FROM A.D. 543 TO 1330.
A.D. 543, there was a terrible famine, during which, Procopius
says, 50,000 labourers died of hunger in the narrow region of Picenum,
and a still greater number in the southern provinces. In one place,
seventeen travellers were lodged; they were murdered and eaten: two
women who were detected in the commission of this atrocious crime
were slain. Earthquakes were experienced all over the world. In 544,
dysentery, which continued until 548, similating in severity the true
plague, committed great ravages in France.
A.D. 552, a severe earthquake was experienced at
Constantinople, doing much damage. Nine years after, 561, a similar
shock was felt at Rome, and also at Constantinople. The year following
there was so great a frost that the Danube was frozen over.
France, Germany, Italy, and various other countries of Europe,--in
fact, the whole inhabited globe,--suffered awfully from pestilence in
the years of our Lord 565–66, 583, 587, 589–90–91, 596 to 610: in the
course of 580, Antioch was again shaken by a severe earthquake. There
prevailed during this period, in the year 589, in Spain, writes St.
Gregory, bishop of Tours, a very singular pestilence, the principal
symptoms of which were pimples, or pustules, with buboes in the groins:
such great havoc did it make, that the houses were as so many tombs,
and the town as one vast cemetery: it was supposed that this disease
was brought from Marseilles in a vessel, as it had raged there the
year previously. St. Gregory, in his ‘History of the Franks,’ also
gives these particulars of this pestilential period: “In the fifth year
of the reign of king Childebert (A.D. 580), great floods,
tempests, earthquakes, hail, and several prodigies, were succeeded by
a dreadful plague; for almost every district of France was occupied
by a dysentery, in which the patients were affected with violent
vomitings, fever, headache, and excruciating pains in the loins:
what they discharged from their mouths was green or yellowish.” This
epidemic was particularly fatal to infants and children: “Parvulos
adolescentes arripuit letoque subegit: perdidimus dulces et charos
nobis infantulos,” &c. King Childebert recovered with difficulty, but
he lost his two sons. Austrigilda, queen of Orleans, sunk under the
disease; she retained to the last the ferocious and vindictive spirit
of the times, having exacted a promise from the king Gunthran that her
two physicians should be put to death if they did not save her; soon
after she expired, both of them were stabbed by the king’s order. The
Count d’Angoulême also died of the pestilence; the corpse appeared
black and charred, as if it had been laid over coals of fire.
Paulus Diaconus describes the Ligurian pestilence which raged during
this period, A.D. 566, in the time of Narses: “Cœperunt nasci
inguinibus hominum vel in aliis delicatioribus locis glandulæ in modum
nucis seu dactyli, quas mox sequebatur febrium intolerabilis æstus, ita
in triduo homo extingueretur: sin vero aliquis triduum transegisset,
habebat spem vivendi. Erat autem ubique luctus, ubique lacrymæ,” &c.
He concludes with the following passages: “Nulla vox in rure, nullus
pastorum sibilus, nullæ insidiæ bestiarum in pecudibus, nulla damna
in dominos volucribus. Sata transgressa metendi tempus, intacta
expectabant messorem: vinea amissis foliis, radiantibus uvis, illæsa
manebat. Nulla erant vestigia commeantium; nullus cernebatur percussor,
et tamen visum oculorum superabant cadavera mortuorum. Pastoralia loca
versa fuerunt in sepulturam hominum, et habitacula humana facta fuerunt
confugia bestiarum.”
Procopius, a Greek historian of Cæsarea, secretary to Belisarius, a
general during the reign of Justinian, records some important facts
of this pestilence, which ravaged the whole world; it lasted four
months at Constantinople, and, when at its height, it is supposed that
10,000 perished daily in that city. Nicephorus also describes this
pestilential period, and remarks that “certain little marks appeared
on the doors and outside of their houses, on their garments, and on
their utensils; some white crusts of a peculiar deposition from the air
adhered to all things, as damp moulds do on the walls or dwellings, and
dew on grass.”
In the year 590, at Rome, in the time of Pope Pelagius the Second,
there was a horribly destructive pestilence prevalent, and also in
Spain. The air was observed to be impregnated with a kind of mist and
fœtidness, which by irritation induced a sneezing; hence the custom
of saluting a person sneezing with the expression “Dominus tecum,” or
some similar expression, a practice which has reached our time. The
year following, 591, Britain suffered from a severe pestilence, also
Turenne, and the provinces of Arragon and Vivares. This disease was
called _inguinaria_, because buboes were formed more particularly
in the groin. In the year 610, pestilential small-pox committed great
ravages at Mecca.
A.D. 614, epidemic elephantiasis prevailed in Italy, and three
years subsequently, an epidemic pestilence, resembling the true plague.
