impotence

10:26 May 9, 2017
This question was closed without grading. Reason: Errant question

English language (monolingual) [PRO]
General / Conversation / Greetings / Letters / history, 1600
English term or phrase: impotence
What do you think is the meaning of IMPOTENCE in this context?? Lack of power or inability to have sex?
What follows is the horoscope of Edoardo VI, written by Girolamo Cardano in XVI century.

At the age of twenty-three years, nine months, and twenty-two days, languor of mind and body would afflict him. At the age of thirty-four years, five months, and twenty days, he would suffer from skin disease and a slight fever. After the age of fifty-five years, three months, and seventeen days, various diseases would fall to his lot. As long as he lived he would be constant, rigid, severe, continent, intelligent, a guardian of the right, patient in labour, a rememberer of wrongs and benefits; he would be terrible, and have desires and vices growing from desire, and he would suffer under impotence. He would be most wise, and for that reason the admired of nations; most prudent, magnanimous, fortunate, and, as it were, another Solomon.
budu
Local time: 10:02


SUMMARY OF ALL EXPLANATIONS PROVIDED
5 +2impotentia generandi: sterility (inability to procreate)
Charles Davis
4 +2inabilty to attain/sustain erection
Yvonne Gallagher
4 +1impotência (PT) (impotence (EN))
Fernando Lopes
1 +1sexual impotence
Tony M


Discussion entries: 7





  

Answers


6 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +2
inabilty to attain/sustain erection


Explanation:
http://www.dictionary.com/browse/impotence

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Note added at 7 mins (2017-05-09 10:34:54 GMT)
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in the context of "desires and vices growing from desire, and he would suffer under impotence" this is the meaning IMO. He wanted to have sex but was impotent

Yvonne Gallagher
Ireland
Local time: 09:02
Specializes in field
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in category: 651

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Tony M
3 mins
  -> Thanks:-)

agree  Tina Vonhof (X)
3 hrs
  -> Thanks:-)
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9 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 1/5Answerer confidence 1/5 peer agreement (net): +1
sexual impotence


Explanation:
Without doing any historical background research, I would say it does mean it in the sexual sense, as it is linked with 'desires' and 'vices', 2 sexually-loaded words. Were it to have meant simply 'powerless', I believe it would have been located in one of the other parts of the text, dealing with his general behaviour. Also, by likening him to Solomon, the suggestion would seem to be that this is indeed someone powerful (he's a ruler of some kind, after all!)

Tony M
France
Local time: 10:02
Works in field
Native speaker of: Native in EnglishEnglish
PRO pts in category: 309

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Tina Vonhof (X)
3 hrs
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19 mins   confidence: Answerer confidence 4/5Answerer confidence 4/5 peer agreement (net): +1
impotência (PT) (impotence (EN))


Explanation:
Ho trovato questa parole in un dizionario "multilingue" (I have read this word in a "multilingue" medical dictionary) (I named my confidence level as high, because I read the term in a medical dictionary - Dicionário Médico, English-Portuguese, of Emmanuel Alves).

Example sentence(s):
  • as I read the word in a medical dictionary, I prefer not to mention examples to avoid errors
Fernando Lopes
Portugal
Local time: 09:02
Native speaker of: Portuguese

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  acetran
5 hrs
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1 hr   confidence: Answerer confidence 5/5 peer agreement (net): +2
impotentia generandi: sterility (inability to procreate)


Explanation:
It is not possible to deduce this from the English, which just uses the word "impotence", but if we look at the source from which it has been translated, Cardano's Geniturarum exemplar (p. 19, towards foot of page), it turns out that the passage reads:

"et generandi impotentia patietur".
https://archive.org/stream/hin-wel-all-00000137-001#page/n24...

So not just "impotentia" but "generandi impotentia".

Two types of impotence are recognised in Canon Law: impotentia coeundi, which includes what we mean by impotence nowadays (though it's not confined to erectile dysfunction; it includes any inability to engage in sexual relations), and impotentia generandi, which is inability to procreate, though it does not necessarily imply inability to have sex. We are dealing here with the second kind:

"The impotency which is a cause of nullity is the incapacity of having conjugal relations (impotentia coeundi), not incapacity of engendering (impotentia generandi), in other words, sterility."
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07695a.htm

Charles Davis
Spain
Local time: 10:02
Works in field
Native speaker of: English
PRO pts in category: 572
Notes to answerer
Asker: Great! Thank you very much Charles Davis.


Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)
agree  Tony M
9 mins
  -> Thanks, Tony :)

agree  acetran
3 hrs
  -> Thanks, acetran :)
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