Authorized Eitition.
INTRODUCTION.
It is generally recognised that the supreme if not the exclusive object of criminal law and penal administration is the protection of society. Unfortunately it cannot be said at the present time that either criminal law or penal administration is fulfilling this object. In a recent comprehensive survey of criminal problems, Professor von Liszt, a distinguished German jurist, felt himself compelled to admit that our existing penal systems are powerless against crime. Similar expressions of opinion are of frequent occurrence among eminent specialists in France, Italy, and elsewhere ; and it is only because the question of crime has recently fallen into the background in Great Britain that the same confession of failure is not heard with equal emphasis among ourselves.
In order to be satisfied that these grave allegations are resting upon solid grounds of fact we have only to look at the increase of criminal expenditure and the growth of the habitual criminal population among all civilised communities. As far as Great Britain and the United States are concerned, the annual ofHcial expenditure in connection with crime amounts
V
00790
tNTttODUCTtO.t.
to »i enormoiu sum. tn Great Britain t ture rcacfic!! a total of at least ten oiJIIions stcrlùi] per annum, and accofding to a recent report o( the Ohio Board of State Charities, the citizens of the United Stale* «pciid an annual sum of fifty-nine million dollar* on judtdacy, police, prisons, and reformatories. What is tttc result of this vast annual drain on the resource» of the nation ? Arc the people (getting an equivalent in the shape of a diminution in the numbers of the criminal classes? According to all the evidence we possess, it t» to be feared tliat this il not the caM: Here are the words of General ItrinkerhofT, President of the National Prison Congress, as to the condition of affairs in tlic United States : "Other questions which agitate the public and divide parties arc doubtless important. But the country can live and prosper under free trade or protection, under kimelalliitm or monomctalli.sm, under Democracy or Republican ism, but it cannot survive a demoralised people with crime in the ascendant. That crime is on ihe increase out of proportion to the population is indicated in many wiiys, but for the counlry'as a whole, the United States census is the most reliable guide. Let us look at it by decades :
V«r. Pr^un.™. Rutlo lo pop r-itioii.
1S50 6.737 «mj.442
.890
j8<«9
757
This rate of increase in a few states, we are glad to note, has not been maintained, and in one or two, for the higher crimes. It has even decreased a trifle ; but.
upon the whole, the swell has been continuous like a tide that has no ebb."
In the United Kingdom it is impossible to estimate the movement of the criminal population by a reference to the number of persons detained in prisons and convict establishments on a given day. Owing to the growing practice of committing juveniles to industrial institutions of all sorts ; owing to the substitution of fines for imprisonment ; and owing to the shortening of sentences, the prison population of Great Britain has not increased in the same manner as in the United States. But when the value of existing methods of penal administration is tested by the growth of the habitual offender we are confronted with a similar record of disastrous failure.
Why are our penal methods so helpless and discomfited in face of the criminal population ? Why do the combined efforts of legislators, judges, police, and prisons produce so few practical results ? Is it because the social disease with which these agencies are grappling is beyond the reach of human skill, and will continue to rage with unabated virulence so long as social life exists ? This deduction is hardly warranted by the facts. The failure of existing methods of criminal legislation and administration is not to be accepted as a proof that the organised forces of society are face to face with an incurable disease in the body politic. All that the failure of our present methods succeeds in establishing is the immediate and imperative necessity of placing our whole penal system upon a more rational foundation.
The collapse of penal legislation is to be accounted
VI» . ■.,-.■. ..
fc/f tm SW: gr"u'.': •; ■ '.-_- \-j - ■_.■ z-'^
which »rt^ f^'.' t' /■■■• -■ - - -T -----
Ui*m^ir.:-'-\ ■..; -■:.-----_ ._ - ^i
\ÌH Wi'-y ■■^■: ■ :_■-:.- ■ _ • ■ ■ .L _ -:
A* fa' » Ibe average member of tbc ammmity » concerned, n Ì4 not to be denied that tfae fear of poni cofiKilucncn nuy exercite a Mlntaiy e&cE on Is» imfMiltc* and reWvei al «ooie critical ao m ea t is hi* career. To what extent ibe dicad of oxaa^ ttUn coIIUioa wlih Uiccriiiiirul law dctenntncs the canne of human action if in the nature at tliii^ hnpOBabic fj «timatc. In any cue it taay sotdy be accepted that the ordin^y man—that is ta sxy, the man wf» habitually lives under ordiiory sodai and biologKal oKiditifm*— is on critical occanaos ddored from entertaining; ccnain kinds of anti-*ocial ideas by nn apprclicnxion that the practice of them will be followed by public indignation and public punbh-mcnL
If (he criminal populalioo was composed of ordinary men it is possible that tbc purely punitive principici on which tile penal code reposes would conttilute an cfhcicnt check on the icndcr>cy to crime, liut is it a fact that the criminal population la composed of ordinary men ? Is there any c^'idencc tf) «Ikiw that the great army of offenders who are piiMÌn|T through our prisoiiM, penilcntianes, and penal Mtrvlludc exiabli.ihmcnts in a cea.selcs3 stream is made up of the wimc clcmcnlH as the law-abiding sections of Ihe community? On the contrary, there is every rmuon to believe that vast numbers of ihe criminal
population do not live under ordinary social and biological conditions. It is indeed a certainty that a high percentage of them live under anomalous biological and social conditions. And it is these anomalous conditions acting upon the offender either independently or, as is more often the case, in combination which make him what he is.
Penal laws pay exceedingly little attention to this cardinal and dominating fact. These laws assume that the criminal is existing under the same set of conditions as an ordinary man. They are framed and administered on this hypothesis ; and they fail in their operation because this hypothesis is fundamentally false. It is perfectly evident that a legislative and administrative system which is drawn up to meet one set of conditions will not be successful if in practice it is called upon to cope with a totally different set. A patient suffering from an attack of typhoid fever cannot be subjected to the same regimen, to the same dietary, to the same exercise as another person in the enjoyment of ordinary health. The regimen to which the patient is subjected must be suited to the anomalous condition in which he happens to be placed. Criminal codes to be effective must act upon precisely the same principle. They must be constructed so as to cope with the social and individual conditions which distinguish the bulk of the criminal population, and it is because they are not constituted upon this principle that these enactments are so helpless in the contest with crime.
The impotence of criminal legislation is also due to another circumstance. It follows from the falla-
cious principle that t!ie ofTendcr is an ordinary mu th.it each alTcmlcr must be dealt witli on exactly the" same footing if he has committed the same olTence. On this principle all offenders convicted of the same offences must be subjected to the same length of sentence, the same pena! treatment, the same punitive regulations in every shape and form. This idea finds expression from time to time in popular outcries against the inequality of sentences. It is seen in the newspapers that one person is sentenced to six months' imprisonment for an offence of the same nature and gravity as another person who is only sentenced to six days, The offences arc in all essential respects the same, but the sentences arc absurdly different. It is immediately assumed that there has been some miscarriage of justice, and a great deal of popular indignation is the result. In many cases there can be no doubt that tiie popular instinct is right. Existing methods of penal treatment do not admit of the application to any great extent of sentences of unequal length for ofTcnces of a similar character. Our penitentiary systems are based upon the principle of uniformity of treatment for all ofTenders, In this respect they resemble our penal laws and are like them equally barren of good results. As long, therefore, as we have almost exactly the same kind of prison treatment for all sorts and conditions of offenders, so long will public opinion be to a large extent justified in protesting against the unequal duration of sentences for offences of a similar nature and gravity.
But, apart from the considerations which have just
been mentioned, the principle of equality of sentences, as far as their mere duration is concerned, is fundamentally erroneous. The duration and nature of sentences, as well as the duration and nature of prison treatment, must be adjusted to the character of th»; offender as well as to the character of the offenca In other words, judicial sentences and disciplinary treatment must be determined by the social and biological conditions of the offender quite as much as by the offence he has committed. In certain cases this principle is acted upon now,but if penal methods are to be made of greater social utility, it is a principle which must be much more extensively applied.
The principle of adjusting penal treatment to the social and biological condition of the oiTender is acted on, for instance, in the case of children. A theft committed by a child of twelve is not dealt with by our judges and magistrates in the same manner as a theft of precisely the same kind by a person of mature years. In the one case the juvenile is perhaps dismissed with an admonition, or if his parental conditions are defective, he is ordered to be detained in an industrial or reformatory school. In the other case the offender of mature years is usually committed to prison. But according to the maxim that the punishment should be adjusted to the crime, both these offenders should be sentenced to exactly the same form of penal treatment Again, in the case of offences commitled by adults, if the one offender is a man and the other a woman the sentences are not the same, although the offence may be precisely the same. Or again, in the case of offences committed
xu
INTRODUCTION.
by n
/ men the sentences are not the same if the c discovered to be feeble-minded and the- other is in possession of his senses. In all these instances justice works upon the maxim : Si duo faciuul idem, non est idenu It sets aside the notion that two ofTenccs of equal gravity arc to be dealt with by awarding the same amount of punishment to both. In such circumstances equality would be gained at the expense of justice.
The principle that punishment should be adjusted to the condition of the offender as well as to t nature of the offence is distinctly laid down by I tham. " It is further to be observed," he says, " i owing to the different manners and degrees in which persons under different circumstances are affected by the same exciting cause, a punishment which is the same in name will nut always either really produc^J or even so much as appear to others to produce, ù two different persons the same degree of pain. Therefore, that the quantity actually inflicted on each individual offender may correspond to the quantity intended for similar offenders in general, the several circumstances influencing sensibility ought always be taken into account." As he s:iys elsewhere "These circumstances cannot be fully provided ; by the legislator; but as the existence of them ìqJ every sort of case is capable of being ascerlainerf^T and the degree in which they take place is capable of ' being measured, provision may be made for them by the judge or other executive magistrate to whom the scvcfdl individuals that happen to be concerned may be made known." In both these passages Bentham
INTRODUCTION. Xlll
makes it perfectly plain that in penal legislation and administration other circumstances must be taken into account besides the actual offence ; and the circumstances to which he alludes are what we have already described as the social and biological conditions of the offender.
The question therefore arises, What are these conditions, and how are they to be ascertained ? What these conditions are and how they can be ascertained can easily be got at by an examination of the delinquent population in our penitentiary establishments of various kinds. Let us look first at social conditions. In the sixteenth Year Book of the New York State Reformatory a very excellent account is given of the social antecedents of the inmates. According to the returns 2,550, or 52*6 per cent, of the inmates came from homes which were positively bad, and only 373, or yó per cent, came from homes which were positively good. It is also stated that 1,998, or 41'! per cent, of the population left home before or soon after reaching the age of fourteen, and in a total population of 4,859 it is recorded that only 69, or i and a fraction per cent, were surrounded by wholesome influences at the time of their lapse into crime. When we come to look at the social condition of juveniles committed to Reformatory Schools in England we are confronted with a very similar set of results. According to the returns for 1892, in a total of 1,085 juveniles committed to these institutions, only 425 were living under the control of both parents. All the others had only one parent, or had one or both parents in
prison, or had liecn deserted hy their parents a1t4 tjellicr. The social condition of the juvenile popul tioii in the prisons of our large cities is equally as bai In a high percentage of cases they have either i homes or no parents, and are without skilled occupi tion in any shape,
Instances such as these—and they might be muld plied a hundredfold^make it quite plain that it i useless attempting to deal with the offence withoi looking at Uic same time at the social conditions" of ihe offender. In the majority of cases the offence is the natural and almost inevitable product of these social conditions. Up to the age of sixteen the magistrates and judycs in England are empowered by law to take these adverse circumstances into account, and to send the ofTcnder to a school instead of committing him to prison. Hut alter the age of sixteen has been pas.sed our penal legislation makes absolutely no provision for the unhappy Juvenile bereft of paternal support and paternal counsel at the most critical period of his existence. Imprisonment is its only remedy. But as imprisonment docs no- , thing to remove the adverse social circumstance whtch have turned the juvenile into a criminal, it hoJ absolutely no effect in preventing him from continuingf' to pursue a career of crime. As long as the conditions which produce the offender remain he will continue to offend, and as long as Penal law shuts its eyes to this transparent fact it is doomed to impotence as a weapon against crime.
The criminal, as we have said, is a product of anomalous biological conditions as well as adverse
social circumstances. Dr. Lombroso's distinctive merit consists in the fact that he has devoted a laborious life to the examination of these biological or, as he prefers to call them, anthropolt^ical anomalies. Criminal anthropology, as he has termed his investigations, is really an inquiry on scientific principles into the physical, mental, and pathological characteristics of the criminal population. The present volume is an example of the method in which these inquiries are conducted. It is a translation of that portion of Dr. Lombroso's La Donna Delinquentz which deals with the female criminal. Dr. Lombroso had predecessors in France in such men as Morel, Legrand du Saulle, Brierre de Boismont, and Prosper Despinc ; and in England in Pritchard, Thomson and Dr. Nicol-son. But he has surpas.sed all these writers in covering a wider field of investigation, in imparting a more systematic character to his inquiries, and in the practical conclusions which he draws from them. Dr. Lombroso proceeds from the principle that there is an intimate co-relation between bodily and mental conditions and processes. In accordance with this principle he commences with an examination of the physical characteristics and peculiarities of the criminal offender. As a result of this examination he finds that the criminal population as a whole, but the habitual criminal in particular, is to be distinguished from the average member of the community by a much higher percentage of physical anomalies. These anomalies consist of malformations in the skull and brain and face. The organs of sense are also the seat of many anomalies, such as abnormal develop-
ment of the ear, abnormalities of the eye and its protecting organs, abnormalities of the nose, such as a total absence or defective development of the bony skeleton ; abnormalities of the mouth, such as hare-lip, high palate, and malformations of the teeth and tongue. The criminal {>opulation also exhibits a considerable percentage of anomalies connected with the limbs, such as excessive development of the arms or defective development of the l^s. We have also sexual peculiarities, such as femininism in men, mas-culism in women, and infantilism in both. Where a considerable number of deep-seated physical anomalies arc found in combination in the same individual, we usually see that the\' are accompanied by nervous and mental anomalies of a more or less morbid character. These mental anomalies arc visible among the criminal [K^pulation in an absence of moral sensibility, in general instability of character, in excessiv'c vanity, excessive irritability, a lo\*e of revenge, and, as far as liabits arc concerned, a descent to customs and pleasures akin in their nature to the orgies of uncivilised trilK^s. In short, the habitual criminal is a product, accorvling to Dr. Lombroso, of pathological and atavistic anomalies ; he stands midway between the Un\atic and the SAvai;[c ; and he represents a special ly|»o \^f the human race»
It l'i ahnv^st neeviless to remark that Dr. Lombroso s «lurtnno vM viitninal atavism and the criminal t>'pe has piovokevl a cvMi^ivlerable amount of opposition and ronltA>vci?»y. It is im|H><sible in the space at ourcom-\\u\\\\\ to examine the question in detail The most weighty ilyeetion tv> the doctrine of a distinctively
INTRODUCTION. XVU
criminal type is to be found in the circumstance that the mental and physical peculiarities which are said to be characteristic of the criminal are in reality common to him with the lunatic, the epileptic, the alcoholic, the prostitute, the habitual pauper. The criminal is only one branch of a decadent stem ; he is only one member of a family group ; his abnormalities are not peculiar to himself; they have a common origin, and he shares them in common with the degenerate type of which he furnishes an example.
Let us give a few instances of the ratio of degeneracy among the criminal population of Great Britain and the United States. Among the inmates of the New York State Reformatory 12 per cent were descended from insane or epileptic parents, 38 per cent were the children of drunken parents, and 4 per cent, were the children of pauper parents. In England suicide is five times more prevalent among the prison population than among the general community, insanity is twenty-eight times more prevalent According to a census taken of the English convict establishments in 1873 it was found that 30 male convicts per thousand were suffering from weak mind, insanity, or epilepsy. It was also found that 109 per thousand were suffering from scrofula and chronic diseases of the lungs and heart, and that 231 per thousand were afflicted with congenital or acquired deformities and defects. In Scotland 33 per cent of the cases of insanity occur among offenders who have been in prison before, and in England 41 per cent, of the cases of suicide occur among offenders who ha\ e been in prison before. More minute investigation
into each indiviàaàl case would txndotibfeedly hcigfaten all these perocntagK. But as Ihey stand they are sufficiently striking, and tiirr cstablisb beyond the possibilit>' of a f3€aibt tiai the crixmnal population exhibits a high pcrccnta^ of defective biological conditions.
