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A modern take on the vampire image. Source: All You Need AI/Adobe Stock

The Great Vampire Epidemic: A Bizarre Chapter in History

Imagine a time when the fear of vampires wasn't just the stuff of horror movies, but a genuine epidemic that swept across Europe. Yes, you read right, - a vampire epidemic! This wasn't a small-scale...
The Black Plague. Source: illustrissima / Adobe Stock.

How You Could Have Survived the Black Plague (Video)

Surviving the Black Plague in the 14th-century Europe necessitated avoiding crowded areas, curtailing the spread of the Bubonic plague through airborne transmission. Keeping a safe distance from...
Plague epidemic. Source: Dr_Microbe / Adobe Stock.

How a Gruesome Epidemic Threatened the Roman Empire (Video)

Rome, the cultural epicenter of the world in 162 AD, faced an unparalleled crisis as a gruesome epidemic threatened to undermine its very foundation. In this riveting account, we follow Galen of...
Japanese illustration of smallpox, dating back to 1720, from a work entitled Toshin seiyo, or The essentials of Smallpox. Source: Wellcome Collection / Public Domain

The Japanese Smallpox Epidemic of the 8th Century: Cause and Effect

Human history has undergone countless epidemics, some which have been nipped in the bud due to sparse populations, some due to prudent medical interventions. Some, like the recent COVID-19 pandemic...
Mictlantecuhtli, the Aztec god of the dead, was quite busy in 15th century. The cocoliztli epidemic may have killed up to 15 million people! Source: Ivan / Adobe Stock

What was the Deadly Cocoliztli Disease that Decimated Aztec Society?

When the Spanish crossed the Atlantic and started arriving in hordes to begin their conquest and plunder of the Americas, they had a weapon in their arsenal that they had not anticipated: disease...
Mass hysteria. Source: Photographee.eu / Adobe Stock

Bizarre and Horrifying Cases of Mass Hysteria Through History

Mass hysteria is a term used to describe the situation in which physical or psychological symptoms appear en masse, spreading rapidly throughout communities, and occasionally across whole cities and...
Eyam’s Ultimate Sacrifice: Medieval Village Locked Down to Stop the Plague

Eyam’s Ultimate Sacrifice: Medieval Village Locked Down to Stop the Plague

‘Lockdown’ is a word we now see on a daily basis as the 2020 coronavirus pandemic requires limiting the movements and activities of communities during the mass quarantine of most of the world’s...
Left: Florence Nightingale inspects a hospital ward during the Crimean War. ( Wellcome Images / CC BY 4.0).   Right: Portrait of Florence Nightingale from Carte de Visite. (H. Lenthall / Public domain)

A History of Nursing Heroes from Florence Nightingale to Coronavirus

By Leslie Neal-Boylan / The Conversation Nurses are heroes of the COVID-19 crisis. May 12 is International Nurses Day, which commemorates the birthday of Florence Nightingale, the first “professional...
Ancient Mill Back in Action to Meet Coronavirus Demand

Ancient Mill Back in Action to Meet Coronavirus Demand

In Britain , a historic and ancient mill, that dates back a millennium is once more producing flour after 50 years. The Sturminster Newton Mill is milling flour to meet soaring demand during the...
IMAGE Upload an image to go with this article. Show row weights FILE INFORMATION	OPERATIONS   Image icon Screenshot_20200404-213144_Docs.jpg (313.42 KB) Alternate text 1,000-Year English Tradition Goes Online for First Time in History This text will be used by screen readers, search engines, or when the image cannot be loaded.   Image icon pandemic.jpg (41.22 KB) Alternate text This text will be used by screen readers, search engines, or when the image cannot be loaded. Add a new file  Files must be less th

1,000-Year English Tradition Goes Online for First Time in History

The coronavirus pandemic has disrupted daily life around the world. It has also interfered with many historic traditions and ceremonies . A 1000-year-old swearing-in of a sheriff was not able to take...
Left: Modern man wearing a face mask to protect against coronavirus.

What Can the Plague of Athens Teach Us About Today’s Coronavirus?

The coronavirus is concentrating our minds on the fragility of human existence in the face of a deadly disease. Words like ‘epidemic’ and ‘ pandemic ’ (and ‘panic’!) have become part of our daily...
Representation of a quarantine zone.           Source: James Thew / Adobe stock

Where Did the Ancient Measure of Quarantine Start?

