CHAPTER I.
FROM 1495 B.C. TO A.D. 540.

It is recorded that in the month Adar,—answering, according to our computation of time, to the period between the middle of February and March, the end of the Jewish year,—during the reign of Pharaoh IV., king of Egypt, in the year of the world 2509 (anno 1495 before the Christian era), and in the 80th year of the life of Moses, the sacred historian and great captain of the hosts of Israel, many awful prodigies in the natural world commenced, especially in commotions of the elements, which were succeeded by a pestilence destructive both to men and beasts in the low lands of Egypt. This terrible pestilence was preceded by fearful commotions of the elements,—hail, thunder and lightning, heat and drought, the generation of insects, &c.; for the summer had been hot, and attended with heavy cold nocturnal dews alternating with rains, after a humid winter. The weather had been very variable; the excessive heats and hot winds exhausted the inhabitants by day, and the cold damp dews chilled them by night: the atmosphere was so filled with fiery elements, and clouds of dust and sand, that men and cattle were in imminent danger of suffocation, and were compelled to seek shelter from these dry storms and tempests. On the 10th, universal darkness prevailed, which continued for three days; and on the 14th, deadly pestilence commenced, which, in one sudden and universal destruction, swept away millions from the face of nature.

Anno 1471 B.C., by dire pestilence, the murmurers and mutineers in the company of Korah, Dathan, and Abiram were destroyed in the encampment at Kadesh, in the desert of Paran, to the number of 14,700 persons; and nineteen years after (1452 B.C.), by a similar pestilence, of the riotous and drunken worshippers of Baal-peor, 24,000 men and women perished.

In the year 1310 B.C., sixty years previous to the Trojan war, the island of Ægina was visited by an epidemic pestilence, which was fatal to great numbers.

Anno 1141 B.C., the people of Ashdod, a place lying on the seashore between Gaza and Joppa, which is called in the New Testament Azotus, were visited by an epidemic pestilence termed Emerods—an affection of the bowels, or malignant dysentery.

In the time of David, 1017 B.C., there broke out a pestilence which in three days destroyed 70,000 persons. About the period of this infliction, the first dreadful epoch of Spanish epidemiology is recorded. The period, however, has been variously given; by some, it is fixed at 1100 B.C., while other writers mention it as having occurred during the great plague or dearth in Egypt. There were, without interruption, twenty-five years of drought in Spain; springs were dried up, rivers became fordable, their waters becoming almost stagnant; there was neither pasture for beasts nor fruit for man; so great was the barrenness of the land, that there was scarcely any green thing to be found, except some olive-trees on the banks of the Ebro and the Guadalquiver. Such, says the historian, was the melancholy state of our ancient Spain; “full of dreadful mortalities, plagues, and miseries of every description, which, with emigration to other lands, nearly depopulated our country.”

Plutarch mentions the occurrence of a great pestilence that happened in Rome in the year 790 B.C., soon after the murder of Tatius: it was so rapidly fatal that it is represented as killing almost instantaneously; cattle as well as men were swept away, and all nature appeared one desolate and abandoned waste: during this awful period it is said to have rained blood, or crimson insects which turned the waters to the colour of blood, as happened in Egypt during the reign of Pharaoh: the crops failed, and the country of Campania may be said to have been ravaged by the sword, famine, and pestilence. Plutarch also gives an account of an epidemic pestilence which afflicted the inhabitants of Italy, especially the capital of the empire, during the reign of Numa Pompilius, of Hezekiah over Judah, and of Sennacherib over Assyria in the year 710 B.C.: by this pestilence 185,000 of the Assyrian armies perished at the siege of Jerusalem, which compelled the assailants to raise the siege and to return to Nineveh, even after they had taken all the principal cities of Judah, including Libnah, a city situated about twelve miles south-west of Jerusalem. It was at this period that Numa Pompilius instituted the Salii, a college of priests of Mars, who carried the sacred shields in procession, to stop the pestilence.

Livy describes another pestilence which occurred at Rome during the reign of Tullus Hostilius, 694 B.C. Zosimus, an officer during the reign of Theodosius the Younger, speaks of the prevalence of a pestilence in the city of Rome during the reign of Tarquin, anno 671 B.C.; and Dionysius Halicarnassus, Murator, and Functius have also mentioned the occurrence of a great famine and pestilence in Rome, anno 545 B.C., which nearly depopulated Velitræ, an ancient town of Latium on the Appian Road, about twenty miles to the east of Rome. A murrain prevailed about this time among their cattle, which destroyed vast numbers, and such havoc was made among the inhabitants of Latium that the Volsci were necessitated to apply to the Romans to re-people their cities. Rome also suffered the year subsequently, as did Campania, celebrated for its lake Avernus, which emitted such poisonous vapours that birds would not go near its banks: this pestilence spared neither age nor constitution, and yielded to no remedies. It appeared suddenly, destroyed its victims rapidly, and on the approach of continued cold weather disappeared as suddenly as it came.

Anno 594 B.C. There perished this year a third part of the inhabitants of Jerusalem by a severe pestilence.