In Syria, Arabia, &c., a great pestilence prevailed A.D. 639
and 640.
A.D. 654, Constantinople was devastated by a severe pestilence.
In the year of our Lord 664, a sudden pestilence (man-cyalm), after
depopulating the southern coasts of Britain, infected the provinces of
the Northumbrians, and, spreading for a long time in every direction,
destroyed great numbers. The year following, 665, it reached Italy,
causing great destruction of life. Fordum (Scriptores, xv. vol. iii.
page 646) cites a Greek historian to the effect that dire mortality
prevailed, A.D. 669, all over Europe, which did not spare the
remotest islands, Great Britain and Ireland. England also suffered
greatly, A.D. 672, from pestilence, at which period universal
disease appeared in Syria and Mesopotamia. England and Ireland were
revisited by pestilence, A.D. 679, beginning in the month of
July, and continuing until the end of September. Rome suffered from
similar ravages the following year, and in A.D. 683, England
again suffered from severe epidemic disease, which lasted three years.
A.D. 685, Syria and Libya were laid waste by disease. Ireland
suffered from a severe epidemic the same year.
From a singular portion of history which has been preserved in the
records of the church of Mayo, we find that the ‘ignis sacer,’ or
pestilence originating from famine, was similar to and contemporary
with the pestilence ‘man-cyalm,’ which raged among the British after
the departure of the Romans from Britain (664).
According to the records, two kings of Erin summoned the principal
clergy and laity to a council at Temora, in consequence of a general
dearth, the land not being sufficient to support the increasing
population. The chiefs (majores populi) decreed that a fast should be
observed both by clergy and laity, so that they might with one accord
_solicit God in prayer to remove by some species of pestilence the
burthensome multitudes of the inferior people_, and thus enable the
residue to subsist more commodiously. “Omnes majores petebant ut nimia
multitudo vulgi per infirmitatem aliquam tolleretur, quia numerositas
populi erat occasio famis.” St. Gerald and his associates suggested
that it would be more conformable to the Divine Nature, and not more
difficult, to multiply the fruits of the earth, than to destroy its
inhabitants. An amendment was accordingly moved, “to supplicate the
Almighty not to reduce the number of the men till it answered the
quantity of corn usually produced, but to increase the produce of the
land, so that it might satisfy the wants of the people.” However, the
nobles and clergy, headed by St. Fechin, bore down the opposition, and
called for a pestilence on the lower orders of the people. According to
the records, God’s judgment immediately fell upon the wicked authors
of the petition. The two kings who had summoned the convention with
St. Fechin, the kings of Ulster and Munster, and a third of the nobles
concerned, were cut off by the pestilence--‘Budhe connail,’ which was
by some called ‘pestis flava,’ by others ‘infirmitas icteritia.’
A.D. 685, there happened an eruption of Vesuvius.
In the year of our Lord 690, rains deluged Italy: six years after, 696,
pestilence prevailed in Constantinople, and during the years 703 and
713, Scotland also suffered from epidemic pestilence. Small-pox caused
great mortality in Spain, A.D. 714.
A.D. 717, 30,000 persons were carried off at Constantinople by
pestilence: it again appeared in the years 724 and 729. In the year 732
great numbers perished from pestilential disease at Norwich in England,
and also in Syria.
A.D. 740, the world was again visited by dismal pestilence,
which continued, with varied intensity, for 260 years, until the year
1000. During this period, 749, an earthquake destroyed many cities in
Syria. Among the many writers on the subject, Baronius, P. Diaconus,
Cedrenus, and Magdenburgh, make mention of an epidemic pestilence
which raged in Calabria, in Naples, also in Constantinople; in which
latter place the mortality was so great, that the living were unable to
bury their dead, cart-loads being huddled together into a vast common
excavation of the earth, while great numbers were left unburied. Short
mentions the prevalence of a fatal pestilence in Wales, A.D.
762, which afterwards extended all over England, continuing until
771. In Chichester alone it is stated that 34,000 persons perished.
Pestilence raged in France A.D. 779, and invaded Scotland
784. Lancisius and Bartianus in their Annals relate the occurrence of
disease in various parts of the world, which destroyed immense numbers
of cattle, especially in Germany, where the mortality was great among
the horned tribe. A.D. 801, St. Paul’s at Rome was thrown down
in the month of April; and in France, Germany, and in various parts of
Italy also, a severe earthquake was experienced. So intensely cold was
it in A.D. 806, that the Rhone was frozen over: the cold was
from 18 to 20 degrees centigrade below zero. Lancisius and Bartianus
also give an account of a pestilence that arose from excessive rains
and cold damp weather, A.D. 817 and 820, and prevailed through
all the dominions of Gaul. The crops failed from excess of moisture,
and famine ensued. The following winter was very severe: the Rhine and
the Danube continued one solid body of ice for _thirty days_,
and epidemic pestilence ensued in the spring, which persisted all the
summer and autumn. The succeeding winter, in 822, was very severe: the
snow lay on the ground twenty-nine weeks, and caused great destruction
to both men and beasts. A long drought followed in the summer, and
pestilence was the consequence: it was attended with such fatality,
that, A.D. 825, it killed almost all the inhabitants in France
and Germany.
