Biomaterial Database

Rape of the lock: note on nineteenth-century hair fetishists. 2019

Diederik F Janssen

Maastricht University (external PhD program), The Netherlands.

The ostensibly bizarre crime of braid-cutting invited occasional alienist inferences from the late 1850s onwards, until it entered mid-1880s police profiles and forensic-psychiatric taxonomies as a corollary of perversion, specifically sadism and fetishism. Cases were rare, but were reported as late as the mid-1930s and enduringly cited as encompassing a staple variety of fetishism. This note briefly reconstructs entries in German, French and English forensic psychiatry, sexual psychopathology and psychoanalysis.

UI	MeSH Term	Description	Entries
D008297	Male		Males
D005060	Europe	The continent north of AFRICA, west of ASIA and east of the ATLANTIC OCEAN.	Northern Europe,Southern Europe,Western Europe
D005260	Female		Females
D005329	Fetishism, Psychiatric	A condition in which inanimate objects are utilized as a preferred or exclusive method of stimulating erotic arousal.	Fetishism (Psychiatric),Psychiatric Fetishism
D006197	Hair	A filament-like structure consisting of a shaft which projects to the surface of the SKIN from a root which is softer than the shaft and lodges in the cavity of a HAIR FOLLICLE. It is found on most surfaces of the body.	Fetal Hair,Hair, Fetal,Lanugo,Fetal Hairs,Hairs,Hairs, Fetal
D006801	Humans	Members of the species Homo sapiens.	Homo sapiens,Man (Taxonomy),Human,Man, Modern,Modern Man
D014754	Violence	Use of physical force causing or intent to cause harm, injury or abuse.	Assaultive Behavior,Atrocities,Behavior, Assaultive,Interpersonal Violence,Physical Assault,Physical Attacks,Structural Violence,Violent Crime,Assault, Physical,Attack, Physical,Attacks, Physical,Crime, Violent,Interpersonal Violences,Physical Assaults,Physical Attack,Violence, Interpersonal,Violence, Structural,Violent Crimes
D049672	History, 19th Century	Time period from 1801 through 1900 of the common era.	19th Century History,19th Cent. History (Medicine),19th Cent. History of Medicine,19th Cent. Medicine,Historical Events, 19th Century,History of Medicine, 19th Cent.,History, Nineteenth Century,Medical History, 19th Cent.,Medicine, 19th Cent.,19th Cent. Histories (Medicine),19th Century Histories,Cent. Histories, 19th (Medicine),Cent. History, 19th (Medicine),Century Histories, 19th,Century Histories, Nineteenth,Century History, 19th,Century History, Nineteenth,Histories, 19th Cent. (Medicine),Histories, 19th Century,Histories, Nineteenth Century,History, 19th Cent. (Medicine),Nineteenth Century Histories,Nineteenth Century History