Herodotus and Justin have recorded the destruction of the army of Xerxes, when retreating into Asia after his defeat at the battle of Salamis, by a grievous pestilence, which attacked both land and sea forces, especially the army under the command of General Mardonius, anno 480 B.C.: the victims were numbered at 150,000. During this period Diodorus Siculus writes that the ancient Spanish troops were the most faithful and courageous, and constituted almost always the strength of the Carthaginian armies: he continues,—They (the Carthaginians) took treasure and soldiers, who by their valour aided the republic in their most critical times of war. The Spanish soldiers endured hardship with indomitable courage, and, being naturally of a robust make, were not intimidated by the pestilence which destroyed others of the Carthaginian army of that time, nor by the 150,000 dead bodies—plague-victims, which without burial strewed the plains. All these circumstances did not prevent their appearing in arms, and demanding the capitulation of Syracuse from its first tyrant, whilst at the same time the other troops, shamefully abandoned by their chiefs, took to a precipitate flight, and surrendered at discretion. History says nothing of the means taken for the curing of this horrible pestilence at Syracuse, nor shows clearly why the Spaniards alone enjoyed an immunity from this pestilence, which was worthy of being perpetuated in history. Villalba however mentions some physical causes which he considers contributed to the remarkable exemption of the Spaniards from the dire pestilence: he states that the ancient Spaniards were a sober race; and, according to all authorities, sobriety is a powerful means of protection against disease. Filarcus, a citizen of Athens, was singularly struck with this fact: among the rich who lived frugally, drank water alone, and were clothed with the richest garments, moderation and bodily cleanliness were observed to be of the highest importance in maintaining the sensible and insensible perspiration; these functions of secretion and of excretion being essential in order that the integral parts of the blood should preserve its purity, its weight, its normal state of electricity, and natural fluidity, upon which depend the preservation of health and the power of resisting disease in times of epidemics, as is affirmed by medical jurists, and as the ancient Spaniards practised. He continues,—Bathing is also an efficacious means of removing the impurities that opposed the sensible and insensible perspiration; and it would appear that in Spain, long before the Second Punic War, bathing was in general favour. The unmeaning sneer of Diodorus Siculus at the habit of the Spaniards of washing their entire bodies with urine, will be recollected, whilst Galen says that in Syria they avoid the plague by simply drinking that liquid excrement. That the Spaniards used urine advantageously as a topical lotion we shall find in the treatises on baths and other subjects of ancient Spain. Drs. Ribeiro and Sanchez assert, with some foundation, that the use of linen in Europe has caused pestilence to be less frequent; thus, as it were, contributing to the cleanliness which the ancients obtained by the use of their public baths. To a similar cause we may attribute the rarity with which the Spaniards were attacked by the aforesaid frightful pestilence. Catullus, Silius Italicus, and Gratius Faliscus eulogize the vapour baths of the ancient Sætabi: in fine, says Villalba, the sobriety, personal cleanliness, bathing in common water, washing with urine, vapour baths, and the wearing linen garments, with fortitude, concurred powerfully to the immunity enjoyed from disease by our Spanish ancestors.

Anno 476 B.C. During this and the succeeding years, says Florian de Ocampo, there prevailed in Spain from time to time a series of pestilences and other minor diseases, by which a multitude of persons perished. The Carthaginians, to appease the ire of the gods to whom they attributed these fatal visitations, offered up human sacrifices, and made incisions on their arms and legs, and on other parts of their bodies: they also immolated cattle of all kinds, according to the severity of the pestilence.

Orosius, another Spanish writer, and also Dionysius, relate the occurrence of a terrible plague at Rome, which caused great mortality, 463 B.C. This was a grievous time, says the historian, men and beasts being equally afflicted. The disease was preceded by great heat and drought, and the calamities and fatigues of war, which were greatly augmented by crowds of countrymen and herds of cattle received within the walls of the city, in order to avoid the ravages and plunderings of the Latins and Hernici, who then desolated the country. The epidemic first seized on horses and horned cattle, then on man, the poorer people being the chief victims: it began about the calends of September, and raged until the end of November. The two consuls Servilius and Æbutius, and many other illustrious Romans, fell victims to the disease.

Livy and Dionysius inform us that, anno 452 B.C., nearly one-half of the inhabitants of Rome were destroyed by the pestilence loimikié, which was also communicated to the Æqui, the Volsci, and the Sabines, and caused a great mortality amongst them. The distress and consternation being general, the land was left uncultivated, and the miseries of famine threatened to overwhelm those who survived the epidemic. This pestilence was succeeded by another, which, if possible, was more grievous; it lasted from 443 to 438 B.C. In time, so frequently had Rome been scourged by repeated epidemic pestilences, that Livy styled it “urbs assiduis exhausta funeribus.”