In the year 853, epidemic pestilence broke out in Scotland: two
years after, earthquakes and violent tempests were experienced; and
in A.D. 856 there occurred an earthquake and a tremendous
inundation of the Tiber, which were succeeded by severe epidemic
sore throats, anginas, &c., as recorded by Baronius, Murator, Short,
and Magdenburgh. A.D. 859, the Mediterranean was so frozen
over, that carriages were driven on the Adriatic Sea. In 863,
epidemic pestilence ravaged Scotland; and in the year 874, myriads
of grasshoppers or locusts, of an immense size, with six feet and
two teeth as hard as flint, overspread Gaul. They devoured every
green thing, and were afterwards driven into the British Channel by a
strong east wind; their dead bodies were washed on shore, where they
putrefied, and therefore were supposed to have caused the epidemic
pestilence, which destroyed a third part of the maritime inhabitants
of Gaul. In 883, famine and pestilence afflicted Italy, and the year
following, pestilential disease raged at Oxford, which also affected
the cattle, destroying great numbers. Soon after this period, when
Alfred the Great had just finished the rebuilding of London, which
had been burnt and destroyed by the Danes, a plague occurred which
raged throughout the land for three years, carrying off many great
men and ministers of state, as well as others. About the same time,
A.D. 896, a mortal famine and pestilence, from intemperate
seasons, happened in Gaul, Germany, Italy, and various other places
in Europe. The frost, twelve years afterwards, A.D. 908,
was so severe, that most of the rivers in England were frozen over.
A.D. 912, a great part of London was again destroyed by fire.
A.D. 922, a pestilential fever was prevalent, and very fatal
in Scotland.
A.D. 929, the winter was severe. The Thames was frozen over
for thirteen weeks: a dreadful famine and disease followed; and in 937,
pestilence arising from great heat and long drought again raged for
some time in England.
A.D. 940, epidemic pestilence of severe character appeared in
the north of Europe amongst the cattle, being fatal to numbers. This
murrain amongst the cattle was followed by disease in man, from which
in Scotland alone 40,000 persons perished. In the year 964, the emperor
Otho’s army was almost entirely destroyed by pestilence. A malignant
fever or plague prevailed in London in 965, and a grievous famine
happened, in 976, in London, and also in Italy. In the year 981, great
mortality prevailed amongst the Lacedemonians; and six years after,
987, England suffered from malignant fevers, which destroyed many of
its inhabitants, whilst a sort of flux caused great mortality among
the cattle. A.D. 993, there was an eruption of Vesuvius. In
997, burning fevers and agues were fatal in England; and in the year
1005, pestilence, in the shape of the true plague, began and continued
for three years in various parts of the globe, more than half the
human race perishing therefrom. Thousands died from famine in Italy.
A.D. 1007, another eruption of Vesuvius.
Notwithstanding the great length of the pestilential period (260 years)
just noticed, in A.D. 1009, the earth became deluged with
rains and pestilence, which began among the Saxons. In the years 1012,
1019, 1020, 1021, and 1024, dreadful pestilential seasons followed.
A.D. 1017, it rained the colour of blood in Aquitaine for the
space of three days.
In the year 1025, the summer was wet and cold, and pestilence raged in
England and in other parts of Europe.
A.D. 1027, an extraordinary convulsive disease--which was
called ‘the dance of St. John or St. Vitus,’ on account of the
Bacchantic leaps by which it was characterized, and which gave to
those affected, whilst performing their wild dance and screaming and
foaming with fury, all the appearance of persons possessed,--first
showed itself in some persons near the convent church of Kolbig, not
far from Bernburg. According to an oft-repeated tradition, eighteen
peasants, some of whose names are still preserved, are said to have
disturbed divine service on Christmas eve, by dancing and brawling
in the churchyard; whereupon the priest Ruprecht inflicted a curse
upon them, that they should dance and scream for a whole year without
ceasing. This curse is said to have been completely fulfilled, so that
the unfortunate sufferers at length sunk knee-deep into the earth, and
remained the whole time without nourishment, until they were finally
released by the intercession of two pious bishops. It is said, that
upon this they fell into a deep sleep, which lasted _three days_,
and that four of them died, the rest continuing to suffer all their
lives from a trembling of their limbs. This tradition, divested of the
embellishments of crafty priesthood, will show the disease to have been
what we now call Chorea or St. Vitus’ dance.
