The city of Spireholm is different of late. Plague doctors may have been immediately recognizable, but until the rise of the germ theory of disease and modern antibiotics, their costumes didn’t provide real protection against the disease.A gigantic 320 page Gothic expansion for the Award Winning SHIVER RPG. Snowden, “the therapeutic strategies of early modern plague doctors did little to prolong life, relieve suffering, or effect a cure.” “Unfortunately,” writes historian Frank M. Ultimately, the plague doctors’ outfits-and methods-didn’t make much of a difference. ( What is a pandemic-and why does it matter?) 561 the Black Death, which wiped out up to a third of Europeans between 13 and continued with intermittent outbreaks as late as 1879 and the Third Pandemic, which ravaged much of Asia between 18. Three horrific plague pandemics swept across the globe before its cause was ultimately uncovered-the Plague of Justinian, which killed up to 10,000 people a day circa A.D. What is plague? How many people died from the Black Death and the other plague pandemics? Learn about the bacterium behind the plague disease, how factors like trade and urbanization caused it to spread to every continent except Antarctica, and how three devastating pandemics helped shape modern medicine. In fact, plague is caused by Yersinia pestis, bacteria that can be transmitted from animals to humans and through flea bites, contact with contaminated fluid or tissue, and inhalation of infectious droplets from sneezing or coughing people with pneumonic plague. De Lorme thought the beak shape of the mask would give the air sufficient time to be suffused by the protective herbs before it hit plague doctors’ nostrils and lungs.

Plague doctors filled their masks with theriac, a compound of more than 55 herbs and other components like viper flesh powder, cinnamon, myrrh, and honey. Sweet and pungent perfumes were thought to be able to fumigate plague-stricken areas and protect the smeller nosegays, incense, and other perfumes were common in the era. In the times before the germ theory of disease, physicians believed that the plague spread through poisoned air that could create an imbalance in a person’s humors, or bodily fluids.

( Memories of the plague resonate in Venice during the coronavirus pandemic.)īut the forbidding ensemble was not just a deathly fashion statement: It was intended to protect the doctor from miasma. Though plague doctors across Europe wore these outfits, the look was so iconic in Italy that the 'plague doctor' became a staple of Italian commedia dell’arte and carnival celebrations-and is still a popular costume today. Their head gear was particularly unusual: Plague doctors wore spectacles, de Lorme continued, and a mask with a nose “half a foot long, shaped like a beak, filled with perfume with only two holes, one on each side near the nostrils, but that can suffice to breathe and carry along with the air one breathes the impression of the enclosed further along in the beak.” Plague doctors also carried a rod that allowed them to poke (or fend off) victims. He described an outfit that included a coat covered in scented wax, breeches connected to boots, a tucked-in shirt, and a hat and gloves made of goat leather.

The costume is usually credited to Charles de Lorme, a physician who catered to the medical needs of many European royals during the 17th century, including King Louis XIII and Gaston d'Orléans, son of Marie de Médici.

The plague doctor secret