In the second year of the Peloponnesian War, 435 B.C., epidemic pestilence broke out at Athens, where the inhabitants of the Athenian territory were crowded together into the city to avoid the ravages of the Lacedemonians: it destroyed 5000 of the prime of their armies, and an immense number of the poor, and continued without interruption for five years. It began towards the close of an open spring, after a severe winter, raged the four following summers and autumns, was especially fatal to their armies at the siege of Epidaurus and Potidea, and continued all through the severe winters. Thucydides, Lucretius, Anacharsis, Plutarch, and Hippocrates give an account of a similar pestilence which ravaged Persia about the same period. Artaxerxes, the king of Persia, sent for the great physician of Cos and Greece to come and arrest its progress, but Hippocrates nobly answered the Persian monarch in these words, addressing Hystaspes, prefect of the Hellespont: “To the epistle which you have sent, and you have asserted to come from the king, write to the king as I briefly answer,—We enjoy victuals, clothing, homes, and everything necessary for life in abundance; and it is neither right for me to use the wealth of the Persians, nor to liberate barbarians from diseases while they may be the enemies of Greece. Farewell.” Thucydides describes the symptoms of the disease in a cursory manner; Lucretius more minutely; and from these historians we infer the following morbid phenomena. The invasion was sudden and unexpected; the disease commenced with a violent headache, fiery redness of the eyes, succeeded by pains and inflammation of the throat, difficulty of breathing, and offensive breath, a sneezing and hoarseness, violent fever with insatiable thirst supervening: watchfulness and delirium or stupor, vomiting of bilious matter, utter prostration of strength, and urgent flux of the bowels, were noticed in the second stage of the disease. In the first stage, the stools were dark and fœtid: there were hiccough, bleeding at the gums, throat, nose, stomach, and bowels,—convulsions: pustules or sores of a livid hue were also observed about the bodies of those affected. This bilious plague or pestilence of Athens exhibited, from the foregoing accounts, symptoms analogous to those of the bilious remittent or yellow fever of America and the West Indies, and would appear to have arisen from similar causes.

The historian, in speaking of the calamity, brings the causes of the pestilence to our view. He says, “As they had no houses, but dwelt in booths all the summer season, where there was scarcely room to breathe, the pestilence destroyed with the greatest confusion, so that they lay together in heaps, the dying upon the dead, and the dead upon the dying: they were tumbling one over the other in the public streets, or lay expiring round every fountain, whither they had crept to assuage the intolerable thirst which was consuming them. The temples of which they had taken possession were full of the dead bodies of those who had expired there.”

Anno 427 B.C. a cruel pestilence or plague spread almost through the world. Mariana and other Spanish writers say that it commenced in Egypt, and, travelling through all the intervening countries, reached Spain: the mortality in most places began among the cattle. From various accounts it would appear that the country people were first affected with this pestilence; afterwards the inhabitants in the towns. Anno 404 B.C. Carthage was almost depopulated, as recorded by Justin and Diodorus Siculus. The Carthaginians sent on an expedition under Himilco to reduce revolted Sicily to subjection, were destroyed in great numbers by pestilence; it was so fatal that, according to one writer, Ocampo, there did not escape either Mallorcan slingers, Celts, Andalusians, or Africans; many fell dead as soon as they took the disease. The bad policy of leaving their dead bodies unburied on the plains, a prey to dogs, &c., contributed in no small degree to the propagation and virulence of the epidemic. This pestilence was distinguished by the remarkable symptoms of violent dysentery, severe fever, acute pains in all parts of the body, anguish, and great depression of both mind and body. Similar disasters have attended expeditions and long campaigns in warm climates within our own time, as our expeditions into Egypt, Flanders, Brabant, the West Indies, &c. testify.

Annis 393 and 383 B.C. the armies of Gaul and Rome were afflicted with sore pestilence. In the latter year, there were many months of severe drought in Andalusia and along the southern coasts, from the Pyrenees as far as Cape St. Vincent; great famine ensued, with pestilential diseases.

Rome was revisited by pestilence anno 366 B.C.: it raged dreadfully for three years, and swept away the great Camillus with multitudes of his people. When the disease was at its height, it is reported that 10,000 citizens died daily: it prevailed terribly in the months of September, October, and November, and the Sibylline books and Lectisternium were resorted to in vain. To add to their calamities and distress, the earth opened in the midst of Rome, giving rise to the tragical and superstitious decease of Marcus Curtius, by his throwing himself, for the salvation of the city, into the awful chasm on the site of which the lake Alba soon after arose.

Orosius in describing this pestilence says, “This was such a pestilence as generally proceeds from irregular seasons, extreme drought, heat of the spring, moisture in the summer and autumn;” which implies that irregular seasons inducing a pestilential constitution of the atmosphere, according to the doctrines of Hippocrates, who dictated medicine to all the world in those days, were productive of pestilence.

Anno 362 B.C. The war of Sicily being ended by the death of Dionysius the greater, the Republic of Carthage sent a captain named Bostan as the governor of Mallorca, Minorca, Iberia, and Formentera, in order that he should negociate with the Saguntians, and draw them over to their side.

The city of Saguntum, now called Murviedro, was visited by an epidemic pestilence. There was a great scarcity of provisions, and many deaths occurred, even among the nobles. The people became sorrow-stricken and disheartened, as reported by the magistrates to their new governor. It may be inferred that the pestilence raged with severity, from its having affected the higher orders.

Annis 346 B.C. and 405 from the foundation of Rome, extraordinary inundations, with great damage to the cattle, fields, and buildings, occurred. All the cities along the coasts on the Mediterranean Sea suffered also from earthquakes; Saguntum, a principal city, having suffered the most. Annis 332, 296, and 291 B.C. Rome was again visited by pestilence, which was particularly fatal to breeding women and to breeding cattle. A similar visitation affected Rome anno 272 B.C.