In what way à:> razr aÓKtìng melhods of penal law and administiatiDQ arir i nic id deal mith the ofiender exhibiting these anrcnaìnu!^ canditians? Do we act upon the pràcfjùc jo cìcar}j ennnciated by Bentham of adjus:irg r«nr iittSioià$ of penal treatment to the nature o« liie zScnòcr as wdl ms to die nature of the otfetK^^? Or :aìe contnay, as &r as adults are concerned. li»? cj^sCrinr ctf lins pfindple is practically ignored 1: ^ assoxmcc -duct aS oficnders are the same, and az^ tiScrcanrt aScced in exactly the same way and to ibe saone mmt fay penal discipline. And what is the rcsaih? A steady and uninterrupted increase oe reòirrisaxì: a &ihue of penal law and penal admìin^sCTaiàrc a< ixssmments of bocial defence, a consian: a^grajacincis -of expendi* ture in connexion with the le^c^jssorc zt zA'm x L
What are the best cseflu» cc si:nga55rg this unsatisfactory state of aSair^? H dit first place penal law must be constructed nirit a ràew to cope with the conditions whkh pcc<h>» iht crnninal population. At present the ptìacipatl cèBce of a criminal c(iurt is to ascertain whether a peiscn under trial for ^ criminal offence is innocent or guOty ; if he is ff^""J ^^ ^ guilty the sentence is almost entirely determined by the character of the ofience. Except in glaring cases of lunacy- the court takes
little or no cognisance of the individual and social conditions of the offender. The sentence is not adjusted to contend with these conditions. In fact it is often calculated to aggravate them, and in such instances is worse than useless as a weapon against the tendency to crime. It should be made the business of a criminal court to inquire not merely into the alleged offence, but in cases of conviction into the conditions of the offender who committed it ; and the duration and nature of the sentence must be determined by the results of this inquiry quite as much as by the nature of the offence. It may be said that this proposal is throwing new and unaccustomed functions upon courts of justice, and to a certain extent this is no doubt the fact But it is also to be remembered that as social organisation increases in complexity, the machinery of government must be adapted to these new conditions. The judicial machine is at present of too primitive a character : in order to do its work efficiently it must be reconstructed, its functions must be enlarged.
In the next place penal establishments must be placed upon the same basis as penal law. In other words, they, too, must be classified and administered with a view to deal with the conditions which produce the offender. At present these establishments are all of practically the same type ; they are all administered on the same lines. Except in extreme cases the same kind of penal treatment is meted out to all classes of offenders. Uniformity of penal establishments and uniformity of penal discipline rest upon the assumption that all offenders are of the same type
ÌNTRODUCTION.
and arc produced by exactly the same condìtid A practical acquaintance with the criminal popull tioii shows that this is not the fact The criminal population is composed of many types. It is composed of casual offenders who do not differ to any great extent from the ordinary man ; it is composed of juvenile offenders ; it is composed of insane, weak-minded, and epileptic offenders ; it is composed of habitual drunkards, beggars, and vagrants ; and finally there is a distinct class consisting of habitual offenders against property. It is useless applying the same method of penal treatment to each and all of these classes of offenders. The treatment must be differentiated, and determined as far as practicable by the kind of criminal type to which the offender belongs. In order to effect this object, penal establishments must as far as possible be classified. Where classification of penal establishments is impossible, and where, in consequence, offenders of various types have to be incarcerated in the same establishment, these offenders should be classified in accordance with the type to which they belong, and subjected to a regimen adapted to their class. If these principles of penal treatment were applied to the criminal population it is certain that recidivism would diminish ; it is certain that the habitual criminal would become a greater rarity, and, most important of all, it is certain that society would enjoy a great immunity from crime.
W. D. ]
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
PACB
THE SKULL OF, THE FEMALE OFFENDER , . I
CHAPTER n.
PATHOLOGICAL ANOMALIES OF THE FEMALE OFFENDER . . . , .27
CHAPTER HI. THE BRAINS OF FEMALE CRIMINALS » . 36
CHAPTER IV. ANTHROPOMETRY OF FEMALE CRIMINALS . . 4$
CHAPTER V.
FACIAL AND CEPHALIC ANOMALIES OF FEMALE
CRIMINALS • . • • • 76
CHAPTER VI.
FURTHER ANOMALIES . . • , ,82
XXll CONTENTS.
PACE
CHAPTER VII. PHOTOGRAPHS OF CRIMINALS AND PROSTITUTES • 88
CHAPTER VIIL
THE CRIMINAL Ti'PE IN WOMEN AND ITS ATAVISTIC
ORIGIN • . • .103
CHAPTER IX. TATTOOING • • . • • .115
CHAPTER X.
VITALITY AND OTHER CHARACTERISTICS OF FEMALE
CRIMINALS . . • .125
CHAPTER XI.
ACUTENESS OF SENSE AND VISUAL AREA OF FEMALE
CRIMINALS ..... 134
CHAPTER XIL THE DORN CRIMINAL . . « • 147
CHAPTER XIII. OCCASIONAL CRIMINALS .... 192
CHAPTER XIV. IIYSTKRICAI. OFFENDERS .... 2l8
CONTENTS.
XXlll
CHAPTER XV.
PAGB
CRIMES OF PASSION.
244
CHAPTER XVI.
SUICIDES
269
CHAPTER XVII.
CRIMINAL FEMALE LUNATICS
289
CHAPTER XVIIL
EPILEPTIC DELINQUENTS AND MORAL INSANITY . 298
I. SKULL OF CHARLOTTE CORDAY (3 platCs).
Facingpage 34
2. OLD WOMAN OF PALERMO
>»
72
3. PHYSIOGNOMY OF RUSSIAN FEMALE OFFENDERS
(4 plates) . . . Facingpage 76
4. GABRIELLE UOMPARD
5. THOMAS .
6. MESSALINA
7. MARGHERITA. LOUISE
n
)»
>»
»♦
96
98
98
100
8. PHYSIOGNOMY .OF FALLEN WOMEN, RUSSIAN
(4 plates)
. Facing page 100
XXV
(
LIST OF ILLVST SAT loss.
9. PHYSiocifoinr or nxscti,
SIAM FEMALE
or7Z3(Dcss is piafees).
I03
10. MICRO. RED ÌMIHAX
113
,
II. HELDS OF VISIOX OF F. M^ Ol EPILEPTIC AMD TRAVQUIL STATE (2 piates).
e 143
12. HELD OF VISIOX OF FEMALE
(3 plates)
Adt^/^e 144
CHAPTER I.
THE SKULL OF THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
When one of the present writers began his observations on delinquents some thirty years ago, he professed a firm faith in anthropometry, especially cranial anthropometry, as an ark of salvation from the metaphysical, à priori systems dear to all those engaged on the study of Man.
He regarded anthropometry as the backbone, the whole framework indeed, of the new human statue ot which he was at the time attempting the creation ; and only learnt the vanity of such hopes and the evils of excessive confidence when use, as is usual, had degenerated into abuse.
For all the differences between the authors of this work and the most authoritative modern anthropologists—all of them in reality professors of anthropometry—arise precisely from the fact that the variations in measurement between the normal and the abnormal subject are so small as to defy all but the most minute research.
One of the writers had already noted this fact as his work "The Criminal Man" was reaching its second and third editions ; and only became still more
TSI mtAL£ OFFESDER.
m
EM nvuic e d i£ it mitca Zatnpa's observations opon the oann uf Sam as&aininh in Ravenna disclosed an cxasi cnTTcspciTKlcoci: between their mcasurctncnts Aiui ihiMc fciuKi:^ in an average taken upon tm normal iiavDiinEae:- And uhilc the anthn^xicDctrical s}-stcm iailxd ^ims to ic%-eal any salient diflerciKcs whatever, a iwHnn uo>caafaitloyical invntigation, on bdi^ ap-^d<ad n àc same crania, pro\-cd the existence io tttniB «r n» tcss than thirt>--three anomalies.
t Hrfiiiliiiiiili Ij tlic attention of inquirers had
d firom the anatomico-pathological method ttk Mattmopometry, with the consequence that the
; to be rashly abandoned. And as one : of this we may mention that Toptnard and r.b-ing dc6cicnt in anatomico-pathological Innafieidige, failed to detect the immense anomalies OHJlMus. in certain crania of assassins which they WOK examining ; and because there were no salient anAmpocDdrìcal difFercnccs in these skulls and the afc«l of Charlotte Corday. they rejected the theory •f anomaly altogether.
We must noi, however, be understood to advocate 1fti^ total abandonment of measurements. On the so««iar>-. we would retain them as the frame, so to spaak. of the picture ; or, ratlicr, as the symbol, the fli( of a school in whose armoury numbers fumisti, che most effective weapon ; and we would recommei Mich retention the more, that whenever a diflferencel ckM» result on measurement, the importance of thi UKunuly is iluubled.
fttudy of female criminology was undertake! . Bcrgonzoli, SolTiantini and myself, wilhl
the help of 26 skulls and 5 skeletons of prostitutes in the possession of Signor Scarenzi. Messrs. Varaglia and Silva ' made notes on 60 criminal subjects who died in the prisons of Turin ; while 17 others who died in Rome were investigated by Mingazzini « and Ardii 3 ; the proportion of offences being : Prostitutes, 4; infanticide, 20 ; complicity in rape, 2; theft, 14; arson, 3 ; wounding, 4 ; assassination, 10 ; homicide, 15; poisoning, 4; abortion, I. As regards race, II were Sicilians, 6 Sardinians, 31 Neapolitans, 7 natives of the March and Umbria, 2 Venetians, 4 Lombards, 4 natives of Emilia, 3 Tuscans, 3 Ligurians, and 6 Piedmontese.
I. Cranial Capacity.
Beginning with cranial capacity, we have the following :—
Normal Females a6 60 observed by Female
The lowest capacity in the 60 criminals is 1,050; the highest 1,630 (a poisoner). Among the prostitutes the smallest is 1,1 10; the highest 1,520.
* Varaglia and Silva, ** Anatomical and Anthropological Observation on Sixty Crania and Forty-two Encephali of Italian Female Criminals.
■ G. Mingazzini ** On Thirty Crania and Encephali of Italian Criminals."
3 Ardii, * * Notes on the Biangular Diameter of the Mandible " {Archivic di Psichiatria^ 1892).
TUB FEMALE OFFENDER.
The average among the first named is i^$ with respect to 13 brachycephalic crania, and 1,266 with respect to 45 dolichocephalic crania, the latter being, as Calori had already remarked, always of inferior capacity.
Among female criminals we find the smaller capacities to be more common in the scfial averages than among normal subjects, while the capacities fall off more than one halC
Arithmetically speaking, the average of criminal (1,322) is higher than the average shown by prostl| tutcs 0<244). ^iid is a little even above the norr (1,310—1,316). _
But according to Mingazzini, who is a far better and more trustworthy observer, the average cranial capacity is 1,265, a very inferior average to that furnished by normal Italian women, for whom the figure found by Nicolini is 1,310, and by Mantegazzaf and Amadci, 1.322.
And there is much importance in the fact that he observed a capacity inferior Io 1,200 in 20 percent of these criminals, and in only 5 per cent, a capacity above 1,400 ; while among the normal women noted by Amadei and Morselli, only 14 per cent, fell below the former figure and 29 per cent rose above the latter ; a result which establishes the inferiority of criminals.
Coming now to separate delinquencies, we find the figures of highest capacity to be under the difTcrenftJ heads as follows :—
'.384 I
THE SKULL OF THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
And of lowest capacity :—
Theft 1,261
Assassination (morder) 1)253 Prostitution I1244
Homicide Rape
1,238 1,180
The capacity again varies geographically, as under :—
1,340 1,268
1,257 1,285
1,289
When these figures are compared with those known in r^ard to normal females and female lunatics—for instance, with the Tuscans of Chiarugi and Bianchi — the average is notably lower.
II. Orbital Capacity.
The maximum orbital capacity among the 60 female criminals was 62, the minimum 44, and the medium 5276 c.c
For the series we have the following figures :—
In these series we have a predominance of the high capacities of 50 and 56 cc, and the average is 5276.
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
The distribution according to crime was :—
Poisoning ... Assassination Homicide ... Wounding ...
• • • • ■ •
> • • ■ • •
• • • • • •
57 54 53 53
f^ape ... • « « Infanticide... Theft ... Arson...
• • • • • •
• • • • • •
• •• • • ■
53 52 52
51
The high capacities predominate in the gravest forms of crime.
Among 26 prostitutes of Paris the average was 43*5, showing an extraordinary inferiority to the remainder. The minimum was 30, and the maximum 69 ; the last being presented by a woman formerly a teacher and notorious for her profligacy.
III. Area of the Occipital Foramen.
Inferior to 600 Between 601-650 651-700 701-750 751-800 800-850
»»
f>
2 = 3*33 per cent. 4= 6-66
11 = 18-33 18 = 30-00
13 = 21-66
12 = 20'00
II
II
II
»l
tl
The minimum area is 580 mm.q., the maximum is 850, the average is 731. The larger areas, between 721 and 740 mm.q., predominate.
The distribution according to crime was :—
IV. Cephalo-Rachidian Index.
The predominant figures are between 15*01 and 19; the minimum is 14*58, the maximum 21*69, ^^^ average 17*72
THE SKULL OF THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
The distribution as regards crime is :—
Poisoning ... Prostitution ... Infanticide ...
Theft
Woundini: ...
V. Cephalo-Orbital Index.
The predominant figures are between 22 and 26 ; the minimum is 18*46, the maximum 30-90, the average 24*64.
Distribution according to crime :—
VI. Facial Angle.
The minimum angle is 69° the maximum 81°. The general average is 74'20 (according to Mingazzini it is 83°), the serial average is 74° to 76^.
Distribution according to crime :—
Among prostitutes the maximum was 82° the minimum 72° and the average 74*60 3
VII. Horizontal Circumference and Curves.
Ctiniiult. PnHtiluto. Between 460 and 470 ... 6-66 —
„ 510 „ upwards ... 7'6 fw
Whence it appears that prostitutes do not reach either the highest or the lowest figures.
The maximum circumference was found in a poisoner of Verona (535), and in a woman guilty of infanticide (530),
The predominating circumferences among criminals are between 470 and 490 ; among prostitutes, between 490 and 510; while among 52 per cent of normal subjects, at least according to Morselli, the prevailing figures are between 501 and 530,
The average presented by criminals—492 (Min-gazzini gives it 4902), is inferior to the normal average of Parisian women (498), and of the ancient Roman women (505), but .is equal, indeed superior to the average among modem Italian women, which is 491.
Curves. —An examination of the proportions of the various parts of the fronto-occipital curve (reduced to 100), and of the anterior horizontal line (putting at = 100 the total horizontal curve), we obtain, in common with VaragUa and Silva, the following results :—
Iloriiontal Anterinr Curve 46'I4
Sub-cerebral AnLenor Curve ... 4-50
Frontal Curve ^~j
Parietal Curve 34-4
Occipital Curve 31-0
THE SKULL OF THE FEMALE OFFENDER. g
These figures demonstrate that the asserted increase in the sub-cerebral curve of the criminal does not exist
As regards the anterior horizontal curve, we find a large development in Venetia (48*06) and in Umbria, and a small one in the Marches and in Latinia
(45-31).
The figure given for Sardinian women, 4574,
differs notably from that of the modern women of the same region, and approximates to the figure presented by the ancient Sardinian females, which was 46-94.
The medium anterior horizontal circumference is 227.
VIII. Cephalic Index.
Among 60 criminals we find 13 brachycephalic and 47 dolichocephalic crania. Among 26 prostitutes we observed 3 sub-dolichocephalic and mesocephalic crania (75 to 80), 17 brachycephalic and sub-brachy-cephalic, with a minimum of 68 and a maximum of 82.
