In 1749, Professor Beccaria, of Bononia, published his work entitled Scriptura Medico-Legalis, and Bononi in his Istruzioni Teorico pratiche di Chirurg: entered with considerable minuteness into the subject of Forensic Surgery, especially in its relations to wounds. The later production however, of Giuseppe Tortosa[[35]], the disciple of Caldani, must be considered as the most elaborate and scientific of all the Italian works on Medical Jurisprudence. The reader will find that we have frequently referred to this author; and it is just to state, that during the progress of our labours we have derived from him no inconsiderable assistance, in ascertaining the sentiments of the Medical Jurists of the Italian school, upon various casuistical as well as physiological doctrines. The work is professed to have been written with the sanction of his master, Caldani, and under the auspices of Franck of Pavia, and of Plouquet of Turin. He includes in his plan such subjects only as relate to Forensic Medicine, excluding those which belong more correctly to the department of Medical Police. The work is divided into three parts, viz. 1. Comprehending all the principal objects of Ecclesiastical jurisdiction. 2. Subjects relating to the Civil courts. 3. Those which relate to the Criminal courts. The subdivisions of each part are arranged in the following order. Part I.—Conjugal Impotence.—Conjugal Rites.—Monstrous Births.—Hermaphrodites.—Magic.—Of Persons possessed of Spirits.—Miracles.—Ecclesiastical Fasting. Part II. Age.—Pregnancy.—Birth.—Superfœtation.—Cæsarean Operation.—Simulated and Dissimulated Diseases. Part III. Of Deflowering.—Sodomy.—Torture.—Legal Examination of Wounds, and Dead Bodies.—Poisoning.—Infanticide.—Homicide by wounding.—Fœticide.—Accidental Death.
The application of Medical science to jurisprudence may, practically considered, be said to have commenced in France about the time of Francis I; but it was not until after the publication of the Constitutio Criminalis Carolina, that the French government, unwilling to allow their criminal code to remain less perfect and refined than that of their continental neighbours, decreed that the assistance of physicians and surgeons should be legally required; and which was at length rendered still more peremptory by letters patent granted by Henry IV, in 1606, conferring upon his first physician the privilege of nominating surgeons in every town to the exclusive exercise of this important duty; and Louis XIV. in 1667, after having formally declared, that all Reports which had not received the sanction of such an officer should be invalid, ordered by a decree, in 1692, that a physician shall always be present with the surgeon, at the examination of a body[[36]]; the surgeons, however, of those times were not distinguished by the knowledge which they now possess; hence, in every thing that did not directly involve surgical discussion and practice, their reports were frequently defective. Magistrates were consequently induced to summon the more learned physician to the assistance of the Juridical Surgeon, long before it was enforced by the law; a practice, which like many others, acquired force and regularity from repetition.
Ambrose Paré is acknowledged as the first French writer on the subject of Juridical Medicine, and his treatise on Reports, published in 1575, was, for nearly a century, regarded as the only standard authority upon these occasions; it was, however, at length, to a great degree, superseded by the more accomplished treatises of Gendri of Angers, in 1650, of Blegni of Lyons, in 1684, and of Deveaux of Paris, in 1693. This latter work is one of very considerable merit, especially as it regards the diagnosis and prognosis of wounds.
The eighteenth century, says Foderé[[37]], an æra remarkable for the conversion of the human mind from the enthusiasm of poetry and the fine arts, to the cultivation and study of the exact sciences, must be considered as the auspicious dawn of medico-legal knowledge in France. The spirit of emulation which animated the rival schools of Surgery and Medicine, produced men, who enlightened by their talents every department of the science of Medicine. Professor Louis, Secretary to the Academy of Surgery, taught publicly in the schools the art of resolving different questions in medical jurisprudence, which previous to his time had never been practised. Numerous memoirs on its various branches appeared in succession; eloquence allied itself to science, and their combined efforts were displayed in this novel mode of benefiting mankind. Upon the great principles of justice and humanity which presided at the reform of the penal code, chairs of medical jurisprudence were established in all the faculties of medicine. In 1788, Louis published at Paris his letters on the certainty of the signs of death, in answer to the dissertations of Winslow and Bruhier; and of whose judicious remarks we have availed ourselves in the discussion of the subjects of “Real and Apparent Death.” (Vol. II. p. 15). To the same author we are also indebted for memoirs on Drowning, and on the means of distinguishing Suicide from Assassination in cases of death by suspension. His Consultations on the celebrated causes of Monbailly, Syrven, Calas, Cassagneux, and Baronet, which are recorded in the “Causes Célébres,” must serve to exalt him still higher in our estimation. Winslow engaged his talents in the investigation of the Cæsarean Operation, including its moral, political, and religious relations. Petit and Bouvart entered the field as controversialists, and disputed the opinions of Louis on protracted pregnancy, with considerable ability. The former of these philosophers wrote also several memoirs on the phenomena of suspension and strangulation; he, moreover, examined the question relative to the signs of death from abstinence. Lorry discussed the question of survivorship with great acuteness and judgment. Salin attempted to deduce from the character of the organic lesions, an inference with respect to the nature of the poison that inflicted them; and he illustrated this opinion in an elaborate memoir on the research of the traces of poison on the body of Lamotte, sixty-seven days after it had been deposited in the earth; in which he decides that the death was occasioned by corrosive sublimate.[[38]] And although the nice distinctions which this ingenious writer laboured to establish never had any existence but in his own imagination, yet the agitation of so important a question was by no means unprofitable; it directed the attention of the physician to the state of the organic lesions, and has ultimately led to some useful conclusions. While Salin was thus engaged on the subject of poisoning, Lafosse sought to distinguish the phenomena produced by death, from the traces of violence inflicted during life upon the body. He, moreover, developed the unequivocal signs of pregnancy and parturition. Professor Chaussier, in the year 1789, by a memoir, to the Academy of Sciences at Dijon, on the great importance of the study of juridical medicine, excited a spirit of emulation which was productive of the highest advantage. At about this period also the memorable “Encyclopédie Méthodique,” was undertaken, in which the celebrated authors already named contributed their powerful assistance, in conjunction with Professor Mahon, in compiling the elaborate articles upon Medical Jurisprudence. Such were the materials, says M. Foderé, which enabled me to publish my first systematic work[[39]] on this science in the year 1796.