Anno 237 B.C. the commotions of the elements in the shape of earthquakes, severe drought, with the want of sufficient food, caused great mortality among cattle and men in Spain, especially at Cadiz.

Anno 218 B.C. the toils of war and the forced marches of the Carthaginian armies on their route to besiege Saguntum, and the unflinching and brave defence by wearying out the assailants, (says Mariana,) caused great pestilence among them. There were also earthquakes and pestilence in several provinces of Spain, also great storms at sea, throwing on the land quantities of fish, some of which were unknown until this occurrence. There was also a fatal epizootic among the dogs and birds.

Anno 216 B.C. In the summer of this year a fatal pestilence began in the vicinity of Carthage. It was supposed that this putrid disease arose from the crowded state of all places, from the multitude of sailors and soldiers there at the time, the country being in a badly cultivated state, the scarcity and bad quality of provisions, and from the stagnant lake, which had always been viewed as a source of disease. For a considerable period it was limited to the place where it originated, but after a time other provinces became affected. Both rich and poor fell victims to this dire disease: some of the principal families suffered; and Hamilca, the wife of Hannibal, and their offspring, were among its numerous victims.

Anno 206 B.C. a vast pestilence, preceded by immense swarms of locusts, occurred in the land near Capua. The same historian, Livy, relates that the Roman and Rhodian fleets, anchored at Phaselis in the Gulf of Pamphylia in the midst of summer, and in an unwholesome situation, suffered from pestilential diseases,—especially the rowers, who were subjected to hard labour, and exposed to the burning rays of the sun. He continues, that violent pestilence ravaged all Italy annis 182 and 181 B.C. This continued for several years; severe drought for six months, and consequent dearth of corn happened, followed by terrible storms, pernicious seasons, and awful commotions of the elements, coldness, dampness, moisture and dryness, noxious vapours, and putrid exhalations. This extraordinary season was followed by a great pestilence among cattle and among the inhabitants of Rome, in the summer and autumn of the year 177 B.C. This pestilence continued for four years, from 177 to 173, during which period swarms of locusts deluged Apulia, as the Pontine provinces were covered the previous year. So destructive were their ravages, that Sicinius the prætor was commissioned with an army to drive them away!

“Pestilentia quæ priore anno ingruerat in boves, eo verteret in hominum morbos; qui inciderant haud facile septimum diem superabant: qui superaverant longinquo, maximæ quartanæ implacabantur, morbo. Servitia maxime moriebantur, eorum strages per omnes vias insepultorum erat. Ne liberorum quidem funeribus subficiebat. Cadavera intacta a canibus ac vulturibus tabes absumebat; satisque constabat, nec illo, nec priore anno in tanta strage boûm hominumque vulturiûm usquam visum.” The translation of this pithy passage conveys that the pestilence which first attacked cattle, fastened upon men,—those who survived the seventh day did so with great difficulty, and were subsequently afflicted by disease (or fever) of a quartan form. The poor and lower classes were those who suffered most, their dead carcases lying about the highways,—dogs and vultures left the carcases untouched which were consumed by corruption,—neither in this nor in a former year was there a vulture seen. From this graphic detail we may infer that the beasts of the field were first attacked, then mankind; that the disease underwent a sort of crisis on the seventh day, terminating either in death or chronic distemper, as we see to be the case in our own days; viz. consumption, dropsy, diseases of the liver and spleen, and ague;—that it was most fatal among the lower orders, who are generally more distressed in times of scarcity, and from other causes more susceptible of disease, such as cold, damp abodes, and poor diet;—that carnivorous animals were sick themselves, refusing to touch the carrion carcases; in fact, the infected provinces were entirely deserted by vultures;—lastly, that the malady was similar to our yellow, bilious, remittent fever, in all its symptoms, as we see it occurring amongst us in various places—the West Indies, America, &c.

Orosius gives us an account of another pestilence, which devastated Rome, anno 144 B.C.

In the year 140 before the Christian era, the war of Viriathus having been concluded, the proconsul Q. Pompeius Rufus commenced blockading Numantia (now Algeria). The plan of his operations being to charge the air with mephitic vapours, he determined on turning the course of the river Douro, and inundating the country round about by means of its waters, which would have the effect not only of spoiling the atmosphere by its moist exhalations, but of inducing famine also, by the destruction of all vegetation. These attempts were, however, fruitless, inasmuch as the Numantians, being a robust and warlike people, resisted the consequences of the proconsul’s attempts against them. Having foreseen his intentions, they had supplied themselves with abundant provisions, which they had intercepted from the Roman legions; while, on the other hand, the Roman soldiers themselves fell victims to their own measures, pestilence having broken out among them—a malignant dysentery, equal in severity and fatality to that which formerly had laid waste the army of Lucullus.

After this period to about that of 134 B.C., Scipio Æmilianus, called the Numantine, organized his army, and having established admirable rules of hygiene and semeiotics, whereby he preserved his former strength and health, began to devastate the plains of Numantia, of Vacca, and Palestine. The want of water which was experienced in the latter place (Palestine) forced them to make wells to obtain drinkable water, but unfortunately the water thus obtained proved to be of a character productive of a malignant epizootic, which destroyed their horses and other beasts of burthen: the pestilence among their cattle increasing, obliged them to change their quarters to the plains of Numantia in order to winter there.

