Abstract
This paper analyses, from a historical and philosophical point of view, the anachronistic and farcical aspects of the hystero-demonopathy occurring in Verzegnis, its extraordinary appeal in medical literature at the time (particularly French), its curious similarities with the case of Morzine in Haute-Savoie (1861), to demonstrate how it has taken on a decisive duplicate role as ‘limiting case’ in the history of epidemics of possession and ‘precursor case’ in that of the modern syndrome of multiple personality. Reading the phenomenon of imitative contagion in a philosophical light, these pages offer an analysis of the concept of ‘spectator’, which was to prove an essential element in the definition of the hysterical subject, both in the report drawn up by Fernando Franzolini and the scientific literature following it, dealing with ‘dedoublement de la personnalite’.
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