Anomalies and Curiosities of MedicineGould, George M. (George Milbrey)
Science
Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine
Gould, George M. (George Milbrey)
Abnormalities, Human; Medicine -- Anecdotes
Multiple Births over Six.--When we pass sextuplets the records of
multiple births are of the greatest rarity and in modern records there
are almost none. There are several cases mentioned by the older writers
whose statements are generally worthy of credence, which, however
incredible, are of sufficient interest at least to find a place in this
chapter. Albucasis affirms that he knew of the birth of seven children
at one time; and d'Alechampius reports that Bonaventura, the slave of
one Savelli, a gentleman of Siena, gave birth to 7 children, 4 of whom
were baptized. At the Parish of San Ildefonso, Valladolid, Julianna,
wife of Benito Quesada, gave birth to 3 children in one day, and during
the following night to 4 more. Sigebert, in his Chronicles, says that
the mother of the King of Lombardy had borne 7 children at a birth.
Borellus says that in 1650 the lady of the then present Lord Darre gave
birth to eight perfect children at one parturition and that it was the
unusual event of the country.
Mrs. Timothy Bradlee of Trumbull County, Ohio, in 1872 is reported to
have given birth to 8 children at one time. They were healthy and
living, but quite small. The mother was married six years previously
and then weighed 273 pounds. She had given birth to 2 pairs of twins,
and, with these 3 boys and 5 girls, she had borne 12 children in six
years. She herself was a triplet and her father and her mother were of
twin births and one of her grandmothers was the mother of 5 pairs of
twins. This case was most celebrated and was much quoted, several
British journals extracting it.
Watering of Maregnac speaks of the simultaneous birth of 8 children at
one time. When several months pregnant the woman was seized with
colicky pains and thought them a call of nature. She went into a
vineyard to answer it, and there, to her great astonishment, gave birth
to 8 fetuses. Watering found them enclosed in a sac, and thought they
probably had died from mutual pressure during growth. The mother made a
good recovery.
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