A.D. 1029 and 1031, epidemic pestilence again pervaded Europe,
especially England and Gaul, after tempestuous seasons, devastations
of locusts, meteors, eruptions of volcanoes, comets, intolerable
vicissitudes of the weather, and famine had caused great havoc.
A.D. 1033, a pestilence infested England; and two years afterwards,
1035, in the month of June, so intense was the cold that all the corn
and fruits were destroyed. There was another eruption of Vesuvius the
year following. A.D. 1042, it snowed heavily during harvest-time; it
rained excessively throughout the year in many parts of Europe; the
sea overwhelmed Flanders, and a terrible commotion of the elements
was the precursor of famine and pestilence in England, Gaul, Germany,
&c.; cattle and men were equally destroyed. The following year, 1043,
there was another eruption of Vesuvius, and also one in A.D. 1048. A.D.
1063 the river Thames was frozen over for fourteen weeks. Pestilential
diseases, such as fluxes, pleurisies, fevers, &c., carried off many
hundred thousands of Saracens marching to invade Rome in the year 1064:
this pestilential epidemic continued until 1066. A.D. 1067, leprosy
being on the increase in Spain, lazar-houses for the lepers were first
established at Valencia by Ruy Diaz de Villar, which were called ‘Cid
Cunpandor.’ About this period an awful plague swept away a great part
of the inhabitants of Egypt and Arabia. The following year, 1068, a
great pestilence raged in York and Durham (in England), and a terrible
plague devastated Constantinople. A.D. 1075, so intense was the cold
this year that the Thames was frozen over from the month of November
until April the following year, 1076; with the exception of a very few
days, there was scarcely any thaw during all this period. A.D. 1077,
London was nearly destroyed by fire. About this period, and two years
after, famine, pestilence, and locusts made great havoc in Italy,
Russia, Flanders, and in England.
In the years 1087–88 and 1089, very rainy, cold summers and extreme
winters were experienced in England, Gaul, and Germany, when pestilence
and famine did much mischief in those countries. There were also famine
and epidemic disease in Italy. In the latter year, 1089, erysipelas
prevailed epidemically in France, causing great mortality. A.D. 1090,
a terrible earthquake was felt throughout England, which was followed
by a great scarcity of fruit and a late, unproductive harvest. The year
following, a severe storm was felt in several parts of England; the
wind was at south-west, especially at Winchelscomb, Gloucestershire,
where the steeple of the church was thrown down; there was much thunder
and lightning; the crucifix with the image of the Virgin was broken
in pieces. On the 5th of October, during the storm a thick mist for
several hours darkened the sky. A few days after, on the 17th, a
thunder-storm from the south-west destroyed upwards of 500 houses in
London: it unroofed Bow church; and at Old Sarum the steeple was struck
down, with many dwelling-houses.
A.D. 1093, a tremendous inundation occurred in Syria, by
which prodigious numbers of the inhabitants and cattle, such as oxen
and horses, were destroyed. A.D. 1096–97, 1100, 1103–4, and
1105, pestilence and famine happened from unhealthy seasons; there
occurred excessive rains, terrible inundations, severe winters,
inclement summers, variable autumns, multitudes of worms (papiliones),
and violent hurricanes in England, Palestine, and Holland, in which
latter place 100,000 persons were drowned by the inroads of the sea. It
was during this period, A.D. 1100, that the lands of Godwin,
earl of Kent, to this day called the ‘Goodwin Sands,’ were inundated.
1104, a comet was seen. The disease which prevailed in England was
an erysipelatous epidemic fever, in which the limbs of the sick were
discovered to be thickly beset with black and livid spots, like
carbuncles in the plague. Two years after, fevers, fluxes, &c., were
rife, and pestilence continued to prevail in various parts of Europe
in the years 1108–9, 1110–11. There appeared a comet in the years
1107 and 1110. A.D. 1113, the water of the Medway failed so
greatly, that the smallest boats could not float in its channel. The
Thames about the same period was so low between the Tower and London
Bridge that women and children waded over. Owing to so great an ebb of
the ocean, the sands were laid bare for a whole day for several miles
from the shore: pestilence ravaged Judea. A.D. 1116, severe
earthquakes were experienced in the month of December in various parts
of England, especially in Shropshire. Two years previously, 1114,
several bridges, being built of wood, were broken down in England by
the ice, when it thawed after the severe frost.
