I was leafing through a book at my mother’s place titled Intrauterine Insemination edited by Dr. Gautam Allahbadia. It has several articles, including a historical review on the subject by Dr. Adi E Dastur. I want to share the stories he has told about the incidence of Artificial Insemination in our history.
He has spoken of Jeremiah, and Rachel, Sarah, Hannah, Michael and Women in the Abimelech’s household, along with Leah. He has also spoken of how Romans and Greeks appealed for divine intervention and added to it magic formula, songs and incantations. Dr. Dastur states that the tenet of insemination is documented in the Hebraic Talmud in the first 30 years of the second century.
A very interesting tale is of an Arabian who during the Arabian hegira in 1322 used insemination on his mare. He left a wad of wool in the mare’s vagina overnight, and then in the cover of darkness had his rival’s prize stallion sniff it. Excited, the stallion ejaculated on a cloth that was kept ready to receive the material. The goods on the cloth were then introduced back into the mare’s vagina, and the desired consequence occurred!
In the scientific instances of performance of Artifical insemination, the first attempt (failed) was of Jon Swammerdam, a Dutch Anatomist, who tried it on fish. Jacobi was successful at it in 1742. In mammals, in 1780 an Italian named Spallanzani impregnated a bitch, and around the same time, John Hunter impregnated a woman with her husband’s semen with hypospadias by vaginal injection.
Girault in 1833 reported 10 successful cases of AI, and in 1850 Pajot described an instrument ‘Fecondateur’, used for AI in 1866. In 1866, the first publication on this matter happened in the USA by a Dr. James Marion Sims. Even though his thinking was aligned with some of the wrong notions of that time, he had been successful in using insemination for achieving pregnancy. Dr. Sims had written the book from his experiences in Europe, and the book shocked several of his British counterparts, and he was subjected to much rile including derisive poetry in magazines and journals.
In 1890, Robert L. Dickinson started using Artifical Insemination in the USA, in the greatest secrecy. And so on, the procedure gained acceptance and was used more and more, and here we are today looking at the procedure as one of our potions of hope.
BTW, Dr. Dastur began with:
“Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth”. (Genesis 1:28)
^WiseGuy^
Image Courtesy: http://blogs.jamaicans.com/metinking/files/2008/12/storyteller.jpg
that's fascinating! I had no idea it went back so far (altho if I had stopped to ponder it, I might have guessed). I love learning stuff like this.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting Wiseguy, thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteWow, this is some great history, who would have thought? I love it and will share with many... Have a great Saturday!!!
ReplyDeleteVery interesting!
ReplyDeleteHow interesting! Thanks for sharing. I had no idea it went that far back!
ReplyDeleteWow, nice to know there is SO much history to IUI!
ReplyDeletei read some of the history of AI for a graduate paper - very interesting stuff.
ReplyDeleteI love this! So very interesting. Thank you for sharing!
ReplyDelete*HUGS*
very interesting.
ReplyDeleteDude! This is so interesting! Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteWe (humans) certainly have been fighting with this demon of IF for a very long time, haven't we?
ReplyDeleteVery interesting post! Thanks for sharing.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting! Thanks for the background.
ReplyDeleteWho knew? Funky!
ReplyDelete