Mingazzini among 17 criminals found an average of 73*35, which shows a larger number of cases of dolichocephalic skulls than among the male criminals whom he examined, where the average was 77*81, and this fact corresponds to the normal. In the 10 dolichocephalic skulls he found an average of 7*26, and in the 8 brachycephalic an average of 8065.
The average index among the 13 brachycephalic skulls is 8441 ; among the 47 dolichocephalic it is 74*58. Calori gives 84 as the average cephalic index among Italian brachycephali, and 77 among Italian
doIichocephalL In the 26 prostitutes, ali from Paira, the average is 74*6, with a tninimiun of 68 and a maximum of Se.
Among the Tuscans, 2 are dolichocephalic, with an index of 7677, and one brachycephalic female had the ancient Etruscan type:
Of 4 crania belonging to nati\'es of Emilia, 2 are dolichocephalic, with an average of 78, and 2 brachycephalic crania ha\'e an a^^erage of 85, which is a higher number than the a\'erage of the Bolognese brachycephalL There are 20 crania from the Neapolitan territor>\
I. Crania from the Abruzzi, Molise, Avellino, Benevento, Basilicata. Average index, 75*93 ; vertical, 7yS7,
II. Crania from Naples and Salema Averse cephalic index, j^'2^ : vertical, 75X)I.
III. Crania from PughL Average cephalic index, 7610; vertical, 7274.
These are consequently all dolichocephalic, with a minimum of 67*03 (in a poisoner}, and a maximum of 79*31 (in a murderess—assassin), and a general average of 75*48. Calori found in the Neapolitan provinces 52 per cent dolichocephalic, with a cephalic index of 76.
Among Sardinian women we have an avers^ of 709, with a minimum of 6827, and a maximum of 74*28 (the subject was a thief). All these cases are dolichocephalic to a higher degree than was observed by Calori, who found 6 per cent of brachy-cephali, with an average of 74 among the dolicho-ccphali, and 81 among the brachycephalL
Zannetti found a minimum cephalic index of 6507 and a maximum of 7608, with an average (among 6 women) of 72*36 ; which is a higher figure than that obtained by us. The cephalic index of the ancient Sardinian women is 74*81, while 71*64 represents that of modem Sardinian males, and 71*68 that of the ancient male inhabitants. Our figure consequently approaches that of the actual Sardinian males, and differs from that of the present Sardinian females.
The average vertical index of our female criminals (71*22) is higher than that of the modem Sardinian women (68*98), but lower than that of their ancient progenitors (77*05), and approximates more nearly to that of the Sardinian males, both modern (71*86) and ancient (72*34). The Sardinian female criminal more nearly resembles the contemporary male type than the type of the woman of her epoch.
Sicilian Females. — According to Morselli the measurement for normal females is 70*6, and for normal males 74*5.
The ancient Corsican women had an index of 78*26, as against 73*53 among the men, showing a difference of 4*73 in favour of the females.
This difference, which up to now remains insufficiently proved, results as reversed in 8 Sicilian female criminals with a minimum index of 682, a maximum of 77*19, and an average of 73*65, which is much nearer to the male average (74*9) than to that of the women of the Sicilian provinces.
Offences, —After this there is little importance to be attached to the distribution according to crime.
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
Among prostitutes we find a The other results are as under :-
average of y^.'Vi
Thdi ...
Wounding Murder... Homicide
Poison Ing
676 768
78'O
899 841 850
IX. Vkutical Index.
The average among the 60 female criminals is yg-g, according to Mingazzin! 715, while among the males it is 74*8.
The highest index is 8253 ; the lowest 6S'62, ini woman of Cosenza who had committed infanticide and 61 6 in another criminal of the same class ob-' served by Mingazzini. Now it is to be remarked that the Calabrian crania are among the most platycephalic in Italy.
Among the modern Italian women, as among those of ancient Rome and Etruria, the larger number oi crania have an index of 7! (Morselli), just as with our female criminals ; the average being 7231 for 56 Italian women of every race, while that of 99 male crania is 7385 (Mantegazza). These results differ but little from ours.
The distribution according to crime is as follows :—
Complicity in Kapc ... 8o'i8 '
Anon 78'ji ,
Prottiiuiion 76-61
Thcfl 74-54 I
Wounding 73*95
Homicide J3'10 J
Murder Insassinalion) 7l'34 I
Infonlicide 7l'<9.J
Poisoning 70'44i9
X. Minimum Frontal Diameter.
I = l 'óó per cent.
17 = 28*33 27=45*c»
12 = 20*00 3= 500
tt ft
f»
The minimum frontal diameter among the 60 female criminals is 85 mm., the maximum is 102. The average is 93 mm. ; and the predominating figures are between 86 and 100; and especially between 91-95.
Among prostitutes the minimum is 85, the maximum 100, and the average 89.
XL Coronal Diameter and Index.
The minimum coronal diameter is 97, the maximum 131, the mean 113 mm.
The prevailing figures are 106-120.
Among prostitutes the maximum is 126, the minimum no, the mean 117.
The smallest coronal index is 75*42 ; the highest reaches 9702.
The prevailing measurements are between 75*01 and 90, 80*01 to 85 being especially frequent. The general mean is 8294.
But these figures correspond more to the geographical origin of the respective criminals than to their crimes, and the predominating numbers are usually low. For the rest we generally find the smallest frontal and coronal indices in the female subject, owing to the lesser development in her of the minimum frontal and coronal diameters and to
THB FEMALE OFFENDER.
the larger development of the posterior diameter.
XII. Minimum Froktal Index.
The smallest frontal index is 59*85, the largest 88. The general averajje is 69"97; and the predominating numbers are between 65-01 and 75,^ especially 65-01 and 70.
Bciwccn 55'oi-6o ... 1= i'66p
6001-6S -■■ a=" 333
65-01-70 ... So-SO'w
7o-o:-7S ... aa ■'36.66
7501-80 ... 3= 5-00
8001-85 '= ''^
85-01-90 ... 1= 1-66
The distribution as regards crime was :-
Complicity in Intinildde .
Homidde .
Murder (luassiiuilon)
Wounding
PnwUlalinii
Theft
XIII. NA.SAL InDE-V.
The smallest nasal index is 3653, the largest Ì 56-42. The average measurement is 4625 (accordìi^ to Mingazzini, however, 48-09), showing narrowness' of nostril. The maximum is 56-4, and the minimum 36-5-
The distribution as regards crime is as follows :—
Pniwnine , Wounding , Inbniiciilc .
48 65
47-50 4697 46-J7 46'M
45'69
4S-W
43-88 4*-9a
XIV. Palatine Index.
General average 8203 (but according to Mingaz-zini 79*5), which is inferior to the male's (787). * The maximum is 100, and the minimum 6808.
The distribution as regards crime is as below :—
Complicity in Rape ...
Poisoning
Wounding
ji ncn •■• ... (.. .■<
XV. Orbital Index.
Among 17 female, criminals the mean found by -Mingazzini was 876 on the right side, and 8735 on the left .
Among 60 of the same class, Varaglia found 22 with an orbital index of over 89 ; 26 in whom the figures were between 83 and 8899 ; and 12 who only reached 82*96. The general mean was S7'26. The maximum (found by Mingazzini) was 102 in an infanticide, while two other infanticides showed the minimum of 74*66.
The distribution as regards crime was as follows :—
Wounding Poisoning Homicide Murder... Theft ...
• • •
8970 89-69
88-93 88-25
86-04
Complicity in Rape
/\lrSOn ••• ••• •••
Prostitution
Infanticide
85-98 85-18 85 02
8475
XVI. Facial Index.
The minimum is 4918, the maximum 77*87; the general average is 6699.
The prevailing figures are 6S'Oi-7a
The distribution as regards crime is as under:—
The minimum height is 60 mm., the maximum 99. The prevailing numbers are between 81-85, ^"^ then between 76-80 and 8690.
The distribution as regards crime is as follows :—
Wounding 83 I Theft 80
Infanticide 83 Murder 80
CompUcily in Rape ... 81-5 Prostitution 78
Poisoning 81 | Arson 75
XVI11. BiZYGOMATic Breadth.
'5= 8-33 per CI ao-a8-33 „ 15-46-66 „
30= 8-33 „ - 3S= 6-66 „ 136-140= 1-66 „
131
The minimum breadth is iii mm., the maximum 138 mm. The prevailing figures are between 121-125, and then between 116-120^
Among prostitutes the average is 123, the maximum is 130, and the minimum 118.
The distribution as regards crime is as follows :—
122
121.5 121.5
120
XIX. Weight of the Lower Jaw.
A special—virile—characteristic of the lower jaw among the 26 prostitutes is its greater weight relatively to the cranium.
The average of 65*9 is really equal to the general average, but if the two, absolutely abnormal minima, of 35*33 are set aside we get an average of 705 ; and in any case the weight relatively to that of the cranium is 120, which is the same as in the male. Mingazzini found the average weight of jaw among 17 female criminals to be 79*i, and that of the cranium
5995. Ardo, examining 20 crania of female criminals and
20 crania of normal women, obtained the following :—
t8 the female offender.
reach that presented by the normal woman, but the minimum is superior to the minimum of the latter The difference (between jaw and cranium) is notably smaller, and the average being higher, it follows that the lower jaw of criminal women weighs more and varies less than the corresponding feature among normal women. The series of the crania is r^ular.
XX. Cranio-Mandibular Index.
Out of 20 crania Ardù obtained the following results :—
Total average ...' Il'54 137
Here the maxima and minima do not reach in the criminal the same figures as in the normal woman, and the average of the criminal is lower. This is owing to the fact that while the criminal has a heavier jaw and skull, the proportion between them is not the same as in the normal subject :— ■
The cranium, that is to say, is heavier in proportion.
Among the 17 criminals mentioned by Mlngazzini, however, the index is 13'2, and 12'0 in 60 of the same class observed by Silva ; and this yields an average equal or superior to the male.
XXI. BiGONiAL Diameter.
According to observations made by Ardù upon 17 criminals their average is superior to that of normal women, and even of the male, while the minima do not fall to the figures shown by either ; that is to sa) , the mean oscillates between higher limits :—
Total average ... 97*2 907 94*1 100*1
By analysis of the series we find :—
Mingazzini found the least breadth (795) in a husband-murderer, while a woman guilty of homicide showed the maximum of 116.
I obtained the following among—
The maximum breadth is 105, the minimum 81 ; and the predominating figures are between 91-95 and then between 86-go.
The highest figures for the jaw, taken serially, are found in Sicily, and the lowest in Sardinia.
Fallen women furnish the maxima among the highest figures.
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
The distribution per c
Wounding... Homicide ... Proslilulion lEiTanticiilt...
C)niplicity in Rape...
Theft ...
Morder (usaninatìon) Poisoning
XXII. Symphitic Height.
Between 11-15
II '6-19
„ W>-23
>• «4-»;
» a8-3i
» 33-35
» 3S-39
1 = 7-OI
I = 3684
1 = 36-84
> = 1578
The figures which predominate are between 24-31, he minimum height is 15, and the maximum 56. The distribution per crime is :—
CumpliciCy in Rape ... 31
In&nlicide 30
Proslilution 19
Theft 28
Wounding zj-^
Murder (i Homicide Poisoning
Amongthe female criminals observed by Mingazzini, he medium height of the symphisis was only 288, while among males it is 31.07.
XXIII. Length of the Branchial Arches.
The predominant numbers are between 56-60, and again between 51-55 and 61-65; the least length is 46, and the greatest is 76.
Distribution per crime :—
... S6
Conclusions. —As we expected, and as we found already during our researches into the male criminal,' the conclusions to which the above data lead us are but few.
The most important are those which relate to the cranial and orbital capacity, and to the weight and diameter of the jaw, to which add observations on the cheek-bones.
It is clear, indeed, that fallen women have the smallest cranial capacity of all, and up to 1,200 a scanty cranial capacity continues to be noted in prostitutes and criminals alike ; while among normal women, even those whose cranial capacity is small and those who approximate to the average, the superiority to the other two classes of their sex persists up to the limit marked 1,300, and offers more analogy to the mentally afflicted than to the sane.
In average capacity and in capacity above the average, women of good life and even lunatics surpass both criminals and the fallen class.
In great cranial capacity the better class of women surpass, five or six times over, criminals, prostitutes and lunatics. Also in this respect prostitutes are slightly superior to criminals ; arid among the latter the highest are the poisoners.
As a whole prostitutes are more remarkable than criminals for smaller as well as for larger cranial capacity, although when compared with women of good lives, they rank below lunatics—a peculiarity
■ ** Uomo Delinquente," vol. i. 3rd ed.
TUB FEMALE OFFENDER.
which they share especially with thieves among mal criminals.
The maxima and minima among prostitutes mort nearly resemble those of Papuan women than i normal females. With regard to size of orbit the * maximum is reached by poisoners and murderesses generally, who in this respect resemble the male. The minimum is found among thieves and unchaste i women, especially prostitutes.
It is curious, however, that the average size of orH presented by normal women, which is 47, and even by lunatics, whose average measure according to Peli is 51, should be surpassed, as in the case of males, by almost all criminal women, especially those guilty of the graver crimes, such as poisoning, assassination, and homicide. To this rule prostitutes arc an exception. The occipital region of female criminals surpasses to a great degree the average in the case of women of good lives, as given by Mantegazza ; but here the maximum is not furnished by murderesses, but bjj women guilty of arson and of wounding, while prostt tutes offer the minimum. The cephalo-rachidianH index in criminals is but little below the normal average, 181, which is, if anything, somewhat higher than the average supplied by poisoners, while the minimum here again is found among womci have committed arson and rape. The ccphalo-orbiu index, is very much below the normal female average! of 28'4,and there is but little difference in this respect between women guilty of arson and wounding; but the lowest figure is reached by those whose ofTencca have been homicide and rape.
The facial angle is found lat^est in the lists of poisoning and wounding, lowest in those of arson and rape, and ot medium size among thieves and cases of infanticide.
The horizontal circumference of prostitutes, both as to maxima and minima, is lower than among criminals, but the medium measurement in both cases is equal to the normal average, and the curves of the cranium furnish no data. This last is true also of the cephalic index, except that in some places, and especially in Sicily, the measurement approximates to that of the male, and, what is more curious, of the males of antiquity, both with respect to the curves and to the vertical index.
The average of the antero-posterior, the transverse (maximum), the vertical, and the frontal (minimum) diameters, is as under :—
Among SanlinUn female criminals 178 127 izS 92
„ Modern Saidinian females (Zannetti) lSo'67 143 12467 9l'5 „ Ancient „ „ 17650 132 136 925
It will be seen that the figures given for the criminals approximate to those of the ancient Sardinian women, with the exception of the vertical diameter, which is larger in our women (Italians of the Peninsula) than among the modern Sardinians, but less than among the ancient Sardinians. The transverse diameter is less among our women, while the longitudinal and frontal minimum occupies a middle position between the measurements of the ancient and modern Sardinian females.
t4 THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
The following is a tabic of the cranial curves :-
Ili-auiicutur OocipiioJronul Hon
Ancient Sardinian remale»... Modmi „ „
Sani inian (emale ctim inali..
aga'So - ÌÌSÌ 66-47 - 49*6 5074 303-17 .., 29-95 700s - SO'36 49-64 iSi ... 33-61 66-39 .. 4573 54"27
By this it will be seen that Sardinian women approximate more to their ancient than to their modern prototypes ; and as regards the anterior portion of the whole horizontal curve, the figures given arc nearer to those of the ancient Sardinian males (4694) than to any others.
And when it is considered that the figure 3381 stands for the anterior portion of the oc ci pi to-frontal curve of the ancient Sardinian males (which is very near the 3361 of our modern women), it is evident that we have here two other peculiarities beyond those above noted, in which female criminals resemble males, and males of ancient days.
Zannetti's great work on the modem Sardinians supplies us with further conclusions, for he has shown that modern females differ more from modern males than did ancient females from ancient males.
The bizygomatic diameter in Sardinian women is on the average 120, 111-50 for the moderns and h6x)0 for the ancients. For the males the figures are: 11677 (moderns) and 11575 (ancients), which prove that here again the modern women approximate more to the ancient females, and still more to the males. The longitudinal diameter of prostitutes is usually the shortest ; and the longest is shown by criminals; the exact contrary is the case with thsfl transverse diameter, prostitutes possessing the highei
and criminals the lowest measurements. But here the ethnical element has to be taken into account, and obscures all conclusions.
