Classical antiquity: the first steps in the process of construction of the notion of anorexia

Abstract

Anorexia nervosa is an ailment whose history can be reconstructed in order to get a picture of how the female body has been conceived throughout the history of medicine. In this article, we concentrate on the first period of this process, the Classic Antiquity, during which the first occidental construction of pathology associated with women, was developed. The notion of hysteria plays a leading role in this process, as it marked the beginnings of recognition and definition of the female body. Our perspective is to try to understand the pair of illness-health as a social construction in which the medical perspective meets the social situation.