ABSTRACT
The end of the nineteenth century witnessed a plethora of new therapeutics, as fads and fashions spread throughout the medical world. Fin de siècle nervous patients had an extensive menu of dietic treatments, medications, remedies, air cures, water cures, bath cures, rest cures, electric treatments, psychic treatments, mental healing, massage, gymnastics, spas, and private and public institutions to choose from. New terms and neologisms abounded. This chapter explores the genealogies of the word, "psychotherapy" and traces how the manner in which it became taken up may serve as a window into the constitution of this discipline and finally, how this may enable Freud's nomination of psychoanalysis to be located. As Freud saw it, the very survival of psychoanalysis depended upon maintaining this singular power of nomination. For him, it was essential that the word “psychoanalysis” did not circulate freely, like the word, “psychotherapy”.