In the first few years of the present century the science of juridical medicine received numerous contributions from the French physicians. M. Vigné, of Rouen, published in 1805 his humane and enlightened reflections upon its practical applications; a work which bears internal evidence of the science as well as the judgment of its author. In the year 1807, the system of Professor Mahon appeared, not, however, until after the death of its author; M. Fautrel having undertaken the charge of arranging the manuscript, of illustrating it with notes, and of giving it to the world.[[40]] Nearly at the same time the small, but useful work of Belloc[[41]] was published; and in the following year Marc[[42]] translated the German manual of Rose on juridical dissection, and enriched it with original observations; to which he also subjoined two memoirs on the obscure subject of the “Docimasia Pulmonaris.” We have deemed it necessary to introduce to our readers this slight sketch of the literary history of Medical Jurisprudence in relation to its progress in the several countries of Germany, Italy, and France; for much of the information thus afforded we are indebted to the elaborate system of Professor Foderé,[[43]] published in six volumes, in the year 1813, and which must be regarded as a new work, rather than the republication of that already noticed, as having appeared in 1796. From this voluminous treatise we have frequently, in the progress of our present undertaking, made copious extracts. It becomes our duty therefore to present our reader with some account of the extent of its objects, and the order of their arrangement. The author divides his work into three parts, viz. the First comprehending subjects of a mixed nature, or those which admit of application to civil as well as criminal cases, “Médecine Légale mixte.” The Second exclusively relating to criminal jurisprudence, “Médecine Légale Criminelle;” and the Third, to medical police, “Médecine Légale Sanitaire.”
The work opens with a learned introduction, in which the importance of the science is fairly examined, and its history pursued with much detail, from its origin, to the period at which the author wrote. The qualifications of the forensic physician are also considered, and the different circumstances opposed to the success of his labours, enumerated and appreciated. Then follow in succession the subjects of the first division, viz. the different ages of human life, puberty, minority, majority, with the anomalies to which the natural growth and developement of the body are liable. Personal identity and resemblance. The relative and absolute duration of life. The grounds of prohibition in testatorship, such as habitual, periodical, and temporary insanity; suicide; deaf and dumb state; somnambulism; intoxication. The qualifications of testators and witnesses. Marriage and divorce. Pregnancy, true and false. Parturition, and the signs denoting the death of the fœtus in utero. Paternity and filiation. Premature and retarded births. Monsters. Hermaphrodites. Survivorship. Signs of real and apparent death. Treatment of the different varieties of Asphyxia. Certificates of exemption, and diseases which exempt. Feigned, dissimulated, and imputed maladies.
The Second division commences with the third volume, and includes, in their respective order, chapters on the examination of bodies found dead. The distinction of assassination from suicide. Wounds. Poisoning. Rape. Abortion. Concealment and substitution of the offspring; and Infanticide.
The Third division, with which the fifth volume commences, successively treats of the preservation of the human species, and of the means of remedying its physical degeneracy. Contagious, hereditary, and epidemic diseases, and the precautions to be adopted against them. The medical police of cities, with regard to aliment, arts, manufactures, and attention to the sick. Military and naval hygiène; and, lastly, the medical police of hospitals and prisons.
No work of similar calibre had been previously published, and its execution is a sufficient proof of the profound erudition and sterling ability of its author; but it is by no means calculated to assist the inquiries of the English physician. It is often unnecessarily prolix and minute, and is adapted only to the judicial courts of the continent. Since its publication numerous writers on detached questions have sprung up, and thrown much additional light on their obscurer points. The subject of poisons has been very ably elucidated by the researches of Professor Orfila[[44]], and in a work[[45]] still more recently published by that distinguished professor, the applications of Toxicological Science to Forensic inquiries have been more minutely considered.
The subjects of conception and delivery, with the various questions to which they have given origin, have been very ably discussed by M. Capuron;[[46]] from whose work it will be perceived we have derived much satisfactory information.