The frontal diameter is larger in prostitutes than in criminals. Females guilty of rape and infanticide have the highest frontal index, and thieves and prostitutes the lowest
The same is true in great part of the coronal index. The nasal index is inferior to the average of 48, especially among prostitutes, thieves, murderesses, and incendiaries.
The largest facial index is found in the lists of infanticide and homicide, the smallest in those of poisoning and arson ; the length of the face is greatest among those guilty of wounding, and least among those guilty of arson.
But it is especially as regards the diameters of the cheeks and cheek-bones, and in the weight of the jaws, that figures come to be of great importance. Prostitutes are wider across the check-bones than criminals in the proportion of 36 to 16 in all the higher numbers, and are inferior to the same class in all the lesser figures.
The bigonial diameter of female criminals is much greater than in women and men of moral lives ; but the higher average is distinctive of the male criminal, who, while surpassing his female prototype in this respect, does so less markedly than the normal woman surpasses the normal male. The maximum like the minimum of male criminals is more remarkable than in the female. Finally, when the extreme figures at either end among criminals of both sexes are com-
pared, it is to be observed that, although the man's maximum is higher than the woman's, the same fails to hold good oi the minimum. The divei^ence in the case of the male is greater, and begins consequently at a higlur level. We are here in presence of a sexual peculiarity, persisting among criminals as among normals.
The bigonial diameter of prostitutes exceeds that of criminals among the higher series (of figures) as 34 is to 21 per cent The maxima of the criminals are to be found among the women who have committed homicide, wounding, or arson.
The lower jaw of female criminals, and still more of prostitutes, is heavier than in women of moral lives, and the measure of skull and jaw is nearly always as virile as the weight.
The maximum measure of symphisis is found under the heading of rape, and the minimum under that of poisoning.
The length of the branchials is greatest among women who are guilty of rape and poisoning, and least among prostitutes.
PATHOLOGICAL ANOMALIES OF THE FESfALE
OFFENDER.
As we have already said, cranial anomalies yield far more striking differences than cranial measurements. In order to economise space, we append a table of anomalies prepared according to their percentages {see p. 29).
It is evident from this table that if anomalies be frequent in the crania of female criminals (and especially of murderesses), they are less so than in the males of a corresponding class. The difference is smaller especially in the median occipital fossa ; in the nasal cavity (33 to 48) ; in irregularity of the occipital region (where the divergence is three times less) ; in the lower jaw (one-half less) ; in the plagio-cephalon, in the sclerosis, and in the frontal sinuses (also one-half) ; finally, in the absence of subscapho-cephali, oxycephali, and epactal bone (of which latter there is only one). The female criminal exceeds the male only in the greater number of wormian bones, in the simplicity of her sutures, in anomalies of the palate, and of the atlas.
«7
m
Nevertheless a comparison of the criminal skull with the skulls of normal women reveals the fact that female criminals approximate more to males, both criminal and normal, than to normal women, especially in the superciliary arches in the seam of the sutures, in the lower jaw-bones, and in. peculiarities of the occipital region. They nearly resemble normal women in their cheek-bones, in the prominence of the crotaphitic line, and in the median occipital fossa. There are also among them a large proportion (9'2 per cent.) of virile crania.
The anomalies more frequent in female criminals than in prostitutes are: enormous pterygoid apophisis; cranial depressions ; very heavy lower jaw ; plagio-cephalia ; the soldering of the atlas with the occiput ; enormous nasal spine ; deep frontal sinuses ; absence of sutures ; simplicity of sutures ; wormian bones.
Fallen women, on the other hand, are distinguished from criminals by the following peculiarities: clinoid apophisis forming a canal ; tumefied parietal prominences ; median occipital fossa of double size ; great occipital irregularity ; narrow or receding forehead ; abnormal nasal bones ; epactal bone ; prognathous jaw and alveolar prognathism ; cranial sclerosis ; a virile type of face ; prominent cheek-bones.
As to the principal anomalies I proceed to give the average frequency with which they are severally found in normal female subjects, in female criminals, and in prostitutes ; but it must be remembered that it is not always possible to deduce an average from
PATHOLOGICAL ANOMALIES.
afe ly OTMMflr 4^fl|d4^|l|BÌt'V| Aae aoMe of dne p^r bi* r '
■pBM
certain pecotiantieft Foriastancz. if Messrs. V» Mid Stiva do not make mcntkn of plai}^! amoDj; fanalt crimuuls, or if Hingannri omits I ■peak of cranial dcprewions or prognatbous features or cranial tdcrovts, are tnay, with Ihe utmost proba* bilily, OMtdufle that the rcaxMi of such ornùutins lies in aitcation not having been paid to those particular points.
Anooutous tcctb, present in only 0^5 per cent of oormal subjects, arc to be foond in icS per cent of criminals and in 51 per cent of prostitutes.
The median occipital fo^sa u existent in 54 per cent of normal subjects, in 5*4 per cent of delinquents, and in 17 per cent of ptrmituies, which ia a figure exceeding that of male criminal» (16).
The narrow or receding forehead is found in 10 per cent of normal women, in S per cent of criminal wi-^mcn, and in t6 per cent, of prostitutes. Vrog-nathi.«m distinguishes 10 per cent, of normals, 33-4 per cent of criminals, and 36 per cent of pro»-titules.
Plagioccphali exists in 172 per cent of nom subjects, in 3S'8 per cent, of delinquents, rising 1 44 |>cr cent among homicides, and in 22 per cent of prontitutes.
This t« an anomaly much more frequently observed among male criminals, where it is found in a proportion of 42 per cent
The «olclering of the atlas with the occiput is never còservcd In normal women, but exists in 3'6 ptf..
cent of female criminals and in 3 per cent of prostitutes.
Cranial sclerosis is present in 17*2 per cent of normal women, in i6*2 of the criminal class, and in 22 percent of prostitutes. This peculiarity resembles plagiocephali in being much more frequent among male criminals, where it reaches the proportion of 31 per cent
The wormian bones are found in 20 per cent of normal subjects, in 64*8 per cent of criminals, rising in homicides to 76 per cent, and in 26 per cent in prostitutes.
The cheek-bones are prominent in 39 per cent of normal women, in r8 per cent of criminals, and in 16 per cent, of prostitutes.
Occipital foramen, —A curious fact is the irregularity of the occipital foramen, where in two cases we find the atlas soldered with the occiput (being 33 per cent), and in seven other cases (or ir6 per cent) different irregularities of the following sort : Articular fossa of the basion, owing to dental apophisis (twice) ; porosity of surrounding bone (once) ; an offshoot of bone extending from the basion to the centre of the foramen (twice) ; incipient process of division of the occiput (once) ; marked asymmetry (once).
The sum shows 15 per cent of irregularities among criminals, 23 per cent among prostitutes ; while in male lunatics the proportion was 05 per cent, and in male criminals 10*5 per cent
Signor Legge, among 1,770 crania in Camerino, found occipital fusion with the atlas in 12 per cent, with median condyles and basilar tubercles in 2*5
amec mi z pom-I a P&edmonlBse Aiet,agBi sai aoi once is • Flocotfiae ki&nlàcìde, afcd dL Hoe ife fw p ua ìa» is 5-T per cmU : i -fr*Snf tD the nae 0 k^Afegr aale^ ■ fcjwf [ calcu-Ulc the tm-Juhji to edst ie t te 9 per cent.
fetaale cii^nh.
Pi w fm tùm tf «HMafio.—TW TCi]r ■■ch brgcr
nny be dcnonsuated bgr Ae bcz Aet m 515 per cent of praatkatB mofc thee s MnwafiBi «ill be present, wfaem» tlK «dc naabcr is tmif fbnDd in 27 per cent of ciioumls. The mcu aowMg pKMti* tutcs b 5 anoniaKci per ctaaJuui as ^not 4 amoog criminal*
Fmt after prostitme», wbooe ***"«"*r" are as 5*5, oorat thieve» (42) ; t*>en homicides (41) ; and lastly infanticitks (411) ; altfaoogfa the Utter are t>-p«cal!y superior to the other two classes, as 27 to 34 per cenL
But all these figures «ink into aunwriad insignifi-
PATHOLOGICAL ANOMALIES.
33
canee when compared with male crania,* where the average of anomalies is three and lour times higher (being 78 per cent.) than in the case of female delinquents and prostitutes.
It will have been remarked how many abnormal characteristics of the crania of female criminals, such as frontal sinuses and projecting cheek-bones, are normal in the male ; and this must be held to reduce the average.
Poltticm criminals (female).—Not even the purest political crime, that which springs from passion, is exempt !rom the law which we have laid down. In the skull of Charlotte Corday herself, after a rapid inspection, I affirmed the presence of an extraordinary number of anomalies, and this opinion is confirmed not only by Topinard's very confused monograph, but still more by the photographs of the
50 Male
Deltnq.
.. O
8
O
2
4
Typical (5 and more anomalies) 84 Average of the anomalies per
2 Anomalies
3
4 n
5
6 ,.
7
cranium
... 11*4
24
4*2
27
40
24
41
27.0
40
51S
5*5
In their observations on 19 crania of male criminals Roncoroni and Ardii found—
1 Cranium with 23 anomalies.
2 Crania ,, 22 2 „ „ 21 I Cranium „ I9 I „ „ 18 I M M 17
>» »»
2 I 2 I 6 7
Crania
Cranium
Crania
Cranium
Crania
I)
with 16 anomalies. 14
n
12 II
TH£ FBUALB OPFESÙUL
CTMiium which Prmce R. Bonaparte prctented to the wrttei», and which are reproduced in Fig* I. 2, 3.
The cranium a platy^cephaltc, a peculiarity which is rarer in the woman than in tlic man. To be noted also is a most rcmarkabk jugular apopbisis with strongly arched brows concave below, and con6ucnt with the median line ar>d beyond it All tbe sutures are open, ai in a young man aged from 23 to 25, and simple, especially the coronao' suture.
The cranial capacity is 1,360 cc, while the average among French women is 1,337 ; the shape is slightly dolichocephalic ^777) ; and in the hodionta] direction the z>-gomatic arch is visible only on the Icfc— a clear instance of aiymmetry. The insertion of the sagittal process in the frontal bone is also asymmetrical, and there is a median ocapital fossa. The crotaphitic lines are marked, as is also the top of the templet ; the orbital cavities arc enormous, c<tpecially the right one, tvhich is lower than the leA, as is indeed the whole right side of the face.
On both -lidcs arc ptcroid wormian bones.
Mtaiuremmls. —Even anthropomclry here pro (he existence of virile characteristics. The orbitai arca is 133 mm.q., while the average among Parisian women is 126. The height of ihc orbit is 35 mm.. as against 33 tn the normal Parisian.
The cephattc index is 775 ; zygomatic index 927 ; the facial angle of Camper, 85" ; the nasal height-jo (among Parisians 48) ; frontal breadth, l20(amoi|| Parisian women 933).
Ptlvi. —Out of 5 of these organs, all belonging to'! proatitutes of Pavia, two measure on an average 135
PATHOLOGICAL ASOUALIES.
33
transversely and 123 obliquely, which is shorter than the average of 5 normal women (150-128). Two presented a virile appearance, and in one there was complete flattening of the right side of the pubes. In all 5 the channel of the sacrum was quite open, while in 5 normal women no such aperture existed.
CHAPTER III. THE BRAINS OF FEMALE CRIMINALS.
1. Weight. —The average weight of the encephali
of 42 Italian female criminals, according to Vaniglia,
and Silva, was 1,178 grammes. The heaviest, belonging to an infanticide, was
1,328 grs.
Out of 17 brains of criminals Mingazzini found 4 sub-microcephalous, the weights t>eìng 1,006, i,02t,
1,056 in infanticides, and 1,072 in a matricide: the general average of the 17 was 1,14676, or 108 grs. below the masculine standard. In 120 normal women the maximum weight found by Giacomini was 1,530 grs. ; and the minimum, 929, was in a woman of 77 years whose intellectual faculties remained intact; while among the total number all were inferior to 1,40a Pfleger and Wechselbaum, out of 148 normal women, a^ed from 20 to 59 years, and of whom the average height was i m. 56, found an average weight of brain of 1,189 S"-1 ^""^ '" 377 women, of ages nnging from 20 years to senility, i m. 55 in height, the mean was 1,154. Tench'"' discovered an average weight of 1,194 ii
167 encephala of Brescian women aged from 15 to 60 years.
If these results be compared with the weights of the 43 criminals it will be seen that the maximum of healthy women is higher than that of criminals, and the minimum is lower. The average weight of criminals falls by 16 grs. below the average of Tenchini, and by 12 grs. below the first mean obtained by Pfleger and Wechselbaum, but is 11 grs. above the second average of those writers.
In the matter of cranial types, we found among 31 dolichocephali an average weight of 1,162 (as against 1,136 in the normal), and among li brachycephali an average weight of 1,198 (Calori gives 1,150 for the normal). This proportion holds good also in respect of cranial capacity : thus showing that among criminals as well as normals there is a balance in favour of the brachycephalic.
Varaglia and Silva found that in 20 out of 42 encephali of criminals the left hemisphere weighed from 1 to 5 grs. more than the right; while in iS cases the contrary was the case to the amount of from I to 6 grs. In 4 instances the two hemispheres were equal, and this proportion corresponds pretty nearly to Giacomtni's observations on the normal subject.
In one instance only among the criminals was there a difference of 51 grs.
The average weight of the cerebellum, the pons, the peduncles, and bulb was as 15542 (or according to Mingazzini 15314), which was higher than the figure (147) exhibited by 16 normal Piedmontese
THE FEMALE OFFENDBH. woracn, but very inferior to the In^^■ln of the male
2. Anomu/ifs. —As to anomalies of tlie convolutions they are very rare, certainly rarer than in the case of male criminals ; and it is precisely because he observed only ihc brains of female criminals that Giacomini had so few exceptions to record. For while Mingazzini, VVillyk, and Tenchini found occipital operculum in 4 per cent, of male i" 33 per cent, a deepening of the second annei convolution (very rare in normal subjects) ; in 6 cent, separation of the calcarinc fissure from the pital (observed in to per cent, of normals) ; and S per cent, supcrficiahly ofthcgyriis cunei; —Giacomii observed in female criminaU only a slight increase in the number of convolutions especially on the right side, and a E''c<"iter scarcity of sulci.
Mingazzini, however, gives, as the result of wider investigations into 17 brains of female criminals, absence of the r, vertical anterior fissure on the left side in a sub-microccphalic homicide ; deepening of the first anncctant convolution on the right in two criminals, and on the left in one ; division of this same convolution into two branches terminating in the occipital lobe in one case; superficiality of the gyrus cunei in tivo ; rudimentary median frontal gyrus joining itself immediately to the superior frontal gyrus (the subject, an infanticide).
P'rom the deep upper side of the latter a fold started, continuing laterally in a transverse direction until it joined the anterior portion of the lower_ frontal gyrus. In the left hemisphen
brain, the median frontal gyrus was interrupted in the posterior portion by a frontal arrow-shaped furrow, and in the anterior part the three gyri were almost entirely fused.
In another cerebrum, this time of a matricide, the left postcentralis is complete and independent ; behind is a transverse furrow, really the prolongation of the left calloso-marginal is, and yet again behind is the left interparietalis arrow-shaped. In the right hemisphere of a woman guilty of corrupting morals, the left interparietalis is represented by a cruciform furrow dividing the superior parietal lobule from the lower, the two lobules being united behind by an anastomatic transversal fold, followed by a sulcus in front of the first external anncctant convolution. In this same cerebrum the ascending parietal gyrus on the left was divided transversely into two secondary gyri by means of a convolution bifurcated on its higher side and exactly parallel to the sulcus of Rolando.
In two cases the left superior temporal convolution communicated with the incisura occipitalis ; and in one instance after sending a spur in a downward direction it continued uninterrupted to the free margin of the malleus. In one case the calcarine fissure communicated with the collateralis ; and in another the lower bifurcation of the same fissure joined the left cxtremus.