The recent global spread of a deadly coronavirus originating in Wuhan, China, has led world leaders to invoke an ancient tradition to control the spread of illness: quarantine. The practice is first...
The Black Death was spread across Europe by rats. Source: rawinfoto / Adobe Stock.

Culling the World: The Catastrophic Conquests of the Black Death

Medieval history is seldom kind. The decades and centuries slumbered onwards, each one bringing its own share of wars, crime , poverty...and disease. Happiness and prosperity were rare and almost...
Embarkation of the Pilgrims’ (1857) by Robert Walter Weir. Source: Public Domain

Why the Pilgrims were Actually Able to Survive

By Peter C. Mancall / The Conversation Sometime in the autumn of 1621, a group of English Pilgrims who had crossed the Atlantic Ocean and created a colony called New Plymouth celebrated their first...
Salmonella bacteria, a common cause of foodborne disease, invade an immune cell.

Scientists Find DNA Evidence of the Bacteria that Almost Wiped out the Aztecs

Architectural investigations of the Grand Plaza resulted in the unexpected discovery of a large epidemic cemetery associated with the 1545-1550 cocoliztli epidemic. The cemetery was found to contain...
Mummy of a 900-year-old Russian "polar princess"

Viruses Sleeping in Mummies—Could Ancient Corpses Lead to Modern Epidemics?

Mummies fascinate historians, archaeologists, and anyone with antiquarian leanings. Mummies allow scientists to learn more about the diets, clothing, appearance, genetics, and general lifestyle of...
Preparation of a corpse, Florentine Codex Book 3

New Study Finds Salmonella Brought by Europeans Caused Epidemic that Wiped Out 80% of the Aztecs

For years, historians and scientists have said that much of the population of the New World died from infectious diseases brought by Europeans, for which the natives had little or no natural bodily...
Have Researchers Discovered What Caused the 16th Century Mexican Epidemic That Killed Over 80% of the Population?

Have Researchers Discovered What Caused the 16th Century Mexican Epidemic That Killed Over 80% of the Population?

A pair of recently published studies point the finger at a deadly form of salmonella as the cause of millions of deaths in a 16th century Mexican epidemic outbreak. This cocoliztli (pestilence in...
St Macarius of Ghent Giving Aid to the Plague Victims, 1673 painting by Jacob van Oost

The Plague that brought down mighty empires is thousands of years older than thought

The Plague is far older than previously known and later changed to become much more virulent—so virulent that it may have contributed to the decline of Classical Greece and the Roman and Byzantine...
La Peste (1695) wax sculpture, Gaetano Zumbo, Museum of Specola, Florence

The Black Death: the Plague that Sowed Terror and Death in Medieval Europe - Part 2

Read Part 1 Science had to wait until the nineteenth century to banish the idea of ​​a supposed supernatural origin of the plague. The fear of a pandemic on a global scale persisted for four...
Truck loaded with plague victims in Elliant drawn by a woman with tattered clothes. Moynet lithograph based on Duveau’s Collections.

The Black Death: the Plague that Sowed Terror and Death in Medieval Europe - Part 1

In recent months, health authorities in California, USA, have been obliged to report two cases of the plague that appeared in West Coast state. In the state of Colorado two other people also...
The Plague at Ashdod by Nicolas Poussin

Professor reveals evidence that Athenian epidemic of 430 BC was first recorded Ebola outbreak

In 430 BC, an outbreak of plague in the Ancient Greek city of Athens that killed its victims in seven to nine days may have been Ebola, some scientists studying the subject believe. The first...
This photo shows the mummy of Michael Orlovits in the Mummies of the World exhibition. Dry air preserved the decease people’s bodies and clothing.

Mummified 18th century bodies give scientists clues about spread of TB

Scientists recently examined tissue samples from tuberculosis-infected bodies that were naturally mummified in a church crypt in Vac, Hungary. Researchers found that the tuberculosis that killed them...
World Epidemic Unearthed in Egypt - Plague in Rome

Victims of End of the World Epidemic Unearthed in Egypt

Archaeologists in Egypt have uncovered the remains of victims of an ancient epidemic that occurred nearly two millennia ago, believed at the time to be the end of the world, according to a report in...

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