From the year 1120, a pestilential period equal in intensity and
destructiveness to that between the years 740 and 1000 (a period of
260 years), preceded by famine, murrain, &c., commenced, and continued
to ravage various parts of the globe until 1392 (272 years), a brief
notice of which, taken from the chronicles, will show its extent and
fatality.
From A.D. 1120 unto 1125, erysipelas raged epidemically
with great mortality in England, and it has been computed that, by
it, a third of the population perished in those years. A.D.
1126–27 and 1128 a destructive pestilence again prevailed in England.
A.D. 1130, a severe earthquake was felt in Shropshire in the
month of September. A.D. 1133, the Po was frozen over from
Cremona to the sea, and the year after, 1134, an earthquake occurred,
just as King Henry was about to embark for Normandy, when flames of
fire burst out of certain rifts of the earth with great violence. On
the 2nd of August there was an eruption of Vesuvius, A.D.
1136, and the year following, a severe earthquake swallowed up the city
of Catania, with more than 15,000 of the inhabitants. Dismal pestilence
occurred again in England, lasting twelve years, from 1133 unto 1146;
famine also added to the miseries of the inhabitants, and much cattle
were destroyed by murrain, and for want of provender.
From the year 1150 to 1169 severe winters and dry summers were
experienced; there were frequent inundations and earthquakes; and
famine and pestilence swept the world, especially Scotland, Ireland,
Italy, Gaul, Sicily, Judea, Asia, and Africa. A.D. 1164,
there was a great inundation in Friesland, which covered nearly
the whole country, and destroyed vast numbers of the inhabitants.
A.D. 1167, Henry II.’s palace in Dublin, at which he spent
his Christmas, was built of wattles, with a straw roof, and the sides
formed of clay. A.D. 1172, great mortality from dysentery
was experienced in England; and two years after, small-pox, measles,
epidemic catarrh, scarlet fever, quinsies, and pleurisies were greatly
prevalent: similar maladies were rife in various other parts of the
world from 1175 to 1193. A.D. 1179, about Christmas, at a
place called Oxen-hall, near Darlington, in the bishopric of Durham,
the earth raised itself up like a lofty tower, and thus remained for
several hours, when on a sudden it sunk down again with a horrid
noise, and formed a deep pit, which continues until this day: it is
supposed that the wells that are now called Hell-kettles were formed
by this convulsion of nature. A.D. 1183 and following years,
a severe pestilence scourged England, and the plague raged at Rome.
A.D. 1185, an earthquake overthrew the church at Lincoln;
at the same time other places in the neighbourhood suffered from the
shock. Castile, and principally the city of Leon, suffered from a most
cruel plague which spared neither sex nor grade, visiting palaces as
well as the hovels of the poor. Many of the bishops were carried off.
A.D. 1190. The old chronicler Geoffrey de Vinsauf describes a
terrible famine and pestilence that happened in 1190, “in the army of
the Crusaders at the siege of Acre, owing to the villany of the Marquis
of Montferrat, the governor of Tyre, who not only refused to supply
the soldiers with food, but would not either allow of the townsfolk to
send them provisions.” So great was the famine and the scarcity, that
“a moderate measure of wheat which a man could carry under his arm
was sold for 100 aurei, a chicken for twelve sols, and an egg for six
deniers. The men were reduced to feed on their horses, which they were
compelled to kill, not even the entrails being rejected. Men of high
rank and the sons of great men fed upon grass even; and herbs such as
they once despised and believed not fit for human use, the greatness
of the famine made now most sweet to the starving. The public ovens
were constantly occupied by men fighting for the bread, and noblemen,
suffering from the pangs of hunger, became thieves and stole the loaves
from the bakers’ shops.” To add to their misery, heavy rains fell, and
pestilence broke out amongst them, so that a thousand deaths happened
daily. De Vinsauf says, “The unusual showers, by their constant and
continuous fall, had such an injurious effect upon the soldiers, that,
with the excess of the affliction, their limbs becoming swollen, the
whole body was affected as with the dropsy, and from the violence of
the disease the teeth of some of them were loosened and fell out.”
But few of those attacked recovered. Every section of this old work,
descriptive of this pestilence, ends with a fierce imprecation on the
Marquis for his desertion and perfidy.
A.D. 1193 and 1194, there was a famine in Italy, and
pestilence swept England, continuing till 1196. “The common people
perished in every quarter for lack of food, and the fiercest pestilence
followed, in the form of acute fever, which destroyed such numbers that
scarcely any were left to minister unto the sick; the customary funeral
service ceased, and in many places large ditches were made, into which
the dead were thrown.”--(Chron. W. Humford, vol. ii. p. 546–7.) There
was, A.D. 1196, a great famine and plague in the principality
of Catalonia, and 1199, pestilential fever raged at Cordova, in which
the celebrated physician Averrhoes observed that every patient who was
bled before purging invariably died.
