The early history of quarantine : origin of sanitary measures directed against yellow fever / by J.M. Eager.

  • Eager, J. M. (John Macauley), 1862-1916.
Date:
1903
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The early history of quarantine : origin of sanitary measures directed against yellow fever / by J.M. Eager. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

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    back with them not only numerous diseases, but also the word laza- retto,-' as applied to a place for the isolation of the victims of com- municable maladies. As a result lazarettoes were built outside the gates of nearly all the principal cities of Europe. Leprosy itself had, however, been introduced into Europe many centuries earlier. It is spoken of as a foreign disease by the earlier Greek and Latin writers. Plin}^ thinks that leprosy was introduced into Europe by Pompey returning to Rome from Syria after his celebrated triumph over fif- teen nations in Asia. It is implied that leprosy walked with the three hundred princes before the triumphal car of the conqueror. These surmises give rise to the interesting query whether leprosy was not the first quarantinable disease introduced by sea. As a quarantinable disease leprosy takes precedence in several ways. For instance, it was the first quarantinable disease (quarantinable from the point of tiew of the United States quarantine regulations) of which the causative germ was discovered. During the epoch of the crusades leprosy became widespread in Europe and resulted in the extensive establishment of isolation sta- tions. Leper houses existed at Metz, Verdun, and Maestricht as early as the seventh century, for long before the crusades the disease had spread from Italy into the Roman colonies of Gaul, Britain, and Spain, and thence into the most remote countries. Mathew Paris estimates that at the time of the great epidemic of leprosy in western Europe succeeding the movement against the Mohammedans 19,000 lazarettoes were in operation in Europe. Religious orders conducted the houses bearing the name of St. Lazarus, but in northern Europe many dedicated to St. George were under secular supervision. Not only were persons sufi'ering from leprosy and other contagious dis- eases sent to such asylums, but the insane and individuals whose sep- aration from society was deemed an advantage to the populace or the ruling powers were also confined there. In these places of isolation quarantine measures, that afterwards had their application at maritime stations and ultimately were directed against j^ellow fever, developed primarily. Lepers were not strictly confined to the leper houses. They were, however, required to wear a special costume, to limit their walks to certain roads, to give warning of their approach by sounding a clapper, and to forbear communicating with healthy persons and drinking from or bathing in any running stream. PEST AND EARLY VIEWS OF ETIOLOGY. In connection with pest and later with syphilis the greatest advances of mediseval times took place in public sanitary methods, leading to the establishment of maritime and land quarantines. During the Middle Ages more attention was given to the isolation of leprosy than of other diseases now known to be virulently contagious, for the reason