Anno 130 B.C. The famous Numantines, so much dreaded by the Romans on account of their valorous resistance, were not less feared by the Greeks, than the horrible pestilence which prevailed in Numantia. The Greek, Appianus Alexandrinus, speaks of them with admiration and dread. The Numantine people, who had hitherto resisted the corrupted condition of the air, ultimately suffered such exhaustion for want of food, their stores having been consumed, that after having subsisted on dressed skins of animals for several days, they fell into the frightful necessity of becoming anthropophagi, so that from feeding on the bodies of those who fell defending their country, pestilence arose, which hastened the downfall of their city.

Anno 126 B.C. Epidemic pestilence prevailed with great mortality in Africa. Orosius, Justin, and Livy, who have described it, attribute this pestilence to the stench arising from the putrid carcases of dead locusts, which were brought over by a strong east wind in such multitudes that they devoured every green thing, even to the bark of trees; they were subsequently driven by a south wind into the Mediterranean, and being again washed on shore in the warm season of the year, putrefied, and produced this awful pestilence, which destroyed 800,000 in Numidia alone. On the sea-coast of Carthage 200,000 perished. Of such terrible visitations by insects, which to this day exist in the East at particular seasons, carrying destruction in their course, Lord Carnarvon gives a description in his ‘History of Portugal and Gallicia.’ It will convey a pretty good idea of their destructiveness and of the distressing consequences. Speaking of natural exhibitions, of which he was an eye-witness in Africa, he writes thus: “A fall of locusts is beyond description the most awful imaginable—a most dreadful scourge, which is considered in eastern and northern countries the most unfailing manifestation of the wrath of God. Travelling along the western coast of Africa, I once beheld this terrible infliction. These creatures fell in thousands and tens of thousands around us and upon us along the sands on which we were riding, and on the sea that was beating at our feet; yet we were removed from their most oppressive influence; for, a few hundred yards to our right, darkening the air, the great innumerable host came on, slowly and steadily advancing in a direct line and in a mighty moving column. The fall of locusts from this central column was so great, that when a cow directly under the line of flight, attempting ineffectually to graze in the field, approached her mouth to the grass, there rose immediately so dense a swarm, that her head was for the moment almost concealed from sight, and as she moved along, bewildered by this worse than Egyptian plague, clouds of locusts rose up from under her feet, visible even at a distance, as clouds of dust when set in motion by the wind on a stormy day. At the extremity of the field I saw the husbandmen bending over their staffs, and gazing with hopeless eyes upon that host of death which swept like a destroying angel over the land, and consigned to ruin all the prospects of the year; for wherever that column winged its flight, beneath its withering influence the golden glories of the harvest perished, and the leafy honours of the forest disappeared. There stood those ruined men silent and motionless, overwhelmed with the magnitude of their calamity, yet conscious of their utter inability to control it, while further on, where some woodland lay in the immediate line of the advancing column, heath set on fire, and trees kindling into a blaze, testified the general horror of a visitation which the ill-fated inhabitants endeavoured to avert by such a frightful remedy. They believed that the smoke arising from the burning forest, ascending into the air, would impede the direct march of the column, throw it into confusion, and drive the locusts out to sea, and thus deliver the country from their desolating presence.”

During the civil wars which were excited by Sylla and Marius, the Roman armies lost 10,000 men by plague in the year 89 B.C.

Anno 60 B.C. Spain, according to the opinion of several ancient and modern writers, both foreign and national, was one of the countries most subjected to the frightful disease of leprosy. Sauvages has asserted that there were no lepers in France, save those that came from Spain and America. Senertus states that in Spain and Africa elephantiasis (leprosy) is more frequent than in any other part of the world. Dr. Casal coincides in this opinion, as may be seen in his ‘Natural and Medical History of the Principality of the Asturias;’ and, finally, the Academic Memoirs of Seville speak of its existence in those countries, as owing to their communication with the Arabs and Jews, without denying, however, that the prevalence of the disease may have been influenced by the peculiar constitution of Spain. Accordingly its dry and burning temperature has contributed considerably, as it would appear, to locate this terrible disease, especially in the kingdom of Andalusia, and in the principality of the Asturias. The use of pork and other salted provisions, so commonly employed as articles of diet in ancient Spain, is supposed to have acted powerfully in perpetuating the disease, inasmuch as the opinions of Ubilis and other physicians go to show that these sorts of aliment are powerful generators of the malady. The first appearance of leprosy in Spain coincides with its introduction into Italy, after having been prevalent in the army of Pompey the Great about sixty years, more or less, before the coming of Christ. The sons of the celebrated general proceeded with the army of their father from Italy to Spain, to stem the invasion of Cæsar, and this was in all probability the cause of its first introduction into that country,—at least, it is so considered by some writers.

