[Crossed alexia-agraphia in a right-handed patient]

A right-handed man, born of a right-handed family, presented an infarct in the territory of the right middle cerebral artery, with a left hemiplegia, a left lateral homonymous hemianopsia and an expression aphasia. The oral trouble disappeared in some weeks, but later a permanent linguistic deficit persisted, affecting mainly the written language and realizing a clinical picture of alexia-agraphia with Gerstmann's syndrome. The neurolinguistic study showed a preferential alteration of the phonologic system in the written language, and at a lesser degree in the oral modality. The extent of the lesion and the relative integrity of oral expression and comprehension, suggested that these functions were localized in the left hemisphere, whereas lecture, writing, calculation, body-parts notion, laterality notion, had been simultaneously implanted during the ontogenesis in the right hemisphere. The latter was probably also responsible for phonological aspects of written and spoken language, according to a scheme opposite to that of usual right-handers.