This tag identifies court records of legal cases involving either the suspicion or reality of lesbian sex.
Abandonnons donc la cause pour nous attacher aux effets; & sans chercher à connoître par quelle raison un hermaphrodite existe, voyons ce qu'il est en effet.
Let us therefore abandon the cause and concentrate on the effects; and without seeking to know by what reason a hermaphrodite exists, let us see what he is in fact.
On en peut distinguer de trois sortes.
We can distinguish three kinds.
PREMIER OBJET.
Etat de l'Accusé.
Cet objet exige des détails que nous craindrions d'entreprendre, si la recherche de la vérité & l'amour de la justice n'ennoblissoient tous les sujets que l'on traite.
FIRST ISSUE.
State of the Accused.
This object requires details that we would be afraid to undertake, if the search for truth and the love of justice did not ennoble all the subjects that we treat.
MOYENS.
L’Accusé demande à être renvoyé de l'accusation intentée contre lui, & cette accusation le suppose profanateur du Sacrememt de mariage. Il faut donc établir, pour la justification de l’Accusé, qu'il ne s'est point rendu coupable de cette profanation.
MEANS.
The Accused asks to be dismissed from the charge brought against zir, and this charge presupposes that he is a profaner of the Sacrament of Marriage. It must therefore be established, for the justification of the accused, that he was not guilty of this profanation.
Mais voici le moment de l'infortune.
But here is the moment of misfortune.
{HRJ: In phrasings such as this, we can envision this text as representing a speech directly to an audience. Given the framing, it doesn’t seem to be purporting to be the actual presentation made to the court, but perhaps a cleaned-up, dramatized version. It would be interesting to know more about this type of publication and how it relates to actual court proceedings.}
Grandjean & Françoise Lambert allerent à Chamberry; & le 24 Juin 1761, après trois publications de bans, sans avoir découvert aucun empêchement légitime, ainsi que l'atteste le Curé de la paroisse, ils furent mariés avec les formalités ordinaires.
Grandjean & Françoise Lambert went to Chamberry; & on June 24, 1761, after three publications of bans, without having discovered any legitimate impediment, as the parish priest attests, they were married with the ordinary formalities.
Memoire POUR ANNE GRAND JEAN, connu sous le nom de JEAN BAPTISTE GRAND JEAN, Accusé & Appellant.
CONTRE M. le Procureur-Général, Accusateur & Intimé.
{HRJ: We begin with the title page. Although no author is listed here, some catalog entries list the author as the M. Vermeil whose name appears at the end of the text and I have followed that practice.}
Mémoire pour Anne Grandjean, connu sous le nom de Jean-Baptiste Grandjean, Accusé & Appellant.
Contre Monsieur le Procureur Général, Accusateur & Intimé.
Question
Un HERMAPHRODITE qui a épousé une fille, peut-il être repute profanateur du Sacrement de marriage, quand la nature qui le tromoit, l’appelloit à l’état de mari?
Introduction
The mention of tribades in Seneca the Elder’s Controversiae, something of a textbook for arguing legal cases, appears to be straightforward. A man comes upon his wife and another woman engaged in sex and kills them both.
Right at the turn of the 18th century (ca 1700), a Parisian police official collected a series of reports on the scandalous behavior of Henriette de Castelnau, countess de Murat. The official noted that it was particularly shameful for a noblewoman to have engaged in such actions. While a number of offences were detailed, the core accusation was her sexual relations with other women.
