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Life in the Middle Ages was dangerous. Whether living in a communal setting, fighting abroad, or simply tending a field, there were numerous challenges that could bring it all to an end. Life inside a castle or a monastery may have offered some protection, but you were just as exposed to horrible, contagious diseases as everyone else.
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Whether working in a village, fighting abroad, or simply
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tending a field, life in the Middle Ages was extremely dangerous, to say the least
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If you lived in a medieval city, you were particularly susceptible to afflictions
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resulting from a lack of hygiene, poor sanitation, and overcrowding. So today, we're going to take a look
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at all the afflictions you might catch if you lived in a medieval city
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OK, time to spray some Lysol on that suit of armor, because we're going in
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Even though we know the condition is caused by the Mycobacterium leprae bacteria
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leprosy is arguably still as misunderstood today as it was during the Middle Ages
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Now called Hansen's disease, leprosy results in skin lesions and nerve damage that can impair
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a person's eyes and limbs. Leprosy develops slowly. Invisible symptoms can take decades
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to manifest, like a Guns N' Roses album. Leprosy was common in both the Byzantine Empire and
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Western Europe from the 12th century forward, often transferred by pilgrims and crusaders
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Leper hospitals were established outside of town centers during the 12th century in France
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and the Low Countries. Facilities tasked to solely care for lepers were known as leprosaria
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or leprosariums and fell under the charitable auspices of the church. While it was really the
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social class of the leper that dictated their overall reception, most lepers were shunned and
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cast out of cities, towns, and villages. In other words, they were treated like lepers
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Oh, so that's where the phrase comes from. Lepers were also refused burial alongside non-lepers
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thanks to an Old Testament passage in Leviticus, which strenuously made the point that lepers were unclean
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and should live in isolation. The Black Plague, a general term for the three different types
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of plague caused by the Yersinia pestis bacteria, spread from Asia into Europe during the mid-14th century
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resulting in millions of casualties in the process. and some decidedly metal artwork
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In addition to its effects on the population, the plague turned generations of medieval artists
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into real edgelords. Most commonly spread by infected fleas carried on cargo ships
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the plague affected one's lymphatic system, causing swelling and discoloration of the areas
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around the lymph nodes, known as buboes. Other symptoms included fever, vomiting, body aches
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and, more than 50% of the time, death. Everyone was terrified by the plague
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According to one eyewitness, one citizen avoided another. Hardly any neighbor troubled about others
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Relatives never, or hardly ever, visited each other. A reason to avoid your neighbors and extended family, it's not all downside
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But as Weird History fans might recall from our episode about body collectors during the Black Plague
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people were so terrified of catching the disease that some of them would literally abandon their children in the street if they got infected
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That's a pretty harsh time out. And those streets were piled with corpses of plague victims because the cemeteries quickly ran out of room Even the ones that still had room were forced to dig huge trenches and bury plague victims in communal graves by the hundreds It a medieval experience
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We're glad they left out of your dinner at medieval times. St. Elmo's Fire was a 1985 coming-of-age film starring Brat Pack actors like Emilio
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Estevez and Demi Moore. St. Anthony's fire, on the other hand, was a sickness caused by eating grains contaminated
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with the claviceps purpurea fungus, also known as ergotism. The ergot fungus grows on moldy
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grains and, once ingested, can cause redness, swelling, and gangrene. Rye was produced and
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consumed in large quantities by the poor and was especially susceptible to the ergot fungus
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so the disease affected the lower classes in the greatest numbers, yet another reason it was tough
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to be yield poor. When one was first struck with St. Anthony's fire
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red spots appeared on the flesh. The initial burning soon became excruciating as limbs swelled
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People often hallucinated, with some believing they were in a fight with the devil
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Sometimes people had convulsions. But as their extremities began to rot, toes, fingers, ears, and even arms or legs
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could actually fall off. In 944 CE, 40,000 people in France perished from St. Anthony's fire
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and monastic hospitals were built throughout Europe to treat victims. Like many diseases of the period, tuberculosis mostly afflicted poor town dwellers living in
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less than hygienic conditions. Surprise! Called the white plague, consumption, or king's evil
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during the Middle Ages, symptoms of tuberculosis include a fever and persistent coughing that can
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result in expressing white phlegm or blood. It's also known to have developed in a memorable
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character performance by Val Kilmer. When the lymph nodes in one's net become enlarged
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the disease is also called scrofula. Tuberculosis was believed to be contagious
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but there were assertions that royalty could cure the disease with a simple touch. Spoiler alert
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they couldn't. Nonetheless, as early as the 11th century, King Edward the Confessor in England and
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Philip I in France conducted ceremonies to touch individuals suffering from scrofula
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Those touched by the king's grace received touch pieces or gold coin amulets, signifying
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the event, like a space shuttle pin you might get when visiting Cape Canaveral. Only this one was supposed to signify that you had been cured of disease, which, to reiterate
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you hadn't been. Also known as the Flux, dysentery was endemic during the Middle Ages, common in medieval
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towns, cities, villages, monasteries, and among groups of soldiers. The flux, more like, you better give that toilet a courtesy flux
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Am I right? Flux. You know, like a flux a toilet? It sounds like flush a toilet
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Wow, tough crowd. Dysentery is spread by bacteria or parasites in water or contaminated food and causes bloody diarrhea fever and dehydration St Martin Bishop of Tours described his own bout with the disease as so bad that he completely gave up any hope of living
