Originally published in Toulouse in French in 1610, this translation of the 1623 edition of Ferrand's treatise, Of Lovesickness or Erotic Melancholy: A Scientific Discourse that teaches how to know the essence, causes, signs, and remedies of this disease of the fantasy, is a veritable summa on the topic of erotomania in the late Renaissance.
As both a philosopher and a practicing physician, Ferrand saw his treatise as a medical book to help people, indeed to "cure" them of "the most frequent and most dangerous disease which threatens mortals of both sexes." In order to explore the nature and cure of the "disease," it was necessary for Ferrand to make frequent detours through chapters dealing with heredity, astrology, the interpretation of dreams, incubi and succubi, and love philters as they relate to the nature and diagnosis of erotic love.
Ferrand takes up questions concerning the diseases of women, hysteria and satyriasis, real and putative sex changes, and the cures for sterility and impotence that can lead to marital breakdown. In fact, under the general heading of a history of lovesickness, one can actually find in Ferrand five related histories: medicine, mental health, psychiatry, feminine sexuality, and pharmacy—all of which he documents copiously from over three hundred authors, from classical sources to church fathers to naturalists.
In their exhaustive analysis of nearly two thousand marginal references, the editors have identified and expanded Ferrand's sources, many of which are either little known or relatively inaccessible today. Their annotations and
commentaries provide a goldmine of research materials for the specialist in medieval and Renaissance studies. Combined with Ferrand's text, this critical edition of a seventeenth-century masterpiece presents erotic melancholy as one of the received ideas of the Renaissance and examines its place in the history of thought.

Jacques Ferrand's profile page

Donald A. Beecher's profile page

Massimo Ciavolella taught for many years at Carleton University and at the University of Toronto before coming to his present positions as professor and chair, Department of Italian, and professor of comparative literature at the University of California, Los Angeles. He also assisted in the translation of The Scruffy Scoundrels.

Massimo Ciavolella's profile page

An impressive tome that marks indeed a milestone in our knowledge of sexology.

Renaissancee Quarterly

Ferrand was one of the last great encyclopedists, and we owe a huge debt to the two distinguished scholars who have undertaken the immense task of translating and editing his engaging treatise. . . . A unique summa on erotomania and a work destined to become a classic.

English Studies in Canada

A monumental work of scholarship.

Mary F. Wack, The Bulletin of the History of Medicine

Whatever their field (medicine, astrology, Petrarchan poetry) and whatever the literature/culture which they are studying (French, Italian, English), all scholars will find A Treatise on Lovesickness of immense value.

Modem Language Review

The welcome appearance of this fine edition whets the appetite for a full investigation of the subsequent history of the medical discourse on the erotic.

Medical History

An exemplary critical edition of Ferrand's treatise of 1610 on erotic melancholy, preceded by an introductory essay (of nine chapters) in which they examine the place of erotic ideas in Renaissance culture. . . . A compendium of 2,000 years of ideas about love.

The Times Literary Supplement