England again suffered severely from epidemic pestilence in the year
1200, and also in the following year. A.D. 1205, a severe
frost was experienced in England from the 14th of January unto the 22nd
of March.
A.D. 1206, on the last day of the month of February, there
was an eclipse of the sun, which lasted six hours--the darkness was
as great as at midnight. This phenomenon was followed by abundant and
continued rains, inundations, and severe epidemic pestilence in Spain.
The years 1210–1213, 1217, 1218, and 1220, were marked by ordinary
seasons, except in Spain, Italy, and Friesland. In the former place,
Spain, 1217, the drought was so great as not only to destroy the
harvests, but the pasture had the appearance of having been burnt
up; famine was the consequence, with disease both in men and cattle.
In Italy the plague, it is said, scarcely left a tenth part of the
inhabitants alive, and in Damietta it is asserted that only three
persons out of 70,000 survived. In Friesland, A.D. 1218,
there was an inundation which destroyed cattle, houses, and many
persons. In 1221, excessive rains, floods, frosts, and inclement heats
induced a famine and pestilence, which almost desolated the whole of
Europe; in some countries, the living were exhausted burying the dead,
and in some cities scarcely a person survived the terrible destruction.
A.D. 1222, there was a severe thunder-storm in England with
lightning, which destroyed several churches; the summer was excessively
dry; frost and deep snow in April had destroyed the blossoms of the
fruits; the country was deluged with rains in autumn, and swept with
tempestuous winds; and the plague raged with uncontrollable fury in
Germany, Hungary, Gaul, Egypt, and other countries: the animals also
suffered from disease. The winter of 1225 was rigorous, following the
great drought. In 1224 a dearth ensued, and there was a great mortality
among sheep.
A.D. 1228, abundant rains, followed by a hot summer, the
subsequent winter being a severe one, induced fatal disease, and an
inundation at Friesland destroyed 100,000 persons.
The inundation of the Tiber, which happened A.D. 1230, drowned
all the lower city of Rome, the river rising even to the stairs of
St. Peter’s church: July and August following were exceedingly hot;
famine ensued, and afterwards pestilence commenced and continued until
A.D. 1235. England suffered also from pestilence, which
decimated the population; in that year 20,000 persons, it is supposed,
died of starvation alone in London. About this period, leprosy
became so common in England that it was made the subject of several
legislative enactments.
During this year, 1230, when King Don Jayme seized on the island of
Mallorca, a frightful and lethal pestilence prevailed not only among
the poor and wretched, but also among the higher orders; in the course
of only one month, several nobles and individuals of the first families
of Aragon and Catalonia died. The desolation which this dire pestilence
caused was such that it almost depopulated the island, and forced the
king to send galleys to Catalonia in search of colonists, he having
given an order to Don Pedro Cornel for 100,000 reals to bring from
Aragon 150 gentry,--caballeros or nobles. This pestilence increased
with another no less fatal disease, viz., ‘the Sacred Persian or St.
Anthony’s fire;’ so that this great monarch, anxious for the safety of
his people, established in the island, by his mandate of 13th September
of the same year, the hospital of St. Anthony for the reception and
treatment of all suffering from so terrible a malady, as appears in
the history of the kingdom of Mallorca written by the chronicler or
historian Don Vincente Mut. In imitation of this establishment, and of
that founded in Castro Xerez in 1214, other hospitals were erected for
the same purposes in Madrid, Saragossa, and in various other provinces
of the kingdom. Twenty-three years after, another hospital, called
after St. Lazarus, was established in the city of Seville, similar to
that which was built in the city of Valencia in the year 1067. The
Annals of Seville, written by Zurita and Don Alonso Melgado, state
that this hospital was founded by King Alonso the Wise. About this
time, 1230, Denmark, Italy, and Gaul were visited by a severe epidemic
pestilence, as also were various other parts of Europe; it continued
until 1236.
A.D. 1233 it thundered and lightened for thirteen days, with
heavy rains, which destroyed all vegetation in England, when famine
and disease were the consequences. At this time most of the houses in
London were built of wood and wattles, and thatched with straw; the
windows were without glass, and there were neither chimneys nor boarded
floors; common straw was used for the king’s bed. The Mediterranean
was frozen over; loaded waggons also crossed the Adriatic in front of
Venice. A.D. 1234 and the year following, 1235, the Thames
rose so high at Westminster, that the lawyers and other members of the
court were brought out of the Hall in boats. A.D. 1237, the
dancing disease, similar to that which was rife A.D. 1027 at
Kolbig, broke out amongst upwards of 100 children at Erfurt; they were
said to have been suddenly seized with this singular malady, and to
have proceeded dancing and jumping along the road to Armstadt; when
they arrived at that place they fell exhausted to the ground, and,
according to the account of an old chronicle, many of them died, after
they were taken home by their parents, and the rest remained afflicted
to the end of their lives with a permanent tremor. The years 1238 and
1239 were also destructive years in Europe.