From all this it is clear that if the external superficies of the hemisphere is the same in criminals as in normals, nevertheless the signs of degeneration are more frequent among the former class.
Mingazzini satisfied himself that the whole cerebral S
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
hemisphere is less extensive in women than in men, whether the women be normal or criminal ; and if wi cannot maintain with Htischke and Rudinger that the parieto-occipital lobe is larger in females, it is yel true that the frontal lobe in men predominates ovei the other to a greater degree than in women.
Mingazzini also found that the absolute length ol the sulcus of Rolando is often greater on the left than on the right, and that this occurs more frequently in women (i8'34)than in men (7'26).
The morphological anomalies found among criminals of ihc two sexes were : 13 men, 19 ; 17 women, 19—so that in every brain the proportion of anoma^ lies is I 46 among males to 1*11 among females, thus showing a notable excess among males.
Some female criminals, however, show a number ol anomalies,
Ferrier, for instance, relates the case of a woman whose right hemisphere was smaller than her left, as 510 grs, to 550, and in whom, moreover, the fissure of Rolando was interrupted by a deep anncctant convolution following on the ascending frontal fold, which, in addition to being atrophied, was crossed in the middle by two sulci. The ascending parietat convolution was similarly divided, and the second^ frontal had the same peculiarity.
In the third frontal convolution he observed ^ depression, at the bottom of which were folds of smaller size and firmer substance than the usual annectant convolutions, which he attributed to flammatory processes.
The malformation of the fissure of Rolando struck
him as extremely rare : he had, in fact, encountered it only twice in his examination of 800 normal brains.
Flesch, in a female thief, found pachymeningitis and interruption of the ascending frontal convolution on the left ; also a real median lobe on the cerebellum, formed, as in many mammiferi, by two sulci beginning in the median fissure, divet|;Ìng in front, and crossing the horizontal convolutions of the median lobe throughout the whole length of the hemispheres.
3. Pathological aaoma/ies.—More important still are the pathological anomalies. Out of 33 female criminals, a post-mortem examination revealed in II grave macroscopic lesion of the central system and its involucra, such as : dilatation of the lateral ventricles; multiple sub-arachnoid hccmorrhages of the frontal region in both hemispheres ; thickening of the spinal dura mater, both cervical and dorsal ; abscess on the cerebellum in connection with the left median cerebellary peduncle; meningo-encephalitis ; cerebral apoplexy ; hemorrhage in the lateral ventricles; syphilis; two transparent rounded vesicles adhering to the peduncle and on the lower side of the chiasma of the optic nerve under the arachnoid ; broad furrows ; abundant sub-arachnoid liquid ; endo-craniaV abscess ; luxation of the odontoid ; paralysis for a month previous to examination of all the extremities; meningitis of the base in connection with the pons and medulla oblongata ; cerebral cedema and suffusion into the ventricles ; humid mother-of-pearly tumour under the arachnoid, between third and fourth pair of nerves (origin evident).
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
Hotzen, in the "Archive of Psychiatry" (i( relates the case of Maria Koster, who, at the age oi 18, after having until then appeared of a quiet and industrious disposition, killed her mother with sixty blows of a hatchet, only to obtain possession of a I scanty sum ; kept a diary of her impressions; ' in domestic service ; then a typographer ; then i needlewoman ; and who presented only asymmetiy of the fnce and of one pupil. She had hysterical attacks after puberty, which in her case only declared itself at 19, but often feigned these attacks. After her death she was found to have phthisis, traces of adherence of the dura mater and of ha;morrhagic pachymeningitis, besides true atrophy of the cerebral cortex.
Her central anterior convolution was crossed by fissures between the third median inferior convolution and its termination in the fissure of Rolando. The central posterior convolution was divided by a furrow into two halves, so that the parietal ; rolandic sulci communicated.
The fissure of Rolando did not terminate in theil fissure of Sylvius ; both the paracentral convolutions were between the third superior convolulion and the median, and traversed by a deep and yawning fissure, which brought the interparietal fissure into direct communication with the first frontal sulcus.
Here, then, ts a case of atrophy, congenital and ^ hereditary atrophy, of the cerebral cortex, characterised by insufficientiy developed frontal convolutions, especially of the occipital lobe, by small c lutions, incomplete enclosure of the cerebellum by ti
large hemispheres, and by abnormally numerous segmentations of the cerebral cortex, amounting to positive aplasia.
Such furrows are not products of superior evolution ; no new cerebral substance is laid down in their neighbourhood, and they constitute, in fact, a case of atrophy of the cerebral matter.
Lambì, in "Westphal's Archiv. fiir Psychiatric" (1888), gives the history of Marianna Kirtexen, who, under maternal guidance, gave forth oracles, and was consulted by peasants, and even by persons of high rank, showing much ability in guessing at their maladies and prescribing strange remedies, for which she was extravagantly paid. She was, in short, a clever swindler, although only 12 years old. She was lame, squint-eyed, and left-handed, her right arm being, indeed, almost paralysed. She was fluent, well-mannered, gave very correct replies, and had a real curiosity—passion even—for seeing and treating the sick.
She died of consumption, and autopsy revealed a long-standing porencephalia in the left hemisphere of the brain, forming a large clepsydral-shaped cavity, of which the middle part or isthmus consisted in an elliptic horizontal fissure 4 mms. long in the white substance. The wider base, rounded and 5*4 centimeters in breadth, lay towards the outside and terminated in the arachnoid, while the small end, measuring 2*8 centimeters, opened into the external wall of the left lateral ventricle. Into the upper segment of the cup-shaped fossa on the outer surface of the left hemisphere ran the lower part of. the pre-
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
central (frontal ascendant) gyrus, and into anterior segment a portion of the superior front^ gyrus entered, also the lower part of the same, . the posterior portion of the median frontal gym In the lower segment the posterior portion of the? inferior frontal gyrus and the gyri of Reil's island were found ; while into the posterior segment entered the anterior portion of the first tem{)orai gyrus, and the lower part of the retrocentral (ascending parietal) gyrus, together with the operculum. There was consequently partial destruction of the frontal ascending convolution, but the cortex had remained intact. On the internal surface of ihc hemispheres were other anomalies due to pressure of the ventricular fluid. The corpus callosum and fornix were atrophied. The g>'rus fornicatus was flaltened in the median portion, and the horns of the lateral ventricle wa dilated and rounded. The internal ganglia wel normal.
Microscopic examination of the grey cortex in the diseased parts revealed a fluted striated substance, mixed with round cells enclosing nuclei (evidently a thickening of the neuroglia).
Other cells mixed with the above had Hattenet edges, a transparent protoplasm, and in the central two or even three simple nuclei. These ceils i surrounded by dark, granular, nucleated matter, ail4^ had the appearance of cartilaginous fibre.
The convexities of the pia mater and arachnoid enclosed a large number of Pacchionian granulations such as are found in the aged, and were notably darkened and thickened.
CHAPTER IV.
ANTHROPOMETRY OF FEMALE CRIMINALS.
I. Authors and t/ie cases they studied, —In the list of those who have recently made a study of the characteristics of female criminals, we must include— Marro,' who investigated 41 cases ; Troisky,^ 58 cases ; Lombroso and Pasini,^ 122 cases; Ziino,"* 188 cases ; Lombroso, 83 photographs ; Varaglia and Silva,s 60 crania : Romberg,^ 20 cases ; and recently Salsotto,7 409 cases ; Madame Tarnowsky,^ 100 female thieves ; and Roncoroni,9 who studied 50 normal women.
' Marro, ** I caratteri dei delinquenti.*' Bocca, 1889. ' Troisky, ** Cephalòmetry of Criminals with reference to some Symptoms of Physical Degeneration," Journal of Charkow, Russia,
3 Lombroso and Pasini, *' Archivio di psichiatrìa," 1883.
* Ziino, ** Fisiopatologia del delitto," i88i.
5 Varaglia and Silva, "Note anatomiche ed antropologiche su 60 cranii e 40 encefali di donne criminali italiane." " Archivio psichiatria," voi. vL
* Romberg, ** loi Cefalogrammi." Berlin, 1889.
7 Salsotto, " La donna delinquente. Rivista di discipline carcerarie,"
1887. ,
® Tamowsky, ** Elude anlhropometrique sur les prostituées et les voleuses." Paris, 1887.
9 Roncoronì, *' Ricerche su alcune sensibilità nei pazzi. Giornale della R. Accad. di Nfed.," 1891 ; " I caratterì degenerativi su 50 donne e jo nomini normali : l'olfatto, il gusto e l'udito in 35 normali." " ArcTu di psichiatria," 1892.
The characteristics of prostitutes, which we cannot study separately from those of female criminals, were investigated by Scarenzio and SoRiantini < in 14 crania ; by Andronico ' in 230 subjects ; by Grimaldi 3 in 26 ; by De Albertis * in 28 ; by Tarnowsky in 150 ; by Bergonzoli and Lombroso s in 26 crania ; while Bei^^ lately made researches into the tattoo marks on 804. Gurrieri examined into the sensibility of 60 cases, and Fornasari gave the anthropometry of a similar number.? Riccardi s a id Ardii 9 made notes on the weight, height, &c., of 176.
We also published in the " Giornale della R. Accademia di Medicina," of Turin, Nos. 9 and 10, 1891, and in the "Archivio di psichiatria," vol. xiii., fase vi.," observations on characteristics of degeneration in 200 normal women, in 120 Piedmontesc female thieves, and in lig prostitutes of Turin. We also studied, synthetically, the type of the criminal in 300 women (234 of whom were in the female penitentiary, and 56 in the prison of Turin), as well as in 6g Russian female criminals and 100 prostitutes of the same
* Sekfcnzio e Softiantini, "Archivio di psichiatm," iSSi, voL vii. p. ag.
■ Andionico, " ProMiluM e delinquenti." " Arch, di piichiitrìa,'' iSSa, vol ili. p. 143-
1 Grìinildi, ■' It pudore. Il manicomio," vol. v. No. I, 1S89.
' De Albertis, " II utuageio su 300 prostitute cenoveii. AtcUvio piLch: icienie pen: ed anttop ; crim.," vol. ii., 1888.
> Bergonioli e Lombroso, " Su lb cianii iti pmsijlule," 1893.
' Beig, "Le tatouage chei les prostiluci;» Danoises." "Arch. paich.," vol. li. fase. 3 and 4, 1891.
' Gurrieri e Fornasari. " I sensi e le anomalie nelle donne normali e
ina serie di prostitute," 1891,
nationality, in which we collaborated with Madame Tarnowsky and with Ottolenghi.'
This constitutes a total of 1,033 observations on female criminals, 176 observations on the skulls of female criminals, 685 on the skulls of prostitutes, 225 on normal women in hospitals, and 30 others also normal.
2. Weight and height, —The net result of the data furnished by Salsotto and Madame Tarnowsky on weight and height {see Tables, pp. 51-2), is to show that 45 per cent, of infanticides and 296 per cent, of murderesses are of weight below the normal ; while 50 per cent, of infanticides and 44 per cent of murderesses are beneath the normal stature.
On the other hand, only 15 per cent, of poisoners were of lower weight, and only 25 per cent, of lower stature than the normal : facts which can be referred to the circumstance that poisoners do not generally belong to the poorer classes.
According to the data of Madame Tarnowsky 19 per cent, of prostitutes and 21 per cent, of female thieves are below normal weight, the figures for peasant women being 20 per cent, and for women of education 18 per cent Height was less than the normal among 28 per cent of prostitutes, 14 per cent of thieves, 7 per cent of peasant women, and 10 per cent of educated females.
Salsotto gives 37 per cent, of infanticides, 70 per cent of poisoners, and 52 per cent of murderesses as
' Ottolenghi e Lombroso, **La donna delinquenti e prostituta.*' Turin, 1892.
of normal weight, and 38 per cent, of infanticidi 50 per cent, of poisoners, and 48 per cent, of femal assasi<ins as of normal stature.
Madame Tamowsky's data are the followingi" Normal weight, $&j per cent, of prostitutes, 51 per cent, of thieves, 46 per cent, of peasant women, and 58 per cent, of educated women. Normal stature, 6r3 per cent, of prostilute.s, 62 per cent, of thieves, 64 per cent, of peasant women (of good lives), and 74 per cent, of educated women,
SaUotto found, on the other hand, that 18 per cent of infanticides, 15 per cent, of poisoners, and 2V6 of female a5sa.ssins exceeded normal iveight ; and Madame Tarnowsky's ligures in the same respect are 22-9 of prostitutes, 28 of thieves, 34 ol peasant women (of good lives), and 24 of educated women,
As to height in Russia the normal was exceeded by 14 per cent, ot prostitutes, 24 per cent, of thieves, ig per cent, of peasant women (of good conduct), ant} 12 per cent, of educated women, Salsotto gives as o height above the medium, 11 per cent, of infanticidei 20 per cent, of female poisoners, and I0'4 per cent Q other murderesses.
To sum up, weight appears more often equal to ( above the medium in thieves and murderesses, butj especially in prostitutes : more rarely is this the case^ in infanticides,
3, Medium height. —This, on the contrary, appears to be rarer in all female criminals and prostitutes than in moral women. Here are the tables :—
Salsotto.
•1 i i
a a
iS 'o
a a«
I
B
Med. weight 55-1 577 58*5
height 152 1-53 1-53 1.55 1*53 1*55 i'56 I'S^ i*54ni.
>>
Marro found that the average height for women of good lives IS 1*55, and for criminals 1*52, with a medium weight for moral women of 57, and for female criminals of 53.
Riccardi gives as the medium height of 42 Bolognese fallen women r52, with a maximum of 167, and a minimum of r43. Riccardi, who studied the question of stature in relation to age and social condition among the Bolognese, found the following data (" Statura e Condizione sociale, studiate nei Bolognese, 1885 ") :—
Whence it results that at the age of 25, which was that of almost all the twenty Bolognese prostitutes measured, they were of shorter stature than the average, not only of women in easy circumstances, but even of poor women.
4. Medium weight —As to weight, from the averages furnished by Salsotto and Madame Tarnowsky, murderesses and female poisoners appear, as we
^ • *
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
already remarked, to be above the average of moi women.
If wc now foUuw Fornasari in a comparLson of tbi respective weights of prostitutes and moral women Ì1 relation to age and height, as in the following tables >■
„ Prnxirurs. ,« NormaU iFomauri
Wn- (kgrnt-l 1
67 «
1.584 1,690
it will be seen that height and age being equal, thj weight is greatest among prostitutes.
Fornasari demonstrated this even better by thi results of twenty more weight-takings, which gave him an average weight of 58 kilogrammes, wiih a maximum of 75 kilogrammes and a minimi 38, these being figures above the average of r women.
This greater weight among prostitutes is confirms by the notorious fact of the obesity of those who grow old in their vile trade, and who gradually become [jositive monsters of adipose tissue. We could cite _ not a,few who attain the weight of (jo-gS, and ev< 130 kilogrammes.
But this stands out still more clearly when,
conformity with a formula obtained by means 1
thousands of measurements taltcn by one of
writers ' in order lo find the relation of weight 1
' Lombroso, " Sulln .Stnlura dt'gti Italiani," MiliD, 1873.
TltE FEMALE OFFEXUER.
ill
ìli ,
fill '111
s ill:
■sill
stature {see Table III.), such women are regarded as having a weight equal to the average in whom the number of kilogrammes which represent the weight is equal to the number of centimeters by which their statures surpass the meter.
It is then seen that 60 per cent, of female poisoners, 59*4 per cent of prostitutes, 50 per cent of female assassins, and 46 per cent of female thieves, have a weight above the average, while in only 45 per cent of Russian peasant women, leading moral lives, and 44 per cent of infanticides is the same the case.
Below the normal, on the other hand, are 46 per cent of moral peasant women (Russians), 37 per cent of murderesses, 36 per cent of thieves, 31 per cent of infanticides, and 29 per cent of prostitutes, while Salsotto gives 25 per cent as the proportion among Italian female poisoners.
5. S/fan of arms. —The average in 44 Modenese (measured by Riccardi) was 1*556 m., while the average stature was r52, the consequent relation being as 102*3 to 100 (and in normals as 103 to 100).
