts of leeches. And, as all theſe are reptiles, and without bones, M. Poupart concludes it probable, that all other inſects which have theſe two characters are alſo hermaphrodites.
The method of coupling praſtiſed in this claſs of hermaphrodites, may be illuſtrated in the inſtance of earth-worms. Theſe little creatures creep, two by two, out of holes proper to receive them, where they diſpoſe their bodies in ſuch a manner, as that the head of the one is turned to the tail of the other. Being thus ſtretched lengthwiſe, a little conical button or papilla is thruſt forth by each, and received into an aperture of the other. Theſe animals, being male in one part of the body, and female in another, and the body flexible withal, M. Homberg does not think it impoſſible but that an earth-worm may couple with itſelf, and be both father and mother of its young; an obſervation which, to ſome, appears highly extravagant.
Among the inſects of the ſoft or boneleſs kind, there are great numbers indeed, which are ſo far from being hermaphrodites, that they are of no ſex at all. Of this kind are all the caterpillars, maggots, and worms, produced of the eggs of flies of all kinds: but the reaſon
Hermaphrodite of this is plain; these are not animals in a perfect state, but disguises under which animals lurk. They have no business with the propagating of their species, but are to be transformed into animals of another kind, by the putting off their several coverings, and then only they are in their perfect state, and therefore then only show the differences of sex, which are always in the distinct animals, each being only male or female. These copulate, and their eggs produce these creatures, which show no sex till they arrive at that perfect state again.