Anno 49 B.C. The continued heavy rains and tempestuous seasons, the like of which had never been seen by the oldest inhabitants, caused frightful inundations of the rivers Cinca and Segre. Epidemic pestilence, peculiar to an atmosphere surcharged with moisture and poisonous exhalations, appeared immediately after. The shepherds were obliged to withdraw their flocks in order to save them from the waters, which, together with the increased price of corn and of other food amongst the neighbouring populace, multiplied the misfortunes of the army of Julius Cæsar, who had not only to combat against the bravery of the Pompeians, but also against the trials of famine and pestilence. Their distress would have been greater and more lamentable, had not some of the neighbouring tribes, who had recently become their allies, succoured them with the necessaries of life, which were sent in under the escort of 500 Ilecaones, a tribe who occupied the banks of the Ebro.

In the time of Mark Antony, anno 30 B.C., a pestilence of so general a character prevailed, that it seems to have spread over the whole world. Dion Cassius mentions this pestilence, which continued for five years, destroying vast numbers of the inhabitants of Jerusalem: it was also very destructive at Rome and in Palestine. The celebrated triumvir died about this period of the pestilence, as mentioned by Nuestro Alonso of Freylas in his ‘History of Pestilences.’

The next account of epidemic pestilence we have, is given by Tacitus, who relates that in the East, in Asia Minor, fourteen years after the commencement of the Christian era, pestilence prevailed; a severe earthquake about this time was experienced; a comet is also mentioned as having been seen, whose tail, it is said, with one fell swoop hurled down a dozen cities at once. Another pestilence is recorded by Suetonius as having raged with great mortality at Babylon: it caused a multitude of Jews to remove to Seleucia. This year was marked by great famine, in fulfilment of the prophecy of Agabus (Acts xi. 28). During the reign of Claudius Cæsar, at this period, pestilence was rife in Greece and Italy.

Pliny and Tacitus both give an account of those periods of mortality from the year of our Lord 40 to 53 and 54, when most of the officers of Rome died of pestilential disease: “ex omnium magistratuum genere plerique mortem obierunt.” It was during the year 40 that the great eruption of Etna occurred, which frightened Caligula from Sicily. Dire famine was also experienced, which, with pestilence, extended from Italy almost to India. Babylon was almost depopulated about this period.—A.D. 88, pestilence carried off 30,000 of the people of Rome. Tacitus gives an affecting account of the ravages of this plague. The houses were filled with dead bodies, and the streets with funerals; neither age, sex, nor condition were exempted from it; slaves and plebeians were suddenly carried off by it amidst the lamentations of their wives and their children, who were also seized with the disease while administering to the sick and mourning over the lifeless bodies of the dead. Pliny, Orosius, and other writers describe this pestilential period as exceedingly fatal. Earthquakes, eruptions of volcanoes emitting sulphureous vapours, inundations, tempestuous seasons, and other awful commotions of nature, characterized this period all over the inhabited globe. In June, a comet appeared; on the 1st of November following, a tremendous ebullition of burning lava issued from the crater of Vesuvius, deluging the country, and Herculaneum and Pompeii sunk in a moment: these cities, with their inhabitants, were buried in one universal mass. Thunder and lightning pierced the heavens, and the ashes and smoke from the burning gulf discharged into the air were wafted to Rome, Syria, and Africa, the inhabitants whereof trembled lest the world should be destroyed or turned into chaos; the fish in the neighbouring seas were killed. These calamities were preceded by a long drought in Italy during the summer; and in the autumn of A.D. 80 a terrible pestilence broke out in Rome, and destroyed for some time 10,000 citizens daily. Eight years after, A.D. 88, an epidemic pestilence appeared in the north of England, and continued for some time; in 92, it carried off 150,000 persons in Scotland.

Philo, the Jewish philosopher, gives a description of a ‘loimic’ pestilence which occurred during that century, and appositely conveys the mode of diffusion and the circumstances of the confluent small-pox. He says, “The clouds of dust suddenly falling on men and cattle produced over the whole skin a severe and intractable ulceration; the body immediately became tumid with efflorescences (ἐξανθήσεσιν) or purulent phlyctenæ, which appeared like blisters excited by a secret fire beneath. Men necessarily undergoing much pain and universal soreness from ulceration and inflammation (φλογώσεως) suffered not less in body than in mind by the severe affliction, for a continuous ulcer was observable from head to foot.” These observations of Philo are intended as a comment on Exodus, ch. ix. v. 9: it shall be “a boil breaking forth with blains.” He finishes by observing, that it should rank among pestilential diseases (ἐν τοῖς λοιμώδεσι νόσοις), or as the infliction of a tainted atmosphere (πληγὴ ἀπ’ ἀέρος καὶ οὐρανοῦ). From a passage in Dion Cassius’ Roman History, it would appear that some mode of inoculation had been attempted in the reign of Domitian, A.D. 92, and revived in that of Commodus.

A.D. 110, a severe earthquake was felt in Shropshire, in England. Four years after, 114, a similar shock, but more extensive, was experienced in China, which caused the destruction of much property and of many lives. During the same period a pestilence prevailed in Wales, which carried off 45,000 of its inhabitants, after a hot summer and an inclement autumn. In fact, in those days there frequently happened great inundations, especially of the river Severn: at one time immense numbers were drowned in their beds, when 5000 head of cattle were destroyed. A.D. 115, a tremendous earthquake laid waste the city of Antioch. Five years after, A.D. 120, Nicomedia and several neighbouring cities were swallowed up; and, A.D. 128, Cæsarea and Necropolis met with a similar fate from a severe earthquake.