A.D. 1240, the fish died on the coast of England; inclement
seasons prevailed, and pestilence appeared in various parts of that
country. Two years after, A.D. 1242, excessive rains swelled
the river Thames, and inundated the country round about Lambeth on the
Surrey side. The year following was remarkable for the appearance of
meteors and drought; deadly pestilence prevailed in various parts of
England. A.D. 1247, pestilence again occurred in England; it
broke out in the month of September. A.D. 1249, an earthquake
threw down St. Michael’s on the Hill without Glastonbury; a severe
shock was felt also about the same period in Somersetshire.
In the same year, 1249, a dreadful pestilence ravaged the armies of
St. Louis the Crusader, caused, says Joinville, his historian, by the
decomposition of the dead bodies of those who had been slain in two
great battles fought a few days previously. They had been thrown into
the river by the Saracens, and when they floated, were arrested by
the low bridge, which was the means of communication between the two
divisions of the French troops. The river was covered with them from
bank to bank, so that the water could not be seen a good stone’s-throw
from the bridge upwards. The pious king caused the bodies of the
Christians to be removed from the river and buried in deep graves;
those of the Saracens were thrust under the arch of the bridge, and
floated down to the sea. This occurred during Lent, and all that time,
being obliged by their creed to live on fish, the soldiers could get no
other than eelpouts,--a gluttonous fish, which fed on the dead bodies.
The disease which broke out among them, Joinville says, dried up the
flesh on their legs to the bone, and the skin became tanned as black
as the ground, or like an old boot that has long lain behind a coffer
(evidently a kind of dry gangrene). In addition to this miserable
disorder, those affected by it had another sore complaint in the mouth,
from eating such fish, that rotted the gums, and caused a most stinking
breath: very few escaped death that were thus attacked; and the surest
symptom of its being fatal was a bleeding at the nose; when that took
place, none recovered. Starvation was soon added to their miseries, for
the enemy was enabled so to blockade them, that the provision-boats
could not reach them. The disorder so increased in the army, that the
barbers were forced to cut away very large pieces of flesh from the
gums to enable their patients to eat. The mortality was very great
indeed, but what number thus perished miserably is not mentioned by
Joinville.
In the year 1250 the summer was rainy and tempestuous, and a hard
winter followed. The old town of Winchelsea was swallowed up by the
sea, and an earthquake was felt at St. Albans, that did much damage.
The summer of 1251 was intolerably hot; there was a famine in Italy,
and epidemic pestilence traversed all England, and was attended with
great mortality; a thunder-storm occurred, during which the chimney of
the chamber where the queen and her children lay at Windsor was struck
down, and the whole apartment violently shaken; large oaks in the park
were torn up by the roots: the lightning was so terrible as to surpass
any that had occurred in the memory of man. A.D. 1252, the
late frost in spring, succeeding drought, destroyed the vegetation;
there were heavy rains in July; at Michaelmas the plague began to rage
in London, and pervaded all England, continuing until August in the
following year, thus affording an instance of this disease beginning in
autumn, running through the winter, and terminating in the summer. The
winter of 1254 was severely cold; a murrain appeared among sheep, and
a mortal disease among horses called ‘the evil of the tongue.’
A.D. 1255–56 and 1258, the tides rose uncommonly high; a comet
was observed in 1256; the rivers swelled with excessive rains, tempests
levelled buildings, the summers were wet, the crops failed by the
destroying power of the elements, and dearth, famine, and pestilence
caused great havoc amongst the inhabitants of England; 15,000 persons
perished in London alone from hunger. “The inundations in autumn,”
says M’Culloch, “destroyed the crops; fatal fevers prevailed,
principal in the summer, during the dog-days, when to one cemetery
alone, that of St. Edward’s, 2000 bodies were carried.” Long droughts
succeeded, and the mortality continued until 1257. _A.D._ 1264,
a murrain destroyed much cattle in England, especially horses; and in
A.D. 1266, swarms of the palmer-worms destroyed all vegetation
in Scotland. In 1269, excessive seasons existed; pestilence destroyed
the Crusaders on their march to the Holy Land, and the French king and
his son perished by it. A.D. 1274, a grievous rot broke out
amongst the sheep, which persisted for twenty-five or twenty-eight
years, destroying almost all the sheep in England. From the year
1277 to that of 1340 similar seasons, inundations, famines, and
pestilence reigned at different times and in different places, among
the inhabitants of Britain, Italy, Poland, Denmark, Prussia, Zealand,
Egypt, Germany, Bohemia, Spain, &c.
