The Epidemics of the Middle Ages

Thus by the autumn of 1551, the Sweating Sickness had vanished from the earth: it has never since appeared as it did then and at earlier periods; and it is not to be supposed, t...

The events to which we are now about to allude, demonstrate, by their surprising course, that the fate of nations is at times far more dependent on the laws of physical life tha...

Imitation—compassion—sympathy, these are imperfect designations for a common bond of union among human beings—for an instinct which connects individuals with the general body, w...

If we now turn to the medical talent which encountered the “_Great Mortality_,” the middle ages must stand excused, since even the moderns are of opinion that the art of medicin...

It was of the utmost advantage to the St. Vitus’s dancers that they made choice of a favourite patron saint; for, not to mention that people were inclined to compare them to the...

The ordinances of Henry the VIIth, which, although adapted to the times, bore hard upon the people, soon produced their fruits. The great diminished the number of their servants...

The effects of the _Black Death_ had not yet subsided, and the graves of millions of its victims were scarcely closed, when a strange delusion arose in Germany, which took posse...

The mental shock sustained by all nations during the prevalence of the Black Plague, is without parallel and beyond description. In the eyes of the timorous, danger was the cert...

Full three and twenty years had now elapsed; no trace of the Sweating Sickness had shewn itself anywhere in this long interval, and England had by its rapid advancement assumed...

At the commencement of the sixteenth century, society was very differently constituted from what it was at the period when Henry the VIIth unfurled his banner for victory. The d...

After the fate of England had been decided by the battle of Bosworth, on the 22d of August, 1485[349], the joy of the nation was clouded by a mortal disease which thinned the ra...

An inquiry into the causes of the Black Death, will not be without important results in the study of the plagues which have visited the world, although it cannot advance beyond...

We have no certain measure by which to estimate the ravages of the Black Plague, if numerical statements were wanted, as in modern times. Let us go back for a moment to the 14th...

The most memorable example of what has been advanced, is afforded by a great pestilence of the fourteenth century, which desolated Asia, Europe, and Africa, and of which the peo...

Both the St. Vitus’s dance and Tarantism belonged to the ages in which they appeared. They could not have existed under the same latitude at any other epoch, for at no other per...

Sect. 1.—The Cardiac Disease of the Ancients. (Morbus Cardiacus.) 306 2.—The Picardy Sweat. (Suette des Picards—Suette Miliaire.) 315 3.—The Roettingen Sweating Sickness 324 Chr...

That Omnipotence which has called the world with all its living creatures into one animated being, especially reveals himself in the desolation of great pestilences. The powers...

Sect. 1.—Destruction of the French Army before Naples, 1528 228 2.—Trousse-Galant in France, 1528, and the following years 235 3.—Sweating Sickness in England, 1528 238 4.—Natur...

APPENDIX:— I. Extract from “Vita Gregorii XI.,” &c. 153 II. From “Chronicon Magnum,” &.c 154 III. From “die Limburger Chronik,” &c. 155 IV. From “die Chronica van Coellen,” &c....

Sect. 1.—St. John’s Dance 87 2.—St. Vitus’s Dance 91 3.—Causes 94 4.—More ancient Dancing Plagues 97 5.—Physicians 100 6.—Decline and Termination of the Dancing Plague 103

Sect. 1.—Mercenary Troops 193 2.—New Circumstances 196 3.—Sweating Sickness 197 4.—Accompanying Phenomena 198 5.—Petechial Fever in Italy. 1505 199 6.—Other Diseases 203 7.—Bloo...