Aristotle's History of Animals: In Ten BooksAristotle
PhilosophyPhilosophy
Aristotle's History of Animals: In Ten Books
Aristotle
Zoology -- Pre-Linnaean works
1. We have treated of the other internal parts of animals, their
number, their nature and varieties. It now remains for us to speak of
the organs of generation. In females these are always internal; but
there is much difference in males, for some sanguineous animals have
no testicles at all, in others they are internal; and in some animals
with internal testicles, they are placed near the kidneys, in others
near the abdomen; in other animals they are external. The penis of
these last is sometimes united to the abdomen, in others it is loose
as well as the testicles; but in promingent and retromingent animals
it is suspended from the abdomen in a different manner. Neither fish
nor any other animal with gills, nor the whole class of serpents,
have testicles; neither has any apodal animal which is not internally
viviparous.
2. Birds have testicles, but they are internal and near the loins, and
so have oviparous quadrupeds, as the lizard, tortoise, and crocodile,
and among viviparous animals, the hedgehog. In some viviparous animals
they are situated internally upon the abdomen, as the dolphin among
apodal creatures, and the elephant among quadrupeds. In other animals
the testicles are external. It has been previously observed, that the
manner and position of their junction with the abdomen is various, for
in some they are joined on and do not hang down, as in swine, in others
they hang down as in man.
3. It has also been observed that neither fishes nor serpents have
testicles, but they have two passages hanging down on each side of the
spine from the diaphragm, and these unite in one passage above the
anus, by above, we mean nearer the spinal column. At the season of
coition these passages are full of semen, which exudes on pressure;
the differences among these may be seen by dissection, and in another
place they will each be considered more particularly.
4. All oviparous animals, whether bipeds or quadrupeds, have their
testicles placed in the loins below the diaphragm, some of a white
colour, others ochreous, but in all surrounded with small veins; from
each of these a passage is produced, which afterwards become united in
one, and, as in fish, open near the anus. This is the penis, which is
inconspicuous in small animals; but in the larger, as the goose and
such like, it becomes more conspicuous immediately after coition.
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