A.D. 1278. In the month of June, this year, the dancing mania
again occurred on the Mosel Bridge at Utrecht, when 200 fanatics began
to dance, and would not desist until a priest passed who was carrying
the host to a person who was sick, upon which, as if in punishment of
their crime, the bridge gave way, and they were all drowned.
A.D. 1283, King Philip of France invaded Spain with an army
consisting of 200,000 infantry and 8600 cavalry; when at Gerona,
this army suffered from pestilence, 4000 being carried off by it.
Innumerable swarms of flies, said to be as big as acorns, were
generated, and attacked both men and horses, numbers of whom were
killed by their poison. This pestilential season was attributed to a
miracle wrought by St. Narcissus.
According to the veterinary surgeons Martin Arrendondo and Fernando
Calvo, in the introduction to the Commentaries of the celebrated
Francisco de la Reyna, mention is made of an epizootic of great
severity, which occurred in one of the cities of the kingdom of
Seville, A.D. 1301, by which there died more than 1000 horses. The
above-mentioned authors derive their information from a paragraph of
Laurenciscus Rasius, in his work entitled ‘Hippiatria or Marescalia,’
in which, when speaking of the diseases of horses, he thus writes:
“Dicta autem infirmitas (febris) epidemialis est, et ex ipsa anno CCCI.
fuerunt in urbe mortui plusquam mille.”
A.D. 1285, a severe thunder-storm was experienced in various
parts of England: as the king and queen were holding converse in their
bed-room, a flash of lightning passed by them, doing them no injury;
but it struck and killed two of their attendants who were in an
ante-room. It was about this period that water was conveyed to London
by means of leaden pipes after fifty years’ labour. Severe dysentery
prevailed in various parts of the kingdom, as also an epidemic,
simulating the influenza of the present day, complicated with typhoid
symptoms, which persisted for upwards of ten years. A.D. 1299,
a comet was seen. The seasons for three years were inhospitable; severe
catarrhs with fluxes pervaded England.
A.D. 1302, great drought prevailed in Spain similar to those
which had occurred for centuries past; famine ensued, when pestilence
raged with great violence, carrying off thousands in various parts of
the country.
A.D. 1307–8, 1309, and 1310, intemperate seasons were
experienced, and famine was the consequence, more especially in
England, Ireland, and Scotland, with great mortality in the latter
country. It was about this period that coals were first brought into
use in England. Various parts of London, as shown by Stow, were in a
filthy condition, which, with the mode of living, and the disgusting
habits of the inhabitants, gave ample cause for the outbreak of
pestilence. Fleet ditch was “of such breadth and depth,” so says Stow,
“that ten or twelve ships’ navies at once, with merchandise, were
wont to come to the bridge Fleete; for some time this canal had been
neglected, and became an intolerable nuisance in a variety of ways.” It
was not until 1733 that it was arched over, when the Fleet Market was
built on it. Pope denounces the filthy condition of Fleet ditch in the
following lines of his ‘Dunciad:’
“By Bridewell all descend
(As morning prayer and flagellation end)
To where Fleet ditch, with disembouging streams,
Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to Thames,
The _king_ of dykes! than whom no sluice of mud
With deeper sable blots the silver flood:
‘Here trip, my children! here at once leap in,
Here prove who best can dash through thick and thin;
And who the most in love of dirt excel--
Or dark dexterity of groping well;
Who flings most filth, and wide pollutes around
The stream, be his the weekly journals’ bound;
A pig of lead to him who dives the best;
A peck of coals a-piece shall glad the rest.’”
A.D. 1316, a peculiar disease prevailed in England,--fever,
with severe dysentery, which raged with an intensity and mortality
equal to the true plague: scarcity amounting to famine was experienced
at the same time, wheat selling at 45_s._ per quarter, equal in
those days to £30 sterling of our money. A.D. 1327, a comet
was seen; the year following, an earthquake, the greatest ever felt in
England, occurred on the 14th of November.
A.D. 1330, the weather was so tempestuous in England, and the
rains fell so heavily, that the harvest did not begin until Michaelmas.
A storm from the westward overthrew several houses and did much damage,
tearing up forest trees of immense size by the roots. Five years after,
1335, there was a grievous famine in England, which was succeeded by
pestilence, and attended with great mortality.