LAUSR

The “Flea catcher” (La Femme à la puce) is a late masterpiece (Fig. 1) by Georges de la Tour (1593–1652). Georges de la Tour was an eminent Baroque French painter, active mainly in the Duchy of Lorraine, shortly adsorbed into France and was indirectly influenced from Caravaggio, probably via his Dutch followers, since his genre scenes clearly derived from the Dutch Caravaggisti. La Tour is best known for the nocturnal light effects. Unlike Caravaggio, his religious paintings lack dramatic effects as against the works in a second phase of his style, perhaps beginning at the end of 1630-s, period of depiction of the “Flea catcher” (1638c). A valuable Master’s Theses by Crissy Bergeron (https ://digit alcom mons.lsu.edu/grads chool _these s/462), analyzed this painting with the aim to identify the represented model and the hidden religious and sexual symbolism. The depicted young woman exposes her bosom; however, according to Bergeron, the painting does not show details and erotic situations, such as those present in many works with the same subject painted in the Low Country, which reflected also the protestant ethics during Counter-Reformation. Bergeron brings several arguments in favor or against the commitment of one of the different opinions, i.e., that the model is Mary Magdalene or, even, the Virgin Mary (hypothesis easily excluded), but focuses on the possibility that the model is a whore or a poor servant, even based on the analysis of the bracelet of low value (Fig. 2). Moreover, from the analysis of Bergeron data, relevant for the purposes of this article, emerge that the poor girl represented was pregnant, as suggested in 1955 by Pariset in the first publication of the painting. A very recent article [1] deals also with the attempt to diagnose the possible disease of the depicted model: the Author appropriately recognizes in the “Flea Catcher” a state of generalized edema “clearly visible in the abdomen and the smooth, tense skin of the hands, thorax, the top of the left foot and the upper thighs. The prominent abdomen may also be due to generalized edema, or a sign of pregnancy, in which case we would most probably be looking at a case of preeclampsia”. In our opinion, an alternative interpretation of the clinical features represented in the magnificent painting is possible. The Artist has depicted a young woman presenting with diffuse edema associated with a yellowish skin, resembling rather generalized myxedema. Looking at the paintings, we can infer that the skin of the model is coarsened and presume that the generalized edema (face, eyelids, hands, thighs, feet, abdomen), as evident in Fig. 1 and in the detail of the hands (Fig. 2), is non-pitting. This, along with the typical puffy face the pale complexion, suggests a possible diagnosis of hypothyroidism. The pictorial representation of clinical signs of hypothyroidism is quite rare, except when associated with evident and disfiguring features of congenital thyroid insufficiency [2–4]. The rarity of hypothyroid models in ancient fine art [5] may be probably due to the unawareness of doctors and of the artists of the existence of the fine phenotypic features of the yet unknown thyroid failure.