INTRODUCTION,
[The following are the sources from which this chapter has been compiled :-
Encyc. Brit. : Qnain's Dict. of Med. : Sir A. Faulkner, M.D., A Treatise on the Plague .
MacLean, Epidemic and Pestilential Diseases : Nathan, The Plague in India : Bombay
Gazetteer.]
The word plague is derived, through the Latin playa, from the Greek p???? :
it signifies ' a stroke.
Plague is the most deadly of all known diseases. Obscure in its origin,
persistent in its duration, terrible in its effects, it has baffled alike the investiga-
tions of science and the observations of the most perspicacious. The attitude it
compels in those who are, and in those likely to become, its victims is one of
abject panic. It assumes varying forms, it strikes with varying force, it rises
and falls with varying rapidity.
Such is the disease which, appearing century after century, now in the most
deadly epidemic, and now in a mild sporadic, form, was the scourge of Europe
up to the very beginning of the 19th century. As well for the sake of com-
pleteness, as for that of interest and comparison, a brief sketch of what it has done
in the past, both in the West and in the East, will not be out of place here.
Previous to
A. D 1300-
PLAGUE IN EUROPE.
(A. D. 542- A. D. 1841.)
The first historical notice we have of Plague is contained m the fragment of
the Physician Rufus of Ephesus, preserved by Oribasius (circ.. B. C. 200) ; but
although mentioned later by Livy and by Orosius as destroying one million people
in Africa, it is not until the 6th century, in the reign of Justinian, that we find
Bubonic Plague in Europe.
Beginning at Palusium (Egypt) in 542 A. D., it spread over Egypt ; in 543
it reached Constantinople, where it is said to have destroyed 10.000 people in one
day ; in 546 we find it in Gaul (France) ; in 565 in Italy, " where it depopulated
the country to such an extent as to leave it an easy prey to the Lombards." Con-
stantinople was, thus, we see, the first haunt of Plague in Europe ; and it appears
to have been the starting point for most, if not all, succeeding European epidemics.
But although Plague appeared thus early in Europe, it was not until very
much later that it appeared in England.
The history of Plague from the time of the Justinian pandemic is very vague
until we reach the 14th century, when that great cycle of epidemics known as the
" Black Death," swept over Europe, inflicting enormous mortality.*
" Whether in all the postilences kuown by this name the disease was really the same may admit of doubt,
but it is clear that in some at least it was the bubonic plague"-Encyc. Brit., Art. "Plague."
" It must, however, be remembered that although numerous pestilenoes in Europe are recorded by medival
chroniclers, there is no sufficient evidenoe, before the 14th century, that they were bubonic plague. The undoubted
prevalence of this disease began after the black death of the fourteenth century."--Quain's 'Dicl. of Med., ?rt
Plague."
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