#hysteria

#hysteria

Hysteria was long attributed to a wandering uterus. The earliest text blaming women's reproduction for illness was the Kahun Gynaecological Papyrus, an Egyptian medical scroll from 1900 BC. Women's wombs were blamed for things like choking, cognitive deficits and the inability to speak, and paralysis. Treatments for women were always nonsurgical: swallowing medicine or rubbing it on the body; fumigating the womb with oils or incense.

Dr. Jean-Martin Charcot developed a theory of hysteria, reinterpreting the condition as a neurological disorder and arguing that it could affect men as well as women.