Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 5 | Page 9

Havelock Ellis
every part of her body. Her conduct was discovered by means of other children who peeped through the keyhole, and she was placed under Penta for treatment. In this case the loss of moral and mental inhibition, due probably to troubles of the climacteric, led to indulgence, under abnormal conditions, in those primitive contacts which are normally the beginning of love, and these, supported by the ideal image of the early lover, constituted a complete and adequate symbol of natural love in a morbidly perverted individual. (P. Penta, Archivio delle Psicopatie Sessuali, January, 1896.)
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The term "erotic symbolism" has already been employed by Eulenburg (Sexuale Neuropathie, 1895, p. 101). It must be borne in mind that this term, implying the specific emotion, is much narrower than the term "sexual symbolism," which may be used to designate a great variety of ritual and social practices which have played a part in the evolution of civilization.
[2] Sexual Selection in Man, iv, "Vision."
[3] K. Groos, Der ?sthetische Genuss, p. 122. The psychology of the associations of contiguity and resemblance through which erotic symbolism operates its transference is briefly discussed by Ribot in the Psychology of the Emotions, Part 1, Chapter XII; the early chapters of the same author's Logique des Sentiments may also be said to deal with the emotional basis on which erotic symbolism arises.
[4] A number of synonyms for the female pudenda are brought together by Schurig--cunnus, hortus, concha, navis, fovea, larva, canis, annulus, focus, cymba, antrum, delta, myrtus, etc.--and he discusses many of them. (Muliebria, Section I, cap. I.)
[5] Kleinpaul, Sprache Ohne Worte, pp. 24-29; cf. K. Pearson, on the general and special words for sex, Chances of Death, vol. ii, pp. 112-245; a selection of the literature of the rose will be found in a volume of translations entitled Ros Rosarum.
[6] G.S. Hall, Adolescence, vol. i, p. 470.
[7] Goron, Les Parias de l'Amour, p. 45.
[8] A.R. Reynolds, Medical Standard, vol. x, cited by Kiernan, "Responsibility in Sexual Perversion," American Journal of Neurology and Psychiatry, 1882.
[9] R. Burton, Anatomy of Melancholy,


Part III, Section II, Mem. II,
Subs. II, and Mem. III, Subs. I.
[10] Numerous examples are given by Moll, Kontr?re Sexualempfindung, third edition, pp. 265-268.
[11] Chevalier (De l'Inversion, 1885; id., L'Inversion Sexuelle, 1892, p. 52), followed by E. Laurent (L'Amour Morbide, 1891, Chapter X), separates this group from other fetichistic perversions, under the head of "azo?philie." I see no adequate ground for this step. The various forms of fetichism are too intimately associated to permit of any group of them being violently separated from the others.
[12] This has already been considered as a perversion founded on vision, in discussing Sexual Selection in Man. IV.

II.
Foot-fetichism and Shoe-fetichism--Wide Prevalence and Normal Basis--Restif de la Bretonne--The Foot a Normal Focus of Sexual Attraction Among Some Peoples--The Chinese, Greeks, Romans, Spaniards, etc.--The Congenital Predisposition in Erotic Symbolism--The Influence of Early Association and Emotional Shock--Shoe-fetichism in Relation to Masochism--The Two Phenomena Independent Though Allied--The Desire to be Trodden On--The Fascination of Physical Constraint--The Symbolism of Self-inflicted Pain--The Dynamic Element in Erotic Symbolism--The Symbolism of Garments.
Of all forms of erotic symbolism the most frequent is that which idealizes the foot and the shoe. The phenomena we here encounter are sometimes so complex and raise so many interesting questions that it is necessary to discuss them somewhat fully.
It would seem that even for the normal lover the foot is one of the most attractive parts of the body. Stanley Hall found that among the parts specified as most admired in the other sex by young men and women who answered a questionnaire the feet came fourth (after the eyes, hair, stature and size).[13] Casanova, an acute student and lover of women who was in no degree a foot fetichist, remarks that all men who share his interest in women are attracted by their feet; they offer the same interest, he considers, as the question of the particular edition offers to the book-lover.[14]
In a report of the results of a questionnaire concerning children's sense of self, to which over 500 replies were received, Stanley Hall thus summarizes the main facts ascertained with reference to the feet: "A special period of noticing the feet comes somewhat later than that in which the hands are discovered to consciousness. Our records afford nearly twice as many cases for feet as for hands. The former are more remote from the primary psychic focus or position, and are also more often covered, so that the sight of them is a more marked and exceptional event. Some children become greatly excited whenever their feet are exposed. Some infants show signs of fear at the movement of their own knees and feet covered, and still more often fright is the first sensation which signalizes the child's discovery of its feet.... Many are described as playing with
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