Lazarus and Joannes Baptista Colloredo
Lazarus and Joannes Baptista Colloredo (* March 20, 1617 in Genoa ; † after 1646) were a well-known case of Siamese twins of the Thoracopagus parasiticus or Omphalopagus parasiticus type . It is possible that Joannes Baptista Colloredo was the first surviving parasitic twin to own a head.
Life
Lazarus and Joannes Baptista Colloredo were sons of Baptista and Pellegrina Colloredo, who died three years after the birth of the twins. The Colloredo couple were wealthy and had had several other children before the twins. The parents treated the twins who had grown together as two separate personalities and had both baptized. The Genoese doctor Augustin Pinquet examined the children when they were babies .
Lazarus later made a business out of the deformity and toured numerous countries where he exhibited, including Italy, Spain, Germany, France (1638), Poland (1640), England (1639 and 1642), Denmark, and Switzerland. According to consensus reports, he was a wealthy and well-bred man. When he wasn't showing off, he hid his brother under his clothes. He is said to have married and fathered several normally developed children. In 1646 he appeared again in Italy; then the trail of the Colloredo twins is lost.
Medical
Except for his ingrown parasitic brother, Lazarus was normally developed. Joannes Baptista had grown together with Lazarus; he had two arms and one leg. His head showed hair and beard growth at the appropriate age, the eyes were usually closed, the mouth was open and showed salivation. Joannes Baptista reacted to touch, but did not eat independently and showed no signs of higher spiritual development. Apparently he didn't have his own digestive system either. However, he is said to have tried to swallow milk. Pinquet passed on information about the twins to the doctor Fortunio Liceti (1577-1657), who treated the case in his work De Monstris . Another doctor who examined the unusual children was Paulus Zacchias (1584–1659). He saw them in 1617 and 1623 and described them in his work Questionum Medico-Legalium . According to Zacchias' testimony, Joannes Baptista reacted to touch and could move his arms, but otherwise had no sensory perception. In his later years, Joannes Baptista's head grew more and more. The parasitic brother's hydrocephalus was ultimately twice as large as the head of the "host". In addition, Joannes Baptista finally developed a distinct bad breath . According to Thomas Bartholinus ' description, the twins had a different sleep-wake rhythm and could sweat independently of one another. Bartholinus also claims to have observed poor breathing activity in Joannes Baptista and reports that he had fully developed teeth. In Hufelands Journal der practical Arzneykunde and Wundarzneykunst of 1810, Vol. 31, XII. Piece, p. 84 ff. A translation of Bartholin's description is printed. There it is said that Joannes Baptista, if the author is not mistaken, has grown on Lazarus' osse xiphoideo , has traces of genitals , can move ears, lips and hands and loses his excrement only through his mouth, nose and ears . Lazarus was worried for the well-being of his brother because he was afraid that if he died, he would also perish from the bad smell if it rotted . A description from Strasbourg, where Lazarus Colloredo appeared in 1645, claims that the two brothers could communicate with each other; but none of the examining doctors seems to have found this out. Rudolf Virchow drew on Bartholinus' results when he wrote a treatise on Siamese twins . Friedrich Ahlfeld, Ernst Schwalbe and Hans Huebner were also interested in the case and diagnosed it as Thoracopagus parasiticus, whereas today it is more likely a case of Omphalopagus parasiticus. Jan Bondeson assumes that Joannes Baptista had no functioning heart and no operational lungs, but was only supplied by his brother's circulation, with whom he possibly shared his liver. According to Bondeson, an operative separation of the twins would probably have been possible without any problems with today's means, but would have cost Joannes Baptista his life. At the time of the Colloredo twins, however, such an attempt could not be considered.
The Colloredo twins in literature
Martin Parker wrote the Ballad of the Inseparable Brothers , inspired by the Colloredo twins ; and John Cleveland wrote a poem - Smectymnuus - about them, but in which he mixed up the two names. In Robert Bloch's Unheavenly Twin a figure appears who represents a similar case to the Colloredo twins, but here the parasite is intelligent and well developed and ultimately dominates its host body.
Henri Sauval reported on the Colloredo twins' trip to France in Histoire et antiquités de la ville de Paris . Sauval was amazed that Lazarus Colloredo was able to play handball and learned from him that his parasitic brother had once saved his life. Lazarus was sentenced to death for killing a man, but escaped execution by arguing that then the innocent Joannes Baptista would necessarily also perish. John Spalding reports on the Colloredo twins' stay in Aberdeen in 1642 in Memorials of the Troubles in Scotland and in England . According to Spalding's testimony, Lazarus Colloredo was an apparently wealthy man who did not need a manager, but had two servants.
Images of the Colloredo twins were reproduced again and again in the centuries after their death. Numerous specialist books from later centuries draw on Bartholinus' description in particular, such as Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine by W. Pyle and The Mystery and Lore of Monsters by CJS Thompson. The descriptions of the Colloredo twins had a major impact on the teratology of their time and later centuries.
literature
- Jan Bondeson : The Two-Headed Boy, and Other Medical Marvels . Cornell University Press, Ithaca NY 2004, ISBN 0-8014-8958-X , pp. VII ff.
- Rudolf Virchow : The Siamese twins. Lecture given to the Berlin Medical Society on March 14, 1870 . Hirschwald, Berlin 1870.
Individual evidence
- ↑ The number of fingers and toes is stated differently in different sources; the only thing that is certain is that it was not normal.
- ↑ Archived copy ( Memento of the original of July 8, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
