Plagues of Almea

[Shm Churmey]

I was thinking recently about diseases (and I'm currently reading a lot of things about Italy in the 13th and 14th centuries) , and how they affected our history.

Did epidemics have any effect on Almean history?
None of the scale of the Black Death seems to have occured; what's the reason? The comparatevily better hygiene of uesti? Ilii intervention?

[vec]

Maybe Zompist didn't remember when writing the Historical Atlas.

[Curlyjimsam]

Maybe Zompist didn't remember when writing the Historical Atlas.

How could the great Zompist forget that? Even I remembered to include the odd epidemic when creating my somewhat patchy history of the Vix-Or.

Good point, though.

[brandrinn]

the Uesti bathe regularly. therefore, they should have devastating plagues every five minutes or so- perhaps Zomp just didn't feel like stopping every page to say "and these were the epidemics of this time-period:"

[Aurora Rossa]

The Verdurians' medical knowledge is quite poor (believing fat is healthy, for one), so a few plagues would be quite realistic.

[brandrinn]

The Verdurians' medical knowledge is quite poor (believing fat is healthy, for one).

back in ancient and medieval times, fat was healthy. in modern times, we don't have to worry about famine, or fighting major diseases, so the risk of heart-disease becomes a bigger concern. but imagine back in the day:

you and most everyone else is skinny (cant afford a lot of food). getting a little fatter would make you healthier- you wouldn't be malnurished, you wouldnt worry about dying of starvation as quickly, you would be able to fight diseases more easily, etc. the risk of cholesterol or heart attack isn't really an issue because only the rich could even afford to eat that much- and with all the exercise you'll be getting in the fields twelve hours a day, you'll burn off more fat than Michael Moore could even fit inside of himself.

therefor, from the perspective of a Verdurian peasant, fat is a hell of a lot more healthy than its alternative, skinniness.

[zompist]

The Thematic Dictionary has a list of diseases, including ch?ma 'plague', tucet 'pox', and pulmonarda 'tuberculosis'. You can take these as common and recurring, to the point that it's not worthy of note in the Atlas. Note also the Ch?mana, the plague hospital built outside of Verduria city (now swallowed up by the expanding city).

Brandrinn, what did you mean about bathing?

The Verdurians' medical knowledge is quite poor (believing fat is healthy, for one), so a few plagues would be quite realistic.

Do you have a learning disorder, Eddy? This has been gone over several times for you. Today, a fatty diet is extremely cheap, and lifestyles are largely sedentary; this is unprecedented in history. Surely you wouldn't be quite so foolish as to advise a premodern people not to let their radios fall into the bathtub or to leave ammunition in their semiautomatics, but you want to give them nutrition advice that's just as anachronistic.

[brandrinn]

Brandrinn, what did you mean about bathing?

before adequate sanitation comes about, clean bathwater is pretty unrealistic unless it's boiled first. the more people bathe, the more they are exposed to diseases. if Europeans at the same technological level bathed as much as Verdurians, they'd drop like flies.

[zompist]

Brandrinn, what did you mean about bathing?

before adequate sanitation comes about, clean bathwater is pretty unrealistic unless it's boiled first. the more people bathe, the more they are exposed to diseases. if Europeans at the same technological level bathed as much as Verdurians, they'd drop like flies.

The Turks and the Japanese seem to have had no such problems.

A little dirt seems to be good for us-- I've heard it said that American's cleanliness is playing havoc with our immune systems-- but too much dirt can be a problem too; you'll remember the doctors of 19th century Europe, before Dr. Semmelweis, killing patients by not washing between examinations.

[Raphael]

You can take these as common and recurring, to the point that it's not worthy of note in the Atlas.

Then again, allthough epidemies were pretty common and recurring in European history, the big Black Plague of 1348 still has a prominent place in our history books.

While Eddy is wrong about the fat, AFAIK he's right about the general state of Verdurian medicine.

[Salmoneus]

The Black Death was one of the most significant occurances in European history, with massive social and political ramifications - the rash of 'Peasants' Wars', for example, and the abolition of serfdom in many countries (including England).

But that was unusual. How many other epidemics do we hear about? The great plague of 1547, perhaps? The Great Plague in 1665, yes, but that didn't acutally do much beyond kill 1 in 3 people.

[Shm Churmey]

before adequate sanitation comes about, clean bathwater is pretty unrealistic unless it's boiled first. the more people bathe, the more they are exposed to diseases.

On the other hand, the need for xclean waters to bathe creates an incentive to build adequate sewer systems; which would have spared Europe many an epidemic in the Middle Ages.

The Romans had sewer systems and water adductions in most, if not all, of their cities, even the smallest ones. And indeed, if epidemics did occur, the first real pandemic in the Roman world was the