WOMEN IN MEDICINE AND SURGERY 289 



Jacobe Felicie, about whom more presently rose above 

 mediocrity. 



The reason for the great difference between the condi- 

 tions of the women doctors of Paris and those of Salerno is 

 not far to seek. The Faculty of Medicine in Paris was, 

 from the beginning of its existence, unalterably opposed to 

 female medical practitioners. As early as 1220 it promul- 

 gated an edict prohibiting the practice of medicine by any 

 one who did not belong to the faculty, and, according to 

 its constitutions and by-laws, only unmarried men were 

 eligible to membership. 



For a long time the edict remained a dead letter. But 

 eventually, as the faculty grew in power and influence, it 

 was able to enforce the observance of its decrees. One of 

 its first victims was Jacobe Felicie, just mentioned, who was 

 hailed before court for practicing medicine in contraven- 

 tion of its edict issued many years before. 



Jacobe Felicie was a woman of noble birth, and had won 

 distinction by her success in the healing art. As the testi- 

 mony at her trial revealed, she never treated the sick for 

 the sake of gain. In nearly all cases the sick who had 

 addressed themselves to her had been abandoned by their 

 own physicians. All the witnesses who had been called 

 testified that they had been cured by Jacobe Felicie, and 

 all expressed their deepest gratitude to her for her care 

 and devotion. But, in spite of all these facts, and in spite 

 of the brilliant defence that this worthy woman made, 

 she was condemned to pay a heavy fine condemned be- 

 cause, as the indictment read, she had presumed to put her 

 sickle into the harvest of others falcem in messem mittere 

 alienam and this was a crime. 1 The faculty was a close 

 corporation and insisted that its members should have a 

 monopoly of all the honors and emoluments that were to 

 accrue from the treatment of the sick and suffering. What 



1 Chartularium Universitatis Parisiensis, Tom. II, p. 150, and 

 pp. 255 and 267, by Denifle and Chatelain, Paris, 1889-1891. 