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OK, that's why the flux gag didn't land. Nobody really knew what caused dysentery during the Middle Ages, and it was one of those diseases
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that didn't just stick to the poor. A fact 15th century Italian polymath Girolamo Savonarola made clear when he observed that
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pestilential dysentery affected not only in the same house, but also in the entire locale
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And with the affliction moving from a child of 10 or 15 to a sexagenarian, proving his own point
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Savonarola himself came down with dysentery in 1495. Just like many college dorms, communal living during the Middle Ages all but encouraged the
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transmission of disease and infection. In medieval hospitals, infection was common due to a lack of
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cleanliness. Patients often suffered due to the prevailing laudable pus theory believed by
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physicians at the time, which held that pus was a good sign and necessary for healing. If pus didn't
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appear, a doctor might find ways to produce it by dinging at the damaged area or finding another way
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to produce an abscess, which is a very liberal interpretation of doing no harm. Luckily, not all
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doctors favored gouging new infections into their patients. Henri de Mondeville, a 13th and 14th
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century French surgeon, advocated for cleanliness and the closing of gashes and cuts, as opposed to
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letting them openly fester. Seems like common sense to us now. But back then, people probably
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thought he was a maniac for even suggesting it. Mondeville even went so far as to recommend using
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wine as a disinfectant. The bonus of all that wine is that if the surgery goes poorly
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neither you or the patient will care too much. While its broader origins remain contested
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syphilis had hit Europe by the late 15th century. In 1495, French soldiers were said to have
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contracted the disease during the siege of Naples, where it may have been widespread since as early
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as 1429. That must have been some siege. Spanish physician and scholar Gaspar Torreya wrote about
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syphilis in the 1490s, describing the ulcers and swelling that could affect one's genitals before
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other pains, pustules, and maladies appeared. He dedicated the work to Cesare Borgia, a Valencian
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military leader and statesman, because it was Borgia's affliction that brought the disease to
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light for the doctor. And who doesn't want their name forever linked to syphilis
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Smallpox declined during the Middle Ages, but just like the McRib, it didn't disappear
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completely. As a disease that had been around for millennia, a portion of the population had
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built up an immunity by the 14th century, but plenty were still vulnerable to it. As early as
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the 9th century, Islamic scholar Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Zakaria al-Razi wrote a medical treatise on smallpox and measles
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describing symptoms and treatments for both. The two diseases had previously been lumped
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under the larger category of rashes However al determined that measles was not as serious as smallpox and they had different causes He described the symptoms of smallpox as fever
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back pain, and restless sleep. A person would feel swollen, and their skin would be inflamed
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followed by lethargy, throat pain, and thick throat saliva that could affect breathing and
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speaking. Al-Razi believed the best way to treat smallpox pustules was to wrap, rub, steam, purge
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and bleed the afflicted individual. The smallpox vaccine was still about 1,000 years away
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So beating the hell out of a victim might have been slightly better than nothing
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There were a lot of diseases that could shorten one's life during the Middle Ages
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And sadly, infants and children were particularly vulnerable. Whooping cough and diphtheria were prevalent among the young
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especially in towns and cities. And just like today, kids were incredibly efficient at catching and spreading infections
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In Scotland, the remains from one Aberdeen cemetery revealed 53% of the buried individuals
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were under the age of 6. While in Linlithgow, that number was 58%
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Some historians estimate infant mortality during the Middle Ages was as high as 30% to
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50%, while others believe 20% is a more accurate figure. That said, it's difficult to get a clear assessment of stillborns and infant mortality
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Infants' bones decay more quickly than their adult counterparts, and if an infant was not baptized prior to burial
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he or she would not have been buried in a Christian cemetery. They were given the same burial rites as an old VCR
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Diseases were not the only causes of infant mortality. Iron deficiency, often the result of extended breastfeeding, was common
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This could contribute to poor health for women and their children alike, just in case you thought the Middle Ages were a little too easy on them
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Any unexplained elements, and even some that could be explained, were usually attributed to unbalanced humors
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You see, medieval physicians sought to balance what were known as the four humors, blood, phlegm, choler, and melancholy
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Previous lineups included David Lee Roth and Gary Cherone, but they had artistic differences with phlegm
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These humors were believed to have physical qualities that influenced the mind and body
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And when one was out of balance, it led to disease. The principle dated all the way back to Greek medicine, and the treatment called for methods to bring about equilibrium
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Diet, climate, exercise, herbal remedies, purges, and bloodletting were all things that could be used to rebalance humors, or so it was believed
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The humors corresponded to different seasons, making their seasonal importance that much more acute
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And balancing one's humors could be preventative or therapeutic. Bloodletting, for example, could be carried out according to a regular schedule
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although we feel that kind of treatment needs to be a surprise, like an intervention or a felony arrest
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As far as treatment, bloodletting was used for everything from the bubonic plague to gout
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Once clergymen were prohibited from participating in bloodletting in 1163, professional barber surgeons began bleeding people instead
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That's like going to Great Clips for a trim and a bleed. Yeah, give me a number two on the sides. Get a nice fade going
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Oh, and go ahead and open a vein while you're back there