Abstract
AimThe purpose of this publication is to reveal the true end of Henriette Couëdon (1867–1941), a famous fortune-teller from 1895 to 1899 and who was examined by de Clérambault in 1920 at the Infirmerie Spéciale de la Préfecture de Police de Paris. That same year, de Clérambault presented her case at the Société clinique de médecine mentale under the title “The End of a Fortune-Teller.” MethodResearch in the archives made it possible to find the police register and the medical records of various establishments where she stayed. ResultsHenriette Couëdon's psychiatric journey was similar to many others. It is a page in the history of psychiatry in France, its institutions and its knowledge, as much as the story of a singular patient. In counterpoint, on a psychopathological level, Couëdon's psychosis – decorated, as it were, with fragments from the fin de siècle – appears to us an imperious appeal to a paternal principle, a paternal in which Henriette Couëdon ultimately failed to inscribe herself, while declaring her “mediumic” uniqueness. DiscussionThe delirium, then called spiritualism, of Henriette Couëdon makes it possible to resurrect an old question: that of the limits of nosographic frameworks. This question remains relevant to today's psychopathology. ConclusionSome decisive contributions complete Henriette Couëdon's alienist trajectory, revealing her true end.
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