Sorano from Efeso, a doctor in Rome in the second century AD, in his work on gynecology, described with precision every aspect related to the physiology and pathology of the menstrual cycle. He reports some terms with which menstruation is defined: καταμήνιον (catamenion), which indicates the monthly periodicity of menstrual flow, ἐπιμήνια (epimenia) relating to the nutritional role of the embryos, and κάθαριsis (catharticsis), purify the body. Sorano provides a very precise description of the menstrual phenomenon, dealing with the duration and rhythm of menstrual flow, explaining that it does not occur in the same lunar phase in all women. In addition, he talks about the amount of menstrual flow and describes some premenstrual symptoms (difficulty in movement and heaviness of the pelvis, sometimes even pain and numbness). Unlike Hippocrates, who believed that the woman enjoyed good health only if menstruating and fertile, Sorano insinuates the suspicion that menstruation can be useful only to procreation, resulting outside of it substantially harmful to female health. Women who were sterile or in amenorrhea no longer had to be treated at all costs and with ferocity. For Sorano in fact amenorrhea was even physiological not only in childhood and senile and during pregnancy, but also in athletes and women with masculine appearance. 

The attitudes of the physicians and the communities of ancient Rome towards the theme have been strongly influenced by the writings of Pliny the Elder, historian and author who lived in the first century A.D. His testimony precedes by less than a century that of Sorano, however the two thoughts are very distant. Sorano’s medical writing has a more “scientific” and neutral approach, while Pliny’s anthropological approach reflects the thought of time, seen from a male perspective. The period told by Pliny in his “Historia Naturalis” is something «that generates monsters», but also prodigious, magical. To it are attributed an extraordinary power and strength but to prevail is its destructive aspect and its ability to contaminate. It is not by chance that Pliny indicates it also with the terms of venenum (poison) or virus, with the meaning of something lethal and infectious. Some excerpts from books VII and XXVIII of the “Historia Naturalis” give an idea of his doctrine: “Wine sour if they pass by, the vine withers, the grass dies and the shoots wither. If a woman with menstruation sits under a tree, the fruit will fall. A mirror will discolor in his eyes, and a knife will no longer be sharp. Bees will die and dogs that taste his blood will go mad.” These ideas influenced common thought well into the late Middle Ages.