Madame Tarnowsky, however, gives the following results among Russian women :—
the span of the arms being consequently inferior among prostitutes and even criminals when compared to the stature, than among the moral poor, which result must be attributed to the greater development of limbs in women v;ho work ; and this we shall find to be the case also among the Bolognese females.
'54 '■"^ FEMALE OFFENDER.
6. The average luigkt of thf body seaUd. —A mong 30 Bolognese prostitutes this \\-as Szt), and relatively ta the height 53'6 per cent., as aijainst 83-2. or relalr to the height 537 per cent among 30 normal womei also Bolognese ; that is to say, there was no remarkable difference.
7. Limbs. Thorax. — From the measurements of limbs made by Madame Tarnowsky, tt appears that the upper limbs of an illiterate working-woman of moral life measure 0608, aa against o 597 in thieves, and 0583 in prostitutes. Even the right arm, which in normal peasant women measures o'fitp, falls in thieves to o^Sos, and in prostitutes to O'SSS, Prostitutes consequently have the shortest arms of all, tbS' reason being in their case, as in that of thieves, they work less than moral women.
The circumference of the thorax, which is 82' prostitutes,differs but little from that of moral wo; (in Bologna 827, and in Modena 847), but relati to the height (540 in prostitutes, as against 53' moral women) the divergence is greater (Riccardi
8. The hand. —The hand, however, according Madame Tarnowsky. is longer in Russian prostitutes (right, 187; left, 184) than in peasant women and even homicides (right, 185 ; left, 184), while in thieves it is shorter (right, 178; left, 175).
Fomasari also found that among the prostitutes of Bologna (where it measured from 155 to 198 mm.) Ihe hand was longer than among normals (141 to 184 mm.), while the breadth varied from 65 to 85 among the first-named and from 52 to 84 among normals.
Such differences which were marked in
figures at both ends gradually disappeared as the median averages were reached ; but the net result was that in normal women, even workers, the hands were smaller without exception.
Fornasari measured the length of the middle finger so as to compare it with the breadth of the hand, and from the difference of the two measurements he was able to deduce the large or smaller digital development when compared with the palm.
The length of the middle finger was measured on the back from the point to the head of the third metacarpus, and on the inner side from the point to the fold which separates the finger from the palm.
The difference, in both measurements, between the middle fingers resulted as from about 19 to 20 mm. On the inner side the length of the middle finger varies in prostitutes as from 60 to 85 mm., showing an average of 70 to 74 ; in normal women the difference is from 53 to 84, but the average is similar. On the outer side the variation in prostitutes is from 75 to ICQ, with an average of 80-84 > ^" normals from a minimum of 65 there is a rise to the maximum of 99, and the serial average is 85-89.
The second measurement, made on a careful anatomical basis, confirms the result yielded by the first in so far as it shows that the shorter middle fingers belong to normal women, and the longer ones to prostitutes ; but that relatively to the serial average, while the first measurement gives a similar length to prostitutes and to normals, the second shows the latter to possess a higher average length.
Comparing now the length of the middle finger (on 6
the outside) to the breadth of the hand, \ the following figures :—
The ciiRerence among the nolognese is from I to 24 in prostitutes, and from 5 to 24 in normal women. Consequently in the former class the digital portici of the hand is less developed than in the latter 1 lively to the palmary division.
If the length of the hand in relation to the heighl taken as lOO, be compared, wc 6nd :—
These figures would lead to the conclusion that th( hand in prostitutes is largest relatively to stature
9. Ned; thigh, and leg. —The measurements for-' the circumferences of the neck, thigh, and leg were only taken in the case of 14 normal women, it being not too easy to find subjects who will submit to the experiment. Between the least circumference, over the ankle bones, and the largest, round the calf, Fornasari found a difierence in Bolognese prostitutes of from 70 to 150, and in normal women of from 100
to 140 ; the median averag^e for the first-named being 120, and for the last-named 100. Normals consequently have the calves least developed on an average, and prostitutes show the maxima and minima of development. Between the maximum measurement of the calves and that of the thigh the variation was from 120 to 240 in prostitutes of Bologna, and from 120 to 220 in normals ; the serial .mean being for the first-named 190, and for the second 150.
The thighs of prostitutes are consequently bigger than normal women's in proportion to the calves.
Between the maximum circumference of the leg and the circumference of the neck, the figures in Bolognese prostitutes were from — 55 to -(- 30, and in normals from — 35 to -(- 5, the results being as under, the neck < = > calves :—
22 ... 4 ... 17 ... prostitutes. 14 ... — ... 8 ... Bolognese prostitutes.
8 ... 4 ••• 2 ... normals.
In most cases normal women have the two circumferences equal ; their neck, however, is often smaller but rarely larger, and even when larger, only a little ; in prostitutes, on the contrary, the neck is often larger or smaller than the maximum circumference of the calves.
10. Foot. —The foot in prostitutes is shorter and narrower than in normals.
With respect to length, the prostitutes of Bologna varied as from 200 to 240 mm. (serial average, 230), while the normals differed as from 200 to 235 (serial
THE FF.UALE OFFESDER.
$8
av-cragc, zro to 220); in bfL-adth, the pro3titut<j ranged from 64 to 90 mm. (median average, 80 to 84), and th« normals from 70 to 96 (with an identical
mean).
Between the lenglh of foot and that of ham prostitutes show a greater difference than nornuls i the maxima atid minima, but the media in the tw classes arc almost the same. The divergence amoi^ prostitutes is from 38 to 75, and amung norr women from 20 to 65, while the media are from 51J to 59 for one as for the other.
The fiXJl, therefore, would appear to be shorter pro|x>rtionately to the hand in prostitutes than in normals.
II. Cranial cafiadly. —Here, as far as measure^ ] mcnts can be exact in the case of women with thelf^ quantity of hair, Marro found the capacity i criminals to be below that of normal women as 1,47* to 1,508, Among the women he observed, th(| following scries of probable cranial capacities wei obtained ;—
«iCHiiiIbiI WomuL
1400-1450 -.. 38'8 per cent.
1450-1500 .. 4S-6 „
iSOO-tsso ... I6'S „
ISSO-1S97 ... 7-a „
Fornasari's observations on Bolognese women give from 1,400 to 1,SS9 for prostitutes, and from I410 to 1,579 for normal woi
Hut the cranial capacity can be best dcmonstratec by the data furnished by Madame Tarnowsky, 1 studied Russian women all of the same age anti locality.
HorizoDtal circumference Ix>ngitudinal curve Transversal curve Longitudinal diameter ... Transversal diameter ...
Prostitutes. No. 150. 5316 316*2 283-8 178-2
142-5
Peasant
Chaste
Women.
No. TOO.
537-o 316-2 285-9 l8i-4 144-8
Educated Chaste
Women. No. 50. 538-0
313*5 286*9
183-2 145'2
Thie\'es. Na xoo.
535-5
317-3 2863
1794 1439
Probable cranial capacity 1452*3 ... 1465*3 ... 1466*8 ... 1462*4
Thieves consequently would appear to have a probable cranial capacity inferior to that of normals by barely 3 cm., while in prostitutes the inferiority is as 13 cm.
The measurements of the crania confirm this prevalence of small cranial capacities among prostitutes.
12. The Cranial circumference among 80 female Piedmontese delinquents corresponded to an average of 530 ; and the same result was obtained by Marro, who found 535 in the normal jvoman. By the serial method, criminal women appear as exceeding normal women in their minima, and falling behind them in their maxima.
We find from the figures of Salsotto that 51 per cent, of criminals had cranial capacities between 521 and 540; 22 per cent had them between 541 and 557 ; and 27 per cent, between 504 and 520.
With respect to crime, we find the largest cranial circumference in homicides (532), after whom come poisoners (517), then infanticides (501), and finally thieves (494) ; and these results are almost identical with those obtained by Ziino. The larger circumferences, serially taken, are wanting in thieyes and infanticides, while abounding in homicides.
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Andronico, out of 230 prostitutes, found in 8/ pdfa cent, of them a circumference between 480 and 500 J," the writers, in 178 prostitutes, found a mean cranial>l circumference of 522, which was less than : criminals ; and De Albertis found an average 1 53;-
In 27 prostitutes of Bologna, Fomasari found i minimum of 470 and a maximum of 560 ; and i 20 moral women a minimum of 490 and a maximuotl of 534-
Madame Tarnowsky discovered an average circumference of 535 in thieves, 531 in prostituies, 537 in illiterate peasants, 538 in 50 educated moral women, the result being a smaller cranial circumference in tlie female criminal. This has indeed been noted by 1 several observers.
Coming now to more detailed results, we have : the least amplitudes (from 485 to 520). above all in prostitutes Cir3l per cent.) and in thieves (15 per cent.), as against 6 per cent, of peasant women and ' 2 per cent, of educated females (Tarnowsky) ; theJ greatest amplitudes (540-580) are rarest above all in prostitutes (2861 per cent.) and in thieves (12 per cent), while abounding in peasant women (467 per cent), and especially in educated women (6z per cent.). According to Salsotto, the least circum-
ferences predominate in female poisoners (55 per cent.) ; while there are fewer of them in infanticides (24 per cent), in murderesses (23 per cent.), and in thieves (15 per cent.); the widest circumferences among criminals are to be found in thieves (3^ per cent.), then in infanticides (31 per cent), next in murderesses (192 per cent.), and in poisoners (10 per cent.). Marre states that the least circumferences (from 485-520) are to be o >served in 274 per cent, of criminals and in 20 per cent of normals ; the widest (from 541-580) are in 104 per cent of criminals and in 36 per cent of normals.
13. Curves. Tlie longtitudinal curve. —According to Madame Tarnowsky, the lowest figures (280-310) are furnished especially by prostitutes (56 per cent) and by thieves (38 per cent.), after whom come peasant women of moral lives (37 per cent), and by educated women (363) ; while Salsotto's figures are; for criminals, thieves (38 per cent) ; poisoners (15 per cent) ; assassins and infanticides (20 per cent). The highest figures (321-340), as given by Tarnowsky, are 34 per cent in peasants, 30 per cent, in thieves, 26'3 per cent, in educated women, and 20 per cent. in prostitutes. Salsotto calculates them as follows: 56 per cent in murderesses, 52 per cent in infanticides, 40 per cent in poisoners, and 30 per cent, in thieves. Marro says that the least longitudinal curves (280-310) are in 57-6 per cent of criminals, and in 14 per cent, of normals ; the greatest (331-340) are in 7'2 per cent of criminals and in 12 per cent of normals.
Transverse curves. —Here the data contributed by
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
Madame Tarnowsky arc widely different from tha given by Salotto ; and the reason of Che divi gcnce is ethnical.
Among Italian female criminals Salsotto does neri find one with a transverse curve measuring from 200 to 300 mm. ; while Tarnowsky, In Russia, finds 86 per cent, among thieves, 8546 among prostitutes, 84 per cent, among peasant women, 80 per cent among educated women.
Between the limit of 321-340 Madame Tarnowsky' finds only 4 per cent, of educated women, and i per cent, of thieves, while Salsotto gives 66 per cent, among assassins, 60 |»er cent, among infanticides, and 20 per cent among poisoners,
Marro noted a great preponderance (5 per cent.) among criminals of the least curves (280-310), and a scarcity (72 per cent.) of the large ones (331-340). In normal subjects the first are present in 4 per cent, only, the second in 33 per cent Grimaldi, among the prostitutes observed by him, noted a great prevalence of the longitudinal over the transverse curve.
The anterior circumference was found by Salsotto in the following order: from 292-300, 52 times (23 per cent.); 301-310, 98 times (41 per cent.) ; 310-328, 87 times (37 per cent.) ; 292-300, in 25 per cent of infanticides and poisoners, and in 206 per cent of murderesses (assassins) ; 301-310 in 48 per cent, of infanticides, in 40 per cent, of assassins, and in 35 per cent, of poisoners; 311-325 in 40 per cent, of poisoners, in 394 per cent, of assassins, and in 27 per cent, of infanticides, with a prevalence of higher numbers among murderesses as compared to infanti-
cides. De Albertis found a low, anterior, semi-curve (282) in prostitutes.
14. This small development repeats itself in the cranial diameters furnished by Madame Tarnowsky, which are important because obtained from women of the same country. The results are as follows :
Medium antero-posterior diameter among educated women 183
)) „ in illiterate peasants 181
tf », in thieves 153
») ,, in prostitutes 178
»« ,, in homicides 177
Maximum transverse diameter in educated women I45'0
M ,, in illiterate peasants I44'9
), ,, in homicides 144*2
f, „ in thieves I43'9
,» „ in prostitutes 143* i
Antero-posterior diameter, —According to Madame Tarnowsky and to Marro, the smaller diameters prevail among prostitutes, and above all among female thieves, with a corresponding scarcity of the larger diameters. For instance, we have 165-180 for 4266 per cent of prostitutes and 82 per cent, of thieves, as against 25 per cent, of moral peasant women and 20 per cent of educated women ; and, on the other hand, from 183-195 are to be found only in 17*33 per cent of prostitutes, in 8 per cent of thieves, as against 35 per cent, of moral peasant women and 50 per cent, of the educated.
Marro's figures are: from 154-175 among 70 per cent of criminal women and 41 per cent of normals ; with 175-185 for 28*8 per cent, of criminals and 52 per cent of normals.
Transverse diameter, —The inferiority of prostitutes and still more of thieves to normals is, according to
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
Madame Tamowsky, especially apparent in the IcsM frequency of the long diameters, as 14S-155 ; the" percentage of these figures among prostitutes and thieves being respectively 57*99 and 18, as against 71 and 68 per cent, among peasants and educated women ; while Marro states that the superiority of normal women is revealed by the greater frequency among them of the large diameters, such as 14S-1S5J which are found in 504 per cent of criminals e 78 per cent normals.
Minimum frontal diameter, —In Russia, Madame Tarnowsky found no woman, whether normal, criminal, or prostitute, whose frontal dianieler was between 95 and 105 ; Salaotto, on the other hand, found this measurement in Co per cent, of puisoncrs, in 51 per cent, of murderesses (assassins), and in only 40 per cent, of infanticides. Madame Tarnowsky found a minimum frontal diameter of i3i and upwards in 66 per cent of cultivated women, in 2ri7 per cent, of prostitutes, in 8 per cent of peasant women, and in 6 per cent of thieves, but never once in any Italian female criminal. Salsotto observed a diameter of 106 to t2 in Co per cent of infanticides, in 49 per cent of murderesses, and in 40 per cent of poisoners.
According to Marro, the maxima from 12 cent! meters upwards are found in 19 per cent of normal and are wanting in criminals.
The medium smallest frontal diameter among the 30 prostitutes of Modena observed by Riccardi was lo6'z, or lower than that of moral women, which wasl 108-2.
Frontal height —The minima here, or 30-40, are found in 25 per cent, of infanticides, in 26 per cent, of murderesses, and in 40 per cent of poisoners ; the maxima,or 5 i-67,are among45per cent.of infanticides, 30 per cent, of assassins, and 23 per cent, of poisoners.
In the Bolognese prostitutes the average height is given at 40-70, and in moral women of the same town, at 40-60. In prostitutes the breadth is 100-129, in moral women 95-124.
The proportion between the height of the forehead and that of the face among Bolognese women is as follows: Prostitutes, 32-64 ; moral, 34-52.
The cephalic index is too ethnical in character for us to attach much value to the results obtained by various observers : we have already noted a marked inclination, amounting to 10 per cent, to the brachy-cephalic form among Piedmontese female criminals ; but Marro found hardly any difference between criminals and normals (the last-named showing %6^ and the first 85), except that the lower indexes as far as yy were found in 2'6 per cent of criminals and in no normals, while the highest, from 85 upwards, existed in 54 per cent of criminals and in 20 per cent of normals.
Both Grimaldi and De Albertis noted a marked number of brachycephali among prostitutes.
Madame Tarnowsky, who is most to be relied upon for ethnical comparisons, gives the media of the cephalic index as almost identical in prostitutes, in thieves, and in moral women, the chief difference being the greater proportion of brachycephali among the first of these three classes.
