History of Monsters. 213

falling out of her white hair, she grew black hair, the wrinkles on her face vanished, and her breasts swelled again to such an extent that this respectable woman was embarrassed by the change. Cardanus mentions certain men who, without moving their heads, could pull their hair forward toward their forehead and then move it back again; yet it is well known that hair possesses no such power of its own, unless it is attributed to the strength and flexibility of the skin.

Furthermore, there have been women with remarkable beards. According to Wolf, a woman notable for her long black beard lived in the harem of Albert, Duke of Bavaria. In the museum of the Illustrious Senate of Bologna, one can see the portrait of a German woman who, while passing through Bologna, displayed a beard two spans in length.

If we turn our attention to the eyes, we will find even more things worthy of wonder. Pliny, recording people endowed with extraordinary eyesight, highlights a certain Lynceus. During the Punic War, from Lilybaeum—a promontory in Sicily—he could see a fleet leaving the harbor of Carthage. In fact, across a distance of 125,000 paces, he could count every single ship. Pliny also admires the keen vision of Callicrates, who crafted ivory ants so tiny that their individual parts were invisible to others.

Likewise, Pliny records that certain people lived in Illyria who, when moved to anger, could bewitch someone simply by gazing at them for a long time. The same is said of women in Scythia known as the Bythiae, who are born with double pupils in their eyes. Indeed, Solinus reports that all those with double pupils are said to possess a kind of poison. Cornelius Gemma writes that he knew a man who could read letters at night without any external light. Moreover, Suetonius, in his *Life of Tiberius Caesar*, testifies that the emperor could see everything clearly in the dark without a lamp.

Since we are discussing vision, we should not overlook the remarkable sensitivities of certain individuals. Scaliger recalls someone he knew who was seized with such horror at the mere sight of watercress (or water-parsnip) that he was immediately forced to flee. Marcellus Donatus knew a nobleman in Mantua, Hippolytus Lanzonus, who so dreaded the sight of a land hedgehog that he would faint as soon as he saw one. Those who are terrified of cats and mice are discussed in their proper place later. Abenzoar also left a written record of himself, stating that he would faint at the sight of even a simple wound—a trait that has been observed in many others as well.

Regarding blindness, we read that Diodorus the Stoic taught geometry even after losing his sight, instructing his students exactly where a line should begin and where it should be drawn. Didymus of Alexandria, the Bishop of Caesarea, who was blind from early childhood, mastered dialectic and geometry and, according to Volaterranus, left behind commentaries on the Psalms. In our own time—specifically four years ago—Giovanni Gambasio of Volterra, a distinguished sculptor, traveled from Florence to Rome. He had lost his sight in both eyes around his twentieth year and did not work in his art for a decade. Eventually, however, he was struck by an ingenious thought to test his sculpting skills once more. After carefully feeling a marble statue of Cosimo I, the first Grand Duke of Tuscany, he fashioned a replica in clay so similar that it left everyone stunned by the novelty. By order of Ferdinand, Grand Duke of Tuscany, he went to Rome and presented a clay bust of Pope Urban VIII, which was an extraordinary likeness. He has since sculpted many other portraits.

Today in Bologna, there is a blind butcher who, by touch alone, can estimate the weight of cattle to be slaughtered, count the coins of a balance scale, recognize currency, ride a horse, and successfully perform many other duties required of a butcher. Finally, Dodonaeus mentions a ninety-year-old man with failing eyesight who received a wound above his forehead; far from dying, once the wound healed, he miraculously recovered his vision. It is also recorded that the Emperor Vespasian restored a blind man's sight by sprinkling saliva on the membranes of his eyes. The blind man had been warned in a dream by the god Serapis to beg this favor from the victorious prince. But while that story may be uncertain, it is surely certain and known to everyone that the Kings of France and England can heal those suffering from scrofula simply by marking the tumors with saliva and the sign of the cross; Polydore Vergil notes that King Edward of England was particularly eminent in this regard.

What has been explained regarding sharp vision should also be understood regarding the subtlety of hearing. According to Pliny, the battle in which Sybaris was destroyed was heard on that very same day