A.D. 133, a great drought existed in England, and the Thames was almost dried up. This condition of the seasons was followed by pestilence; and thirteen years after, Scotland was visited with an epidemic, to the great destruction of its inhabitants.

Arabia was ravaged by pestilence in the year of our Lord 158. The disease appeared in Rome during the reign of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus and Lucius Verus, preceded by a more destructive plague in Asia, which the great Ammianus Marcellinus, the philosophic hero, asserted arose from the foul air of a small box which a Roman soldier had opened at the capture of Seleucia. This opinion was in accordance with the superstition of the times. At that period the elements were greatly deranged: commotions of the physical world, inundations of rivers, agitations of the earth, devastations from locusts, caterpillars, and every variety of the insect tribe, famine, putrid vapours, with great inclemencies and irregularities of the seasons, foretold the approach of the awful pestilence which in the same year desolated Rome: its symptoms were, a burning fever and gangrene of the extremities, particularly of the feet. These times were also distinguished by wars and rumours of wars: 450,000 Romans were butchered in Syria and in Cyprus by the Jews. Fourteen cities were destroyed by earthquakes, amongst which was Antioch, with 100,000 inhabitants: 580,000 were supposed altogether to have perished by the sword, famine, and pestilence.

Aurelius Victor, speaking of the emperor M. Antoninus, gives a lucid description of those calamitous times. He says, “Unless he had been born for these times, all the affairs of the Roman empire would have been ruined assuredly as if by one fall; for there was rest no where from arms, and wars burned through all the East, Illyricum, Italy, and Gaul. The motions of the earth, with annihilation of cities, inundation of the rivers, thick pestilences, species of locusts infested the fields; indeed, nothing can be said or conceived, by which mortals used to be wasted with the severest agonies, which have not raged during his administration.”

A.D. 173, there was a severe winter, and consequently a famine in England; a pestilence broke out the summer following, and continued to the autumn and subsequent winter. In this year, as also in 175 and 178, Rome was visited by epidemic pestilence, which committed great ravages among the soldiery. Five years after, it was again afflicted with disease; and in A.D. 195, plague prevailed in all Italy. “A great pestilence,” says the historian, “raged in all Italy, and became most violent in Rome by reason of the great concourse of people assembled from all quarters of the world. The emperor, by the advice of his physicians, retired to Laurentum, a cool place beautifully shaded with laurels, on the supposition that the sweet smell of those plants counteracted contagion. The people of the city were also advised by the physicians to fill their noses and ears with sweet-smelling ointments, and to use perfumes, in order to prevent the action of human effluvia and of the contagious air. These precautions, however, as might have been expected, proved of little avail: the distemper proceeded unchecked, and men and cattle continued to perish therefrom in multitudes. Five thousand died daily in Rome for a considerable time, and famine with pestilence persisted for three years.” (See Herodian, Dion Cassius, &c.)

A.D. 203, there was an eruption of Mount Vesuvius.

In the year 211, a plague, preceded by an earthquake and a great inundation of the river Trent, appeared in the British Isles. A.D. 218, the river Tweed overflowed; and dire pestilence followed four years after, destroying 100,000 lives in Scotland.

Mortal pestilence affected the whole world A.D. 250. Italy, Ethiopia, Egypt, Asia, France, Spain, and various other parts suffered great ravages from disease. “For twelve years subsequently,” says Zosimus, “a pestilential fever followed the Scythians, and devoured the scanty remains of the human race.” “Pestilence has contaminated the face of the earth,” says Jornandes, a learned historian.

A.D. 252, Alexandria and other districts suffered from epidemic pestilence, which continued its ravages with great fury for twelve or fifteen years. This pestilence was not, however, one uniform disorder, but was comprised of several different kinds, such as dysentery, ignis sacer, or scurvy, typhomania, remittent fevers, &c. According to Cedrenus, there were at the time singular exhalations and dews, which resembled the ichors of dead bodies: “hence,” he says, “constant loimoi, with other severe and unmanageable disorders (βαρέα καὶ ἀνίατα νοσήματα), which destroyed multitudes of the people.”

A.D. 262. During the reign of Gallienus 5000 citizens of Rome perished daily. Cyprian, a bishop of Carthage, a man of erudition (see reprint, Fell, fol. Oxon. Amst. 1700), in detailing the symptoms of this horrific pestilence, thus writes: “The symptoms were, a dejection of spirits, exhaustion of strength, incessant involuntary evacuations, violent fever of the bowels, with destruction of the sight, hearing, and feeling.” Aurelius Victor asserts of this pestilence, that it spread rapidly all over Rome, and arose from heavy cares and depression of mind, as well as from a pestiferous state of the atmosphere. We may here recognize all the terrible symptoms of that devastating disease Cholera, which, beginning in the year 1817, ravaged the four quarters of the globe, and continued for a series of years. Several earthquakes were experienced this year in Europe, Asia, and Africa, with three days’ darkness. A.D. 272, there was another eruption of Vesuvius.

A.D. 292, pestilence and famine prevailed in England and Wales; it also raged with great intensity in those places, A.D. 310, carrying off, in the latter, 40,000 persons.

