Androgenic Alopecia in a Postmenopausal Sicilian Baroness

The document discusses a portrait of Aurora Monizio di Mandralisca, a postmenopausal Sicilian baroness from the eighteenth century, which is housed in the Mandralisca Museum in Cefalù, Sicily. The portrait shows the baroness with clear signs of androgenic alopecia, a form of hair loss. The authors speculate that this could have been caused by ovarian hyperthecosis or insulin resistance, or possibly by an androgen-secreting tumor such as an ovarian Leydigoma or an adrenocortical adenoma. Other causes like polycystic ovary syndrome or congenital adrenal hyperplasia were considered less likely due to her presumably normal sexual development and known parity.