Strasbourg : Imprimerie d'Ad. Christophe, 1869.
Description : [4] p., 1-26 p., [1 l.] pl. ; ill.: 1 phot. ; 24 cm.
Photograph : 1 albumen, mounted to board.
Subject : Labia majorum — Localized lymphedema ; Elephantiasis papillomatosa.
Notes :
The subject of the photograph, Madeleine Wecker, was a 31 year-old domestic worker, nulliparous, who lived in Strasbourg. She has hoisted her gown to reveal a giant nodous outgrowth descending from her left labium, its appearance described by the author as a crête de coq, an antique term for genital warts (condyloma acuminata) although Dietz is intending the origin of the term, i.e. the growth's resemblance to a rooster's florid caruncle. Localized lymphedema that develops into elephantiasis of the labium is rare and occurs less frequently than its penoscrotal counterpart, however Johann Veit believed that more than a few cases may have been wrongly diagnosed and reported in the literature as vulvar fibromas (1898 Handbuch der Gynäkologie vol. iii p. 216). Other nineteenth century writers expressed the opposite view, that most of the reported cases were misdiagnoses of syphiloma or tuberculosis. Only a small number of the Dietz papers were circulated and it was never cited although it offered significant value both for the photograph of a rare condition and also for the extensive bibliography that included ancient Greek and Arab texts. Édouard Dietz the doctor also dropped into obscurity—no other information of his career can be found.
