Psychopathia sexualis: With especial reference to contrary sexual instinct: A medico-legal studyKrafft-Ebing, R. von (Richard)
Science
Psychopathia sexualis: With especial reference to contrary sexual instinct: A medico-legal study
Krafft-Ebing, R. von (Richard)
Paraphilias
Case 36. A man always announces to a puella publica his intended
visits. She must stand at the window, awaiting him, with her face done
up, and, on his entrance into the room, complain of severe toothache.
He is sorry for her, asks particularly about the pain, takes the cloth
off and puts it on again; but he never has coitus, and finds his
satisfaction simply in this act.[57]
The following case, which, unfortunately, was not carefully examined
scientifically, is peculiar to itself:—
In an examination before a criminal court in Vienna, the following
facts were brought to light: Count N., accompanied by a young girl,
appeared in the public garden of an hotel, and, by his actions there,
gave public offense. He demanded of his companion that she kneel down
before him and implore him with folded hands. Then she was compelled
to lick his boots. Finally, he demanded of her, publicly, “an
unheard-of thing” (osculum ad nates, or the like), and only desisted
after she had sworn to do it at home.
In this case, the most remarkable thing was the desire of the perverse
individual to humiliate the woman before witnesses (comp. the fancies of
sadists, Case 29); further, that the desire to humiliate the woman came
entirely into the foreground, and acts of a purely symbolic nature were
undertaken. Of course, with these, in this imperfectly-observed case,
acts of cruelty were probable.
(f) _Sadism with Other Objects_—_Whipping of Boys._—Besides the sadistic
acts with females described, others occur with other living, sensitive
objects,—children and animals. There may be a full consciousness that
the impulse is really directed toward women, and that only _faute de
mieux_ the next attainable objects (pupils) are abused. But the
condition of the perpetrator may be such that the impulse to cruel acts
enters consciousness accompanied only by lustful excitement, while its
real object (which alone can explain the lustful coloring of such acts)
remains in the dark.
The first alternative suffices as an explanation of the cases which Dr.
Albert describes (Friedreich’s _Blätter f. ger. Med._, p. 77,
1859),—cases in which lustful teachers whipped their pupils on the naked
nates without cause. We must think of the second alternative, the
sadistic impulse with unconsciousness of its object, when boys are
immediately excited sexually at the sight of punishment of their
companions, and are thus determined in their later vita sexualis, as in
the following cases:—
Case 37. K., aged 37, merchant, applied to me in the fall of 1889 for
advice concerning an anomaly of his vita sexualis, which made him fear
invalidism and impossibility of future happiness in marriage.
Patient came of a nervous family. As a child he was delicate, weak,
and nervous. Healthy except for measles; he later became strong.
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