A 19th century boxwood
French vaginal speculum. The central obturator is also
made entirely from wood. This relatively wide bore
tubular speculum could also have been used to
introduce leeches to the cervix (for amenorrhoea). In
the first half of the 19th century France used 100
million leeches and despite leech farming in Germany
and France they were nearly made extinct and had to be
imported from North America and Russia
