page_title: Angélique du Coudray
section_title: The Machine
hierarchical_section_title: Angélique du Coudray / Life / The Machine
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: La "machine" de Mme du Coudray, sage-femme. Mannequin utilisé pour enseigner l’art des accouchements. XVIIIe s. Musée de l'Homme, Paris.
context_page_description: Angélique Marguerite Le Boursier du Coudray was an influential, pioneering midwife during her lifetime, who gained fame when men were taking over the field. She rose from middle-class origins to become noticed and commissioned by King Louis XV himself.
context_section_description: Du Coudray invented the first lifesize obstetrical mannequin, for practicing mock births. It was usually called "The Machine." Each cost about 300 livres to construct, usually out of fabric, leather, and stuffing, and occasionally including actual human bones to form the torso. Various strings and straps serve to simulate the stretching of the birth canal and perineum to demonstrate the process of childbirth. The head of the infant mannequin has a shaped nose, stitched ears, hair drawn with ink, and an open mouth (with tongue) into which a finger can be inserted to a depth of 5 centimetres (2.0 in). This detail was important, as it allowed the midwife to put two fingers into the mouth, to facilitate the passage of the head in a case of breech presentation. These mannequins were very detailed and accurate. The invention is often attributed to a Scotsman, William Smellie, but the French Academy of Surgeons approved du Coudray's model in 1758, giving her a prior claim on the invention.
caption: The Machine
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