Nymphomania vs. Satyriasis

Nineteenth-century professional journals, medical textbooks, and encyclopedias often declared that satyriasis was the equivalent of nymphomania. Yet, in keeping with their belief that women were less highly sexed than men, many doctors took for granted that the male disease occurred far less frequently. Medical men also assumed that nymphomania, as a disease, was much more severe than satyriasis. The consequences predicted for the nymphomaniac were generally worse than those for the satyriasist; a nymphomaniac's fate was prostitution or the insane asylum, while at least some physicians thought that a satyriasist might go through life without getting into trouble if he learned to control himself.

Further, many doctors recognized—although they publicly criticized the fact—that it was easier for men to fulfill their sexual desires in "illicit indulgences." According to an influential English psychiatrist and editor of the Journal of Mental Science, Henry Maudsley, such liaisons were "openly condemned, secretly practiced, and tacitly condoned."

The case studies of satyriasis, both in mental institutions and in private treatment, vary enormously. Like nymphomania, cases of satyriasis included men who openly masturbated, exhibited their genitals, and sexually attacked women, children, and mental institution attendants. Similarly, the causes of satyriasis were varied: genital inflammation, lesions of the "cerebro-spinal system," brain tumors, use of opium, and extreme sexual abstinence or overindulgence. Some medical authorities confused satyriasis with "priapism," an extremely painful condition in which a man's penis remains erect for hours and even days. Castration was sometimes used as a treatment for satyriasis, but this drastic procedure does not appear to have been a routine treatment for mental disorders in men. Moreover, none of the satyriasis cases presented male behavior equivalent to the flirting, lascivious glances, or wearing of perfume, which was sometimes called "mild nymphomania."

The standards of behavior for women were, of course, much stricter than those for men. And some doctors recognized the role that social strictures played in limiting women's sexual expression. At an 1869 meeting of the Boston Gynecological Society, a woman diagnosed with nymphomania was brought before the gathered doctors. Typical of these medical presentations, the patient wore a mask, presumably to protect her identity. Even so, we can assume that exposure to a roomful of physicians must have been excruciating for this unnamed Victorian woman. One doctor responded to her in a patronizing, but possibly sympathetic manner: "If this woman could go ... to a house of prostitution, and spend every night for a fortnight at sexual labor, it might prove her salvation." He hastily concluded that, of course, no physician could recommend such a course of treatment.

In the nineteenth century, sex had become fraught for both men and women; bourgeois respectability demanded increased control, moderation, and self-discipline. Middle-class women in particular were expected to be a model of purity, to control men's lusts by the strength of their example. Although we do not know how the great majority of women coped with these moral pressures, some at least—like Mrs. B. in the following case—internalized contemporary notions of illness and consulted doctors with their sexual fears and concerns.

Full article:
Nymphomania
A History
By CAROL GRONEMAN
W. W. Norton & Company