A.D. 302, epidemic pestilence (loimos), preceded by famine, broke out in Syria. The account of this pestilential disorder by George Cedrenus appears to be similar to that by Eusebius; he says: “At this time almost every evil that can be enumerated fell upon men—famine, loimos, and drought, with misfortune of a certain disorder; it was an ulcer, the denomination of which was answerable to its affinity with the fiery anthrax, spreading over the whole body: it proved highly dangerous in all respects to the persons affected, but by a particular determination to the eyes in most cases, it produced blindness in thousands of men, women, and children.” Nicephorus says of this disease—“It originated in famine, and was called anthrax; it was an ulceration attracting or draining out humours, with an intolerable stench, which, in spreading over the bodies, extended to and affected with violence the eyelids (κανθοὶ), and occasioned blindness both in males and females.” We are further informed by Eusebius and Cedrenus that the army of Gallienus, in Armenia, was affected with pestilence, which extended to every city in the eastern provinces, and even to villages and lone houses. The great mortality among the poor was attributable more to famine than to the disease; they were obliged to eat hay, grass, roots, &c. The rich, however, were not exempt from this pestilence, but were also carried off in great numbers. The emperor Diocletian, according to Cedrenus, died of the malady: “he was affected with severe pains over the whole body,—a violent phlogosis preyed upon his inward parts, and his flesh melted like wax. In the progress of the complaint, he became totally blind; his throat and tongue putrefied, so that worms came from his mouth, and he emitted an odour not less offensive than that of dead bodies in the sepulchres.” This malady was evidently confluent small-pox.

A.D. 325, epidemic pestilence, preceded by famine, prevailed all over Britain, and in many other parts of the world. During the years 336, 355, 358, 362, 367, 368, and 375, deadly disease, with famine and earthquakes, were again experienced in the British Isles. In Wales alone, in the latter year, 43,000 persons died from pestilence. A terrible earthquake was felt in Macedonia, and 150 cities were swallowed up in Asia and Greece. Ammianus Marcellinus mentions a plague which broke out in Amida, a city of Persia, during its siege by Sapor, which was attributed to the distresses of war, and to the corruption of unburied bodies lying about in the streets, plains, &c.

A.D. 361, there was a terrible famine in Italy. Four years after, 365, severe shocks of an earthquake, with inundations round the Mediterranean, did much damage. 50,000 persons were drowned at Alexandria in the month of July. Italy and Syria suffered from plague, which continued until 394. An inundation of the Nile nearly destroyed the cities of Alexandria and Libya; and rain, storms, and drought were experienced in Judea, which was also visited by immense swarms of locusts. These phenomena were succeeded by dire pestilence. There were several earthquakes at intervals between the months of September and November, which destroyed many places in Europe. During the years 400, 407, 417, and 419, pestilence desolated Asia, Africa, and Europe; a severe earthquake shook Cibyra, and destroyed many villages in its neighbourhood: in 419, an earthquake swallowed up several cities in Palestine. A.D. 442, pestilence swept away great numbers in England this year. A.D. 446, on the 17th of September, at Constantinople, a severe earthquake, attended with fire, pestilence, and famine, caused great misery. The walls of the town with seventeen towers were thrown down. A.D. 458, an earthquake destroyed nearly all Antioch on the 14th of September. Pestilence, about the same period, again broke out in England, and in various other regions, as related by Echard. The Greek ecclesiastical historian Nicephorus, and other writers, state that it prevailed more remarkably in Cappadocia, Galatia, and Phrygia. Isodorus tells us that so great were the famine and disease in Spain, in A.D. 443, that men fed with fury upon each other.

From the year 450 until 467, pestilence raged in Rome; it revisited the city A.D. 473. The year previously, 472, on the 11th of November, at noon, there occurred an eruption of Vesuvius, which ejected flames that were seen at Constantinople, obscured the sun at noon day, and ravaged all Campania: there were ashes four inches deep on the tops of houses many miles distant. A.D. 480, a severe earthquake was experienced at Constantinople, which lasted forty days, causing much destruction of life and property. Epidemic pestilence infested Scotland; and Asia and Africa were nearly depopulated by epidemic disease.

A.D. 502, Scotland was visited by epidemic disease, which destroyed both men and beasts. A.D. 512, there was an eruption of Vesuvius. A.D. 517, Palestine suffered from pestilence, as did the inhabitants of Wales ten years after, in 527. The year previous, 526, Antioch with several other cities was nearly destroyed by an earthquake; it also suffered from a similar visitation two years after, 528, when 4800 of its inhabitants were buried in its ruins.

A.D. 540, so dire a famine was experienced in Italy, that parents were reduced to the cruel necessity of eating their children. About the same period, during the reign of Justinian, a destructive pestilence ravaged the greater part of Europe and Asia for more than half a century. It was at first observed to be plague in its usual form only, attended with tumours in the groin or axillæ, or behind the ears; but in its progress it was found to consist of various disorders, corresponding, in their leading features, according to the description by Evagrius, to “the true pestilence.” These disorders consisted of pestilential or scarlet sore throat, and dysentery, with small-pox and measles. This fatal epidemic is shown to have continued in Asia until the year 590. Some authors have computed the number destroyed during this pestilential period at two millions.