Aretaeus, De causis et signis acutorum morborum (lib. 2)
Francis Adams LL.D., Ed.

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CHAPTER III. ON VERTIGO, OR SCOTOMA

IF darkness possess the eyes, and if the head be whirled round with dizziness, and the ears ring as from the sound of rivers rolling along with a great noise, or like the wind when it roars among the sails, or like the clang of pipes or reeds, or like the rattling of a carriage, we call the affection Scotoma (or Vertigo); a bad complaint indeed, if a symptom of the head, but bad likewise if the sequela of cephalæa, or whether it arises of itself as a chronic disease. For, if these symptoms do not pass off, but the vertigo persist, or if, in course of time, from the want of any one to remedy, it is

completed in its own peculiar symptoms, the affection vertigo is formed, from a humid and cold cause. But if it turn to an incurable condition, it proves the commencement of other affections--of mania, melancholy, or epilepsy, the symptoms peculiar to each being superadded. But the mode of vertigo is, heaviness of the head, sparkles of light in the eyes along with much darkness, ignorance of themselves and of those around; and, if the disease go on increasing, the limbs sink below them, and they crawl on the ground; there is nausea and vomitings of phlegm, or of yellow or black bilious matter. When connected with yellow bile, mania is formed; when with black, melancholy; when with phlegm, epilepsy; for it is liable to conversion into all these diseases.