A History of Monsters. 445

weakens, it is unable to perform its own duty; for this reason, monstrous parts are produced.

Furthermore, if the nourishing faculty can be a cause of monstrosity, the nutritional material itself should not be excluded from these same faults. Indeed, a poor disposition of this nutritional material—even without a defect in the nourishing faculty—can imprint a monstrous form upon any part, whether inside or outside the womb. This is because every form, as was noted just a moment ago, is received according to the capacity of the recipient. Therefore, when a portion of nourishment attached to a limb lacks the proper disposition to receive that part’s shape, a monstrous part is produced, whether during or after gestation.

To this we must add the power of the imagination. It often happens that the fruits for which a pregnant woman has a vehement craving are later seen imprinted upon the fetus. By the same logic, if a woman carrying a child is seized by a powerful desire to eat calf’s feet or a lamb’s head, the signs of this appetite are impressed upon the fetus. Thus, infants are sometimes born with a calf’s foot or, occasionally, with the head of a lamb.

We learned from a trustworthy midwife that this very thing happened in Bologna three years ago. The wife of a certain apothecary, while pregnant, frequently observed through her window and longed for some skinned lambs hanging in a neighbor's house. Eventually, she gave birth to a boy with a lamb's head, much to the grief of her relatives, though the child did not live long. The same must be said when pregnant women observe various species of wild beasts. However, this monstrous fantasy is to be attributed more to the mother than the father, since women can retain a hidden image in their minds not only during intercourse but also after—indeed, throughout the entire period of gestation—because women tend to cling more tenaciously to powerful imaginations. Fortunio Liceto reports that in recent years, a Sicilian noblewoman saw a lobster recently caught from the sea in a fisherman's hand; when the time came for her delivery, she gave birth to a lobster exactly like the marine creature along with the fetus.

Nor should parents be excluded from the causes of this type of monstrosity. If both are composed of various members alien to human nature, monstrous offspring can also result from their union, since nature always strives to procreate something similar in essence to itself. Indeed, this is cited as the primary reason why so many monsters of this kind are born in the regions of Africa.

Furthermore, unnatural lust must not be removed from these causes of monsters. Since historians and the teachings of Aristotle reveal that women have sometimes succumbed to beasts, and men have mingled with them, we should not be struck with wonder if infants marked with the heads of beasts sometimes emerge from women, or if offspring filled with human heads or other human limbs are sometimes born from beasts. Aristotle clearly declared this in his books *On the Generation of Animals*, writing that monsters can repeatedly arise from this abominable union when the nature, size, and gestation period of the mating animals do not differ greatly from one another. If it happens otherwise, it must be asserted that monstrous offspring are rarely, if ever, born. Accordingly, Pliny, Aelian, Maiolus, Lemnius, and Cornelius Gemma have recorded in their writings that offspring have occasionally flowed from the union of humans with wild beasts.

Nor should anyone convince himself that a third species can always be produced from animals of different kinds; rather, the matter must be judged by the dominance of the seed. If the seed of one parent prevails, it will produce an offspring similar in essence to its own species, but with the accidental characteristics of the other. However, if the seeds are joined in a balanced proportion, a monster-bearing third species will result—provided that the natures of the parents (for example, a human and an ox) do not differ too greatly. If the difference in nature is not significant—such as that between a horse and a donkey, or a dog and a wolf—then the offspring produced by these parents will not be particularly monstrous. Aristotle also accepted such offspring when the gestation periods were compatible.

With these things understood and explained, we can also turn our attention to Aristotle regarding the origin of offspring from the intermixing of humans with beasts, which sometimes reflects only the nature of the mother, sometimes the father, and occasionally both. We may reason thus: when a perfect fetus is generated from an abominable union between a human and a beast, this