VOL. VII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 7JQ 



Extract of a Letter, tvritten March 5, 1672, by Dr. Thomas Corne- 

 Lio, a Neapolitan Philosopher and Physician, to John DoddingtoNj 

 Esq. his Majesty's Resident at Venice ; concerning some Observations 

 made of persons pretending to be stung by Tarantulas. Translated 

 by the Editor. iV" 83, p. 4066. 



In the country of Otranto, where those insects are in great numbers, a man, 

 who thought himself stung by a Tarantula, showed in his neck a small speck, 

 about which, in a very short time, there arose some pimples full of a serous 

 humour, and in a few hours after, he was sorely afflicted with very violent symp- 

 toms, as syncopes, great agitations, giddiness of the head, and vomiting ; but 

 without any inclination at all to dance, and without any desire of having mu- 

 sical instruments, he miserably died within two days. 



The person who gave me the above particulars affirmed, that those who think 

 themselves bitten by Tarantulas, are for the most part young wanton girls, 

 whom the Italian writer calls Dolci di sale, who by some particular indisposition 

 falling into this melancholy madness, persuade themselves, according to the 

 vulgar prejudice, that they have been stung by a Tarantula. And I remember 

 to have observed in Calabria, some women, who, seized on by some such acci- 

 dents, were accounted to be possessed with the devil, it being the common 

 belief in that province, that the greatest part of the evils which afflict mankind 

 proceeds from evil spirits. 



This brings to my mind a terrible evil, which is often observed in Calabria, 

 and is called in their language Coccio maligno. It arises on the surface of the 

 body, in the form of a small speck of the size of a lupine. It causes some pain, 

 and if it grow not soon red thereupon, it in a very short time certainly kills. It 

 is the common opinion of those people, that such a distemper befalls those 

 only that have eaten flesh of animals dead of themselves: which opinion I can 

 from experience affirm to be false. So it frequently falls out, that of many 

 strange efl^ects we daily meet with, the true cause not being known, such a one 

 is assigned as is grounded upon some vulgar prejudice. And of this kind I 

 esteem to be the vulgar belief of the cause of that distemper, which appears in 

 those that think themselves stung by Tarantulas. 



But why should we not rather think that that distemper is caused by an inward 

 disposition, like that which in some places in Germany is wont to produce that 

 evil, which they call Chorea St. Viti, (St. Vitus's dance). But of this I hope I 



Scarabcei of that author. Another species is sometimes found in the bodies of caterpillars, and is the 

 Filaria Lepidopterorum of Gmelua : it is described by Goetze, Roesel, Degeer, &c. &c. 



