A case of multiple personality / by Albert Wilson.

  • Wilson, Albert, 1854-1928.
Date:
[1904]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: A case of multiple personality / by Albert Wilson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    up with her own natural facial expi’ession and go on as if nothing had happened. These fits recurred several times a day with increasing frequency, and lasted from ten minutes to an hour. There were no premonitory symptoms beyond those described. As days and weeks wore on, the normal state was of shorter duration; and indeed so prolonged was the abnormal, that I visited her almost daily for ten weeks before I saw her in her normal condition. For the sake of simplicity I will here give further particulars of this abnormal phase. The patient became childish, clipped her words, and had no knowledge of ordinary names, nor of her ordinary surroundings. Thus she did not know the meaning of the word “ legs,” and if you explained, she would say, “ Legs, what legs ? What dat mean ? Dese sings ? Dese long sings?” and so on. When I said, “I want you to walk,” she replied, “Walk? What dat, what walk mean?” I said, “ Get on your feet,” pointing to them. “ Get on them things ? Those feet ? What feet ? Walk, mean get on those things ? Can’t do it!” So I lifted her on to her feet, but she could not stand. Her feet gave way, turning outwards. But some things she appeared to know; thus, she would call a drawing slate “ a jawing skate,” and yet if I touched her nose and asked what it was allied, she either might not know or would call it her ear. But if I said it was the nose, she would argue before she understood. Similarly she called her mouth her nose, and her chin her mouth, and her ears were her eyes. This habit of misnaming things disappeared in a month or two; probably she heard the right names from those about her, for in this abnormal condition she would be quite lively and bright, though restless. She would turn over books, looking for N’s and O’s. P she called H, and E, B. She also reversed colours, seeing the complementary colour. Black she called white, green red, and vice versa. She wrote her words backwards, beginning at the tail of each word, and writing it from right to left, but to the right of the word preceding it, so that she had to calculate what space would be wanted for each word, which she did with very fair correct- ness, as may be seen from the specimen reproduced (Plate I.). This writing was done with ease and ordinary rapidity, and the total effect of it does not differ from ordinary writing.