Norbert Hanold’s condition is called a “delusion” often enough by the author of the story, and we also have no reason to reject this designation. We can mention two chief characteristics of “delusion,” by which it is not, of course, exhaustively described, but is admittedly differentiated from other disturbances. It belongs first to that group of illnesses which do not directly affect the physical, but express themselves only by psychic signs, and it is distinguished secondly by the fact that “fancies” have assumed control, that is, are believed and have acquired influence on actions. If we recall the journey to Pompeii to seek in the ashes the peculiarly-formed foot-prints of Gradiva, we have in it a splendid example of an act under the sway of the delusion. The psychiatrist would perhaps assign Norbert Hanold’s delusion to the great group of paranoia and designate it as a “fetichistic erotomania,” because falling in love with the bas-relief would be the most striking thing to him and because, to his conception, which coarsens everything, the interest of the young archæologist in the feet and foot-position of women must seem suspiciously like fetichism. All such names and divisions of the different kinds of delusion are, however, substantially useless and awkward.[2] The old-school psychiatrist would, moreover, stamp our hero as a dégénéré, because he is a person capable, on account of such strange predilections, of developing a delusion, and would investigate the heredity which has unrelentingly driven him to such a fate. In this, however, Jensen does not follow him; with good reason, he brings us nearer to the hero to facilitate for us æsthetic sympathy with him; with the diagnosis “dégénéré,” whether or not it may be justifiable to us scientifically, the young archæologist is at once moved farther from us, for we, readers, are, of course, normal people and the measure of humanity. The essential facts of heredity and constitution in connection with this condition also concern the author of _Gradiva_ little; instead, he is engrossed in the personal, psychic state which can give rise to such a delusion.