On Consummated Incest

This paper represents a partial synthesis of a wider study based on the psycho-analytical investigation of cases of consummated incest, with consideration of the conditions leading to this situation and the consequences deriving from it. We say a 'partial synthesis' since, of the incestuous relations that we have studied, we refer here only to the conclusions derived from the father-daughter relation.

Our findings are based upon prolonged clinical observations, and corroborated by comparisons with characters taken from mythology, history, and literature. In this summary we cannot go into the reasons for the virtual lack of psycho-analytical and anthropological contributions to the subject.

We will begin with the account of an investigation of a typical case.

Susanna started analysis with one of us after a brief treatment with a male analyst, to whom she expressed the wish to proceed with one of her own sex. She complained of states of acute depression and sexual indifference to her husband. She also presented various psychosomatic symptoms such as bronchitis, chronic appendicitis, hæmorrhoids and severe trouble with her teeth which kept her under perpetual dental treatment. She was a slim, good-looking young woman of twenty-six years of age, from a wealthy upper-class family, and could express herself with ease.

Her first words revealed a nymphomaniac compulsion which drove her from one medical consulting-room to another in search of fleeting sexual relations with doctors. She had done and was doing the same thing with her successive music teachers. She was also studying classical dancing, for which she had a special inclination, and showed marked talent for drawing, painting, literature and other artistic sublimations. She had been married for two years, was anxious for a divorce and hoped that analysis would help her in this crisis. Her history showed as a main element an extremely frustrated relationship with the mother. The latter was a cold woman, who had