Its form or shape is like a
virile member, with this exception, that the man's is outside, and the
woman's inside.
It is divided into the neck and body. The neck consists of a hard fleshy
substance, much like cartilage, and at the end of it there is a membrane
placed transversely, which is called the hymen. Near the neck there is a
prominent pinnacle, which is called the door of the womb, because it
preserves the _matrix_ from cold and dust. The Greeks called it
_clitoris_, and the Latins _praeputium muliebre_, because the Roman
women abused these parts to satisfy their mutual unlawful lusts, as St.
Paul says, Romans 1. 26.
The body of the womb is where the child is conceived, and this is not
altogether round, but dilates itself into two angles; the outward part
is full of sinews, which are the cause of its movements, but inside it
is fleshy. It is wrongly said, that in the cavity of the womb there are
seven divided cells or receptacles for the male seed, but anatomists
know that there are only two, and also that those two are not divided by
a partition, but only by a line or suture running through the middle of
it.
At the bottom of the cavity there are little holes called
_cotyledones_, which are the ends of certain veins or arteries, and
serve breeding women to convey nourishment to the child, which is
received by the umbilical and other veins, to carry the courses to the
_matrix_.
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