The gonio-symphilic diameter is—
Io Russian normolt ... 93'g
„ praniliUcs ..- 94-a
,, thicvei ... - 9S-S
,, hamicula 96'6
the highest ntiinbcr being evidently among crin and prostitutes.
The facial angle is—
In KuuUn normali 73°'M
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„ homicidoa ,.. ... ji'ni
15. Ifair. —The hair of criminals and prostitutoi is darker than among normals.
The following comparative tabic is by Madamir.J Tarnowsky :—
Dark hsii .
Fair hnir Red hùr .
Prostitutes appear to have a smaller proixirtioi of dark hair than thicve.1, because the fair-haired specimens of their class are the most sought after, Marro already, even in his scanty figures, had noted a predominance of fair and red-haired women among the unchaste, and this observation accords with our own. His results were :—
An unusual quantity of hair is also frequent among criminal women.
Riccardi in a total of 33 prostitutes found 6 with an exaggerated amount of hair, 9 with a moderate quantity, and 4 with wavy hair. Fomasari among 60 found 48 with very abundant hair.
ArchiEoIogy, indeed, has furnished us with an example of thick, fair hair in Messalina, and records also the abundant tresses of Faustina,
Madame Tarnowsky, on the contrary, found only 13 per cent, of criminals with very thick hair.
Among the women most noticeable for their quantity of hair were Heberzeni, Trossarello, and Madame la Motte. Of the last-named, Samson, the executioner, observed, " The most remarkable thing about hep was her abundance of hair."
16. Iris. —The intensity of the pigments is still better proved by the dark colour of the eye, which is most frequent in prostitutes and thieves.
The following results are given by Madame Tarnowsky :—
She remarked that the grey or green irises were strewn in the proportion of 30 per cent with orange yellow spots.
17, Wrinkles. —Taking into account only the deeper wrinkles, I concluded, after examining 158 normals (working-women and peasantry) and 70
woman in question was born to do evil, and that, if one occasion to commit it had failed, she would have found others.
This characteristic is wanting among prostitutes.
18. W/it'le Aairs. —Not only is both senile and precocious greyness much more frequent in female than in male criminals, but it is even more common among the former than among normal women, who from our figures appear, contrary to assertions in treatises on the subject, to turn white sooner than men of the criminal class. Nor do these results
100 Normal women of
operative and peasant
classes 81 31 57 84 90 too
80 Criminal women ... 15 50 74 100 100 lOO
contradict the theory that greyness is in direct relation to psychical activity, for the female criminal, who is almost always a crìminaloid, is less than the male to the emotions of an agitated life ; while among normals, on the other hand, the woman grows grey later than the man, because she leads a much more tranquil life, and is much less sensitive and active than he.
19, Baldness. —Women do not turn bald more frequently than men, in spite of certain modes of coiffure which more or less spoil the hair, and in spite also of certain special physiological circumstances, such as pregnancy and childbirth, which tend to cause loss of hair. Still, in female criminals baldness is less common than among the normal class.
Wc find, for instance, the following percentages* baldness in women :—
35
20. Summary. —It must be confessed that thes accumulated figures do not amount to much, but th!(^ result is only natural. For if external dilfercntiations between criminal and normal subjects in general are few, they are still fewer in the female than in the male. We saw already from the cranium that stability of type is much greater in the woman, and diflerentiation much less, even when the skull is anomalous.
The following are our most important conclusions,
Stature, stretch of arms and length of limbs are less in all female criminals than in normals : and, in proportion to the stature, the average weight of prostitutes and murderesses is greater than in moral women.
Prostitutes have the longer hands and bigger calves ; while their feet are smaller. Their fingers, however, are less developed than their palms.
Female thieves, and above all prostitutes, are inferior to moral women in cranial capacity and circumference, and their cranial diameters are less ; but, on the other hand, their facial diameters are larger, especially in the jaw.
Criminals have the darker hair and eyes, and thj
holds good also to a certain extent of prostitutes, in whom fair and red hair now surpasses and now approximates to the normal.
Greyness, rarer in the normal woman (than in man), is more than twice as frequent in the criminal woman, and vice versa, in the latter baldness is /ess common both in youth and maturity ; and the same is true of wrinkles, these being markedly more frequent only in criminals of ripe years.
Little of all this can be positively affirmed of prostitutes, who are painted and made up when not (as is usual) very young; but so far as it is possible to judge, they are as little subject to precocious greyness and baldness as are congenital male criminals.
CHAPTER V.
FACIAL AND CEPHALIC ANOMALIES OF FEMALE CRIMINALS.
For the sake of brevity we append a table of the principal anomalies in the cephali and faces of female criminals and prostitutes, as observed by us and others. {See Table V.)
The prevailing characteristics are thus shown to be:—
Cranial asymmetry. —Present in 26 per cent, of criminals and in 32 per cent of prostitutes, with special prevalence among female assassins (46 per cent.) and poisoners (50 per cent). {See Plate I., Fig. 18.)
Platycepkali are common in 15 per cent of poisoners and in 2 per cent of thieves. The average among criminals of all classes is 8 per cent, while affong prostitutes the proportion falls to i '6 per cent only, which is about the figure of normals. Flatycephali, however, are not specifically characteristic {See Plate I., Fig. 14-J
Oxycepkali. — The percentages of this peculiarity are:—Among criminals, 135 ; among prostitutes,
I
I
- RliSIAN I'tM^LE OFrESr.1
269 ; and among criminals, murderesses stand highest, showing 22 per cent.
Receding foreheads are in the proportion of II per cent in criminals, 12 per cent in prostitutes, and only 8 per cent in normals.
Among Russian women the figures were: 14 per cent, for homicides, 10 per cent, for thieves, 16 per cent for prostitutes, and 2 per cent, for normal women.
Over-jutting brows were found by us in ij per cent of cases, by Salsotto in 6 per cent, and among normals in 8 per cent, by the writers ; while Madame Tarnowsky observed the feature in 6 per cent, of homicides, in 12 per cent of thieves, in 10 per cent, of prostitutes, and in 4 per cent, of normals, {See Plate I., 2, 14, 17, 20 iis; Plate II., 18, 24.)
Crania/ anomalies. —Present in 35*5 per cent of criminals and in 45 per cent of prostitutes.
Frontal anomalies. —Present in 20 per cent, of female delinquents, in 22 per cent of prostitutes, and in 6 per cent of normals. (See Plate I., 2, 17, and Plate IL, 17.)
Asymmetry of the face. —Present in 77 per cent of delinquents and in 1*8 per cent of prostitutes.
Enormous lower jaw. —Found in 15 per cent of delinquents, in 26 per cent, of prostitutes, in 9 per cent of normals. {See especially Plate I., 2, 3, 4, 7, 19, 20 ; Plate II., i, 15, 17, 23.)
Projecting cheek-bones. —Found among ig'gper cent, of criminals, especially murderesses (30 per cent), among 40 per cent of prostitutes, and 14 per cent of normals. (See Plate I., 3, 7, 9, 15, 20 ; Plate II., 2, 3, 4,6,7,8, 16, 17,23)
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AiwmatoHS «vm.—Giadmigo gives a complete tabic of the can in 245 cximnulit as compareci to 14000 normal women :—
From which the cooclusioa is that among criminals the anomalid are more than twice as frequent, with the exception only of Darwin*9 tubercle, which is, however, abnormal in Fig. 10, Plate L
Prt^tcting tars. — Proportion, among criminals observed by u.i 9*2 per cent., amoitg prostitutes 9^ per cent, normals 6 per cent As regards dclin-qucnts the peculiarity is most frequent in swindlers (17 per cent.), in woundcrs (iO'5 per cent), and in poisoners (15 per cent), (Set Plate I^ I, 2, 2 bis, 8, 13, 14, 17 ; Plate 11., 8. 12, 22, 23.)
Strabismus. —The percentage among delinquents is 8'5, among prcsttlutes 5, and normals 4 ; while as regards criminals the greater frequency is in thieves {16 per cent) and in poiioncra (ID per cent.).
Alito/ar prognathism. —Proixirtion among delinquents 7 per cent, assassins standing highest (12 per cent), and among prostitutes 13 per cent
Virile physiognomy. —This feature shows a percentage of il'Sin delinquents, 4 in prostitutes. {Set Plate I., 6, 6 bis, 30, 20 bis, and note how, especially in profile, the peculiarity gives a hard, cruel look to faces which on a front view are sometimes hand-
some ; for instance, 2,3, 8, 11,12, 16, 19. For prostitutes, see Plate II., 2i, 24.)
A crooked nose was found by us in 25 per cent of criminals, in 8 per cent, of prostitutes (Plate I., i, 2 òis, 5, 12).
A flat nose was noted in 40 per cent of normals, in 12 per cent of homicides, in 20 per cent of thieves, and in 12 per cent of prostitutes. {See Plate I., 10, 19; Plate XL, 8, 12, 13, 18.)
Mongoiian physiognomy. —Found in 13 per cent of criminals and in 7 per cent of prostitutes.
Asymmetry of the face is wanting in prostitutes. The proportion among thieves was 10 per cent only, and in homicides 6 per cent
Anomalous teeth. —Observed in 16 per cent of delinquents, in 28 per cent of prostitutes, in 8 per cent of normals. In Russia the figures were 40 per cent in homicides, 58 per cent in thieves, 78 per cent in prostitutes, and 2 per cent, in normals.
CHAPTER VI.
FURTHER ANOMALIES.
The list of characteristics of degeneration is not yetJ complete.
1. Moles. —Hairy moles form a feature that lias been but little studied, but must be added to those which mark degeneration in the female subject. It is a kind of indirect supplement of the beard, by which the female approximates to the male. We have noted it among normals in 14 per cent-, among criminals in 6 per cent., among prostitutes in 41 per cent
Gurricri found it, however, only in 8 per cent of the latter. Zola mentions the moles of Nana and J those of the profligate Countess, her worthy rival.
2. Hairviess. —Among 234 prostitutes one of the present writers, like Ardii, found a virile quantity of hair in IJ per cent, as against 5-6 per cent in normals and 5 per cent, in criminals.
On the other hand, down which is present in 6 per cent of prostitutes in Russia and in 2 per cent of homicides is wanting in thieves and in normals in 1 that country. In Italy it was found in II percent.
of normals, in 36 per cent, of homicides, and in 13 per cent of thieves and infanticides.
In No. 7 of Plate I. it is seen to form almost a beard.
3. Madame Tarnowsky observed yet another series of anomalies, which the writers did not find in their subjects, and which seem to be characteristic of Russian women. This is a cleft palate, which she found among 8 per cent, of normals and 14 per cent of homicides, among 18 per cent, of thieves and 12 per cent of prostitutes. She remarked asymmetry of the eyebrows (of which there is a striking example in No. 18, Plate I.) among 4 per cent of normals, 40 per cent, of homicides, 20 per cent of thieves, and 44 per cent of prostitutes.
4. Masseter muscles, —Madame Tarnowsky found another peculiar feature in 6 per cent, of homicides and in 4 per cent of thieves (while it was wanting in both prostitutes and normals). This was an unusual development of the masseter muscles, which was doubtless to be connected with the exaggerated size of the jaws.
Yet another, still more singular and atavistic, peculiarity which she noted in two criminals, was hypertrophy of the muscles of the neck, such as may be seen in large quadrupeds. {See Plate
I., 8.)
5. Prehensile foot —From observations made by Ottolenghi and Carrara it seems that the prehensile foot in normal women is almost three times as frequent as in normal men, being as 11 to 28. In iemale criminals it is only a little rarer than in
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
normals {24). In prostitutes the proportion (42) j almost double tliat observed among nofmals.
B*sis ffom B mm. upwards.
Buisfrom 3 mm. ujwnr
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In one out of 60 prostitutes Gurrieri found tha^ the second and third toe coalesced as far as the small I phalange.
6. T'ife larynx 0/prostitutes offers set^eral anomalies. \ ■ —Professor Masini in 50 prostitutes ' found IS • " .A.rch. di p»ich.," liv., fate i.-ii.
with deep voices, and vocal chords that were large in proportion to the size of the laryngeal opening. Twenty-seven had still more masculine voices, with high bursts of sound followed by low, deep tones.
On external observation the larynxes of these women were of normal movement in all. Chiefly remarkable was the exaggerated size of the wings of the thyroid, and a very flat thyroid angle. To this external conformation the glottis corresponded in width ; the vocal chords were thick and close together ; the vocal tubercle was marked, and the bases of the arytenoid cartilages very wide.
In each case the larynx resembled a man, thus showing once again the virility of face and cranium characteristic of the prostitute class.
7. Summary. —Almost all anomalies occur more frequently in prostitutes than in female offenders, and both classes have a larger number of the characteristics of degeneration than normal women.
Only the asymmetrical face, strabismus, virile and ' Mongolian types of physiognomy are more common among criminals than among prostitutes ; while outstanding ears are only a little less frequent in the former than in the latter class.
Prostitutes are almost quite free from wrinkles, hypertrophy of the masseters, platycephali, crooked noses and asymmetrical faces ; what they have more frequently are moles, hairiness, prehensile feet, the virile larynx, large jaws and cheek-bones, and above all anomalous teeth. That is to say they show fewer of the anomalies which produce ugliness, but are marked by more of the signs of degeneration.
THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
If we compare infanticides who, from Uie vet nature of their oftciice, depart least from the type t normals, with other delinquents, we find percentagi such as are recorded in Table VI. (s^e following page).* They are least subject to asymmetry, to strabismus, to virility of face, to anomalous teeth and cheekbones, but have, more frequently than others, peculiarities of the ears and hydrocephalic heads, Female poisoners, thieves, and assassins are most remarkable for cranial asymmetrj' and strabismus ; while tile female assassin has most often a virile and. Mongolian type of face.
Female homicides and poisoners offer most i sniples of cranial depressions and diasthema of thdfl teeth ; and incendiaries are most characterised by flafca and deformed noses.
Homicides, poisoners, and incendiaries have the more prominent check-bones, and infanticides resemble them in showing the largest number of asymmetrical faces and exaggerated jaws ; but on the whole the type of murderesses (whether assassins or poisoners) is more degenerate than that of infanti cides.
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CHAPTER VII.
PHOTOGRAPHS OF CRIMINALS AND PROSTITUTES.
Anybody wishing to observe with his own eyes the anomalies we have detailed will derive assistance from Plates I., 11., III., which contain photographs of French and Russian prostitutes and delinquents.
If asked why we have chosen these examples from distant countries, we can but reply that, beyond not finding in any other European land a co-operation so intelligent as that afforded by Madame Tamowsky, we are also hampered by juridical considerations.
Among the most ridiculous of the prohibitions obtaining in Italy, or rather in the Italian bureaucracy, which is certainly not the first in Europe, is the absolute impossibility of measuring, studying, or phott^raphing the worst criminals once they have been condemned.
So long as there is a presumption of innocence, so long as these persons are only suspected or accused, one can discredit them in every way, and hold them up to publicity by recording their answers to their judges.
But once it is admitted beyond question that
they are reprobates, once the prison doors have closed for good upon them—oh, then they become sacred ; and woe to him who touches, woe to him who studies them !
Consumptive patients, pregnant women, may be manipulated, even to their hurt, by thousands of students for the good of science ; but criminals-Heaven forefend !
When one of the writers wished to publish photographs of male criminals in his " Uomo Delinquente," he was driven to the German prison "album"; and the difficulties thrown in his way by the Italian authorities were doubled in the case of female offenders and prostitutes, whose sense of shame it was considered necessary to respect in every way.
In Russian prisons Madame Tarnowsky was afforded every facility, and after making a complete study of the body and mind of the delinquents, she forwarded us their photc^raphs.
T. Female criminals. —We will first take 5 homicides, of whom the two .first have the true type of their class. (i« Plate I.)
The first, aged 40, kilted her husband with reiterated blows of a hatchet, while he was skimming the milk, then threw his body into a recess under the stairs, and during the night fled with the family money and her own trinkets. She was arrested a week later and confessed her crime. This woman was remarkable for the asymmetry of her face ; her nose was hollowed out, her ears projecting, her brows more fully developed than is usual in a woman, her jaw enormous with a lemurian appendix.
THS PEUALB OFFENDER.
No. 2, aged 6a Was constantly ill-treated 1 her husband, whom she finally joined with her son in strangling, hanging him afterwards so as to favour the idea of suicide.
Here again we have asymmetry of the face, breadth J of jaw, enormous frontitl sinuses, numerous wrinkle^fl a hullowed-out nose, a very thin upper lip, with deep^ set ej-es wide apart, and wild in expression.
No. 3, aged ar. Was married against her will ill-treated by her husband, whom she killed, after a^ night altercation, with a hatchet while he slept
In her we find only a demi-type. Her ears stand out, she has big jaws and cheek-bones, and very black hair, besides other anomalie.s which do not show in the photograph, such as gigantic canine teeth and dwarf incisors.
No. 4, aged 44. Strangled her husband by agreement with her lover, and threw him into a ditch. She denied her crime. Ho!iowed-out nose, black hair, deep-set eyes, big jaw. Demi-type.
No. 5, aged 50. A peasant. She killed her brother at supper, so as to inherit from him. She denied her guilt persistently. Was condemned, together with her hired accomplices, to twenty years" penal servitude She had black hair, grey eyes, diasthema of the teeth, a cleft palate, precocious and profound wrinkles, thin lips, and a crooked face. Demi-type.
Passing now to poisoners, we find the following to be the most remarkable out of twenty-three :—
No. 6, aged 36. Of a rich family, with an epileptic mother, and a father addicted to alcohol. She poisoned her husband with arsenic after sixteen years
CRIMINALS A^■D PROSTITUTES. gì
of married life. Nose hollowed out and club-shaped, large jaws and ears, squint eyes, weak reflex action of left patella. She confessed nothing. Character resolute and devout Type.
No. 7, aged 34, Also poisoned her husband with arsenic ; also denied her guilt An enormous under jaw. On close examination displayed gigantic incisors, and down so long as to resemble a beard. Demi-type.
No. 8, aged 64. Poisoned her son's wife and the mother of the same. Deep wrinkles, ears much higher than the level of the brows. A singularity is the size of the neck-muscles, exaggerated as in oxen. Thin lips, and a cleft palate. Demi-type,
No. 9, a peasant, aged 47. Poisoned her daughter-in-law because of inability to work. Fluent in speech, never confessed the crime. Asymmetrical face, oblique eyes {a feature, however, which might be ethnological), huge, unequal jaws, small ears, nose " club-shaped and hollowed out On a near view she displayed big canine teeth, and a great parieto-occi-pital depression. Her children like her grandfather were epileptic. Type.
No. 10, aged 20. Attempted to poison her husband, an old man, who treated her ill. Darwin's lobule was enormously developed in her ear, as may be seen even from the photc^raph. Hydrocephalic forehead, nose hollowed out and club-shaped, lai^e, unequal jaws, eyes and hair black. Type.
No, II, aged 35. Poisoned her daughter-in-law, for an unknown reason, with some medicine. Fair hair, asymmetrical face, overlapping teeth. Guilt confessed
TtIS FKHALB OPFMNDtJt.
Now we come to tbc tnccndUrics, of whom there are lO, Umt of a strilcing type.
No, 12. Set fire to the village palEsadcs to revci^ bcrscir on some malignant gouip&. A large nose, thin lips, lowering expression, «riih incisors replaced by molars. Type.
No. 13, aged 63. Sets fire to a netgfabour'a house because of a quarrel about money. Denkd the offence. Defective teeth, big, teline eyes, very Urge cars, asymmetry of cj-ebrows. Dcmi-typc.
No. 14, aged 25. Set fire, in concert with her husband, to a neighbour's house out of re%-er^e Sbe accused her husband and denied her own complicity. Many wrinkles, projecting parietal bones, big carsartd ' jaws, tow forehead. Dcmi't>'pe. 1
No. I s, aged 41. A pca.«ant Set fire to nine houses out of revenge ; pretended to have done it while drunk. Very ferocious countenance, asymmetrical, with enormous cars and jaws. Sullen, very black eye», fair hair, diasthema of the incisors, narrow arch of palate. Type.
No. 16, aged 45. Convicted more than once as a receiver, who had twice hidden convicts in her house. Crooked face and teeth, hollowed-out nose, large, prognathous face, enormous superciliary arches.
Out of 9 infanticides, 3 presented the salient type.
No. 17, aged 6a Killed a newborn babe to save ] her daughter's reputation. Cut the infant into piet and hid ÌL Confessed nothing. A strong character. Many wrinkleti, enormous check-bones, cars, and frontal sinuses. Right side of face higher than the left. Forehead receding as in savages. Canine teeth
gigantic and badly placed. Sunken eyes, brownish-green in colour.
No. 18, aged 60. Assisted her daughter to drown the latter's newborn child ; then afterwards accused the daughter, in consequence of a quarrel about a lover whom the two women shared.
Physiognomy relatively good, in spite of the subject's licentious tendencies which age could not eradicate. Nothing anomalous beyond the hollowed-out nose and very wrinkled skin. The face, however, though it does not appear so in the photograph, was really asymmetrical, and the woman had the cleft palate and fleshy lips which betray a luxurious disposition.
No. 19, aged 19, the domestic servant of a priest, had a child, of which the father was a stable-boy. Driven out of every house, she killed her child by beating it on the frozen ground. Crooked face, a hollowed-out nose, big ears and jaws, incisors overlapping.
Finally comes a female brigand—No. 20, aged 25. Was the companion in arms of a band of brigands, one of whom was her lover. A hollowed-out nose, large jaws and ears, a virile physiognomy ; and in her also there is congenital division of the palate.
Many may find that after all these faces are not horrible, and I agree, so far, that they appear infinitely less repulsive when compared with corresponding classes among the men whose portraits were reproduced by us from the " Atlas de L'Homme Criminel." Among some of the females there is even a ray of beauty, as in Nos. 19 and 20 ; but when this beauty exists it is much more virile than feminine.
TJÌE FEMALE OFFENDER.
To understand this at once, let ihe reader Ic lower profile in Nos. 20 6is, 6 and 6 ^is, even the most inexperienced will see how hard, cruet, and masculine are these lines, which yet are not wanting in grace.
It is useful also to remark the physiognomical resemblance among the most diiTerent criminals. Nos. 6. 10, 9, and 3 look like members of the same family. And let anybody compare these with the few French tliievesreproduced by Mace' (Plate IIIOi and he will sec how little race can do ; for the French women seem Russians, and the Russians French. No. 2, for instance, in Plate III., in her Jaws and long face, resembles No. 7 in Plate I., who is a ! Nos. 4 and 8 are like the sisters of Nos. 2 and [ Russians, having the same oblique eyes, big, hollowed'J out noses, and precocious wrinkles ; while No. 9, Plate III., resembles No. 30, Plate I. All have the same repulsive, virile air, the same big, sensual lips, &c.
The French women, however, are infinitely more typical and uglier, and here I would remark that the more refined a nation is, the further do its criminals difTcr from the average. It is, for instance, well known in Russia that among Tartar criminals the depraved type is less striking than in the Russians, especially those who arc natives of Moscow and St. Petersburg (Kcnnan's "Siberia," ii.).
The photographs (/re Plate III.) chosen haphazard
from the note-books of Maci {a police official who
was certainly unbiased and quite ignorant of criminal
anthropology) only confirm our conclusions ; for there
' " Mon Musie Criminel," Paiis, 1S90, p. 148.
are but three out of all the examples, namely, Nos. I, 3, and 7, who show either a small number of abnormal features (such as big ears and lower jaws, very black hair, strong brows, and coarse full lips), or else show them to a limited degree.
Among the rest of the specimens eight or nine anomalies are present, and the type is often complete.
Note, in No. 2, the immense jaws, thick lips, crooked face, the oblique, squinting, cruel eyes ; in No. 6 the marked strabismus, the sessile ear, the asymmetrical face ; in Nos. 4 and 5 a repetition of these peculiarities ; and in No. 8 the flat, crooked nose, low forehead, and slanting eyes. In every instance the jaws are huge. The types are singularly virile. Nos. 2, 4, 5, 8, and 9 are striking examples, having the bodies of women, but all the air of brutal men : whom they resemble sometimes, even in their dress.
Nos. 12 and 13 are German women, whose vertical wrinkles and thin lips seem to me to mark them out as thieves.
A typical assassin is No. 14, also a German, with her still, glassy eyes, big jaw, and masculine aspect.
Characteristic again is No. 10 (Plate III.), a certain Z., first a prostitute, then a thief, finally a murderess, who killed her guest and calumniated her benefactor, but was absolved on her trial. For, although handsome at first sight, she presents, nevertheless, all the features which I consider typically criminal : immensely thick, black hair, a receding forehead, over-jutting brows, and an exaggerated frontal angle, such as one notes in savages and monkeys ; while the
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Still mme typically bocnkidal and lafdriooa. io I (/ffinicm, il the female crnatnaJ Bcrland.' Here i h«ve sunken eyca, a receding Ibrdicad. a unall li •eMJle ear», numcroui deep, precocious wrinkles, tà ctmiktil iipM, a Hal, crooked oofc, which airvod ( ward», n receding chin, and a virile physiognoi d'lK». 7. 8)-
Talmeyr (Sur U Ban^ has painted a verità iMftd of ADUMiini and thieves, of which the leader was
* " Ar<*-l<»'« il'Anthri^pcil'-gM CrEmlncnc," Lyoni. 1891.
■ t ••■■• ttira< iwii )«>niBÌU III the kinitneu of l^nnce RoUnd tkma-
EH«, bIiii inaKiiti «tic nl ihe fineii ■nihropotueJtsil oollcciloQ» in IN>|«, «nil wIk) hul ihc llkencMc* done »pfd*Ily lui me.
Gabrielle Bom paro.
a working woman, who was always drunk, had corrupted her own son, led the most profligate life, and little by little had turned all the men she had to do with, her son not excepted, into a gang of murderers.
Another woman, Thomas by name (Figs. 9, 10), was profligate and drunken, besides habitually practising abortion as a profession. She always fell into a dipso-epileptic state after accomplishing her crime. She resembled Nos. 4 and 8, Plate III., and was remarkable for facial asymmetry, sessile, protruding ears, a crooked nose, thin, crooked lips, and many wrinkles.
These two photographs give a very good idea of the criminal type in women, which evidently is less brutal than the corresponding type in the male offender.
Very often, too, in women, the type is disguised by youth with its absence of wrinkles and the plumpness which conceals the size of the jaw and cheek-bones, thus softening the masculine and savage features.
Then when the hair is black and plentiful (as in No. ID, Plate III.), and the eyes are bright, a not unpleasing appearance is presented. In short, let a female delinquent be young and we can overlook her degenerate type, and even regard her as beautiful ; the sexual instinct misleading us here as it does in making us attribute to women more of sensitiveness and passion than they really possess. And in the same way, when she is being tried on a criminal charge, we are inclined to excuse, as noble impulses of passion, acts which arise from the most cynical calculations.
gS THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
For this reason many will hardly agree with us fl finding the criminal tj-pe in No, lO, Plate V., nor y in Messalina, who, all flattered thougli she was by contemporary writers, >'et offers many of the features of the criminal and born prostitute—having a low forehead, very thick, wavy hair, and a heavy jaw,
Magnan {see "Actes du 2* Congrès d'Anthropo-It^e Criminclle," Paris, l88g) mentions the foUowìn examples, as showing the absence of the type peculi] to born criminals,
Mai^herita, the first of the two, must be admittc not to show, on a casual view, the usual charactcristici of degeneration ; but when one learns that she is onl]? 12 years of age, one can but feel surprise at her^ unusual precocity, for her physiognomy is that of a woman of twenty. She has very strong jaws and cheek-bones, sessile ears, hypertrophy of the middle incisors, atrophy of the lateral teeth, and dulncss of the sense of touch. She is, in short, the complcle type, not of a bom criminal, but of a prostitute and yet Magnan mentions her as completely noi typical I
VVc Icara that her fits of anger were violent ; she broke everything, threatened her mother, stole and incited her brother to steal. She used to bit) her little brothi-r without any motive, and putting I pin between her teeth would invite him to kiss ha Her memory was good. What chiefly distìngui her were sexual disorders, and especially an invincible tendency to onanism. " I would be glad not t do it," she said to her mother, " but I cannot he]£^ myself."
All medical remedies were useless. At 11 years of age she underwent chloridectomy, and the bandages were hardly removed when the old practices recommenced.
Let us take the next example, that of a born thief.
Louise C. (Magnan writes of her), aged 9, was the daughter of a mad father, always in a condition ot sexual excitement. She was of weak intelligence ; her instincts had always been bad, her conduct turbulent, and her mind incapable of concentration.
At three she was a thief, and laid hands on her mother's money, on articles in shops, on everything, in short, that came in her way. At five she was arrested and conveyed to the police-office, after a determined resistance. Her habits were vagabond and unruly. She shrieked, tore off her stockings, threw her dolls into the gutter, lifted up her skirts in the street
Magnan asserts that she has no morbid peculiarity of face; but on looking at her photograph (Fig. 13), one perceives that, although only nine years old, she offers the exact type of the born criminal. Her physiognomy is Mongolian, her jaws and cheek-bones are immense; the frontal sinuses strong, the nose flat, with a prognathous under-jaw, asymmetry of face, and above all, precocity and virility of expression. She looks like a grown woman—nay, a man.
Precocity and virility of aspect is the double characteristic of the criminal-woman, and serves more than any other feature to destroy and mask her type.
2. Prostitutes. — With the aid of Madame Tar-
lOO THE FEMALE OFFENDER.
nowsky we have examined loo prostitutes, all from Moscow, and all aged from i8 to 20 years. We do not undertake to say that among them there are no Germans and no Jewesses ; but the greater number are Russians from Moscow. {See Plate II.)
Contrarily to criminals, these women are relatively, if not generally, beautiful ; still among them there is not wanting the type which we are accustomed to regard as the criminal one ; but it is only found in lO per cent, of the examples, being especially marked in Nos, i8, 23, 16, 2, 3, la In 15 per cent, we have only a half-type ; and in all the examples there are the characteristics of madness as well as of criminality. Observe Nos, 17, 18, ig, 22, 23, where the wild eyes and perturbed countenance, together with facial asymmetry, recall women seen in asylums for the insane, especially the maniacal cases.
The faces of these women are singularly monotonous as compared to those of criminals. Nos. 1,2, 3, 4, 6, 8,12, and 14, seem all to have the same face, the same jaws, cheek-bones, and hair.
Some of the photographs are quite pretty. No. 25 might be called a Russian Helen, and No. 20 is very handsome in spite of her hard expression. The first fifteen might pass in the streets for beauties; and indeed our more fashionable cocoUes have exactly the same type. Ninon de Lenclos and Marion were justly celebrated for their beauty.
This absence of ill-favouredness and want of typical criminal characteristics will militate with many against our contention that prostitutes are after all equivalents of criminals, and possess the same qualities
CRIMINALS AND PROSTITUTES. TOI
in an exaggerated form. But in addition to the fact that true female criminals are much less ugly than their male companions, we have in prostitutes women of great youth, in whom the beauti du diable^ with its freshness, plumpness, and absence of wrinkles, disguises and conceals the betraying anomalies.
Moreover, most people do not find ugliness in the black, thick hair (Nos. i to 8, 21 and 22), outstanding nose (Nos. i, 2, 9, 11, 12, 16,17, 18, 21, 23, 24), strong jaw (Nos. I to IS, 17, 21, 23), hard,spent glance, which we have pronounced to be characteristics of degeneration, and which distinguish all these examples except Nos. 16, 21, and 22, with their wild air, and Nos. 5 and 28 with their beautiful ^y^s. And yet another thing to be remembered is, that the profession of these women necessitates a comparative absence of peculiarities which, when existing, excite disgust and repulsion, and require as much as possible to be artificially concealed. Most certainly the art of making up, imposed by their trade on all these unfortunates, disguises or hides many characteristic features which criminals exhibit openly. And it may happen, therefore, that we are only permitted to see abundant hair, black eyes, and absence of wrinkles, where acquaintance with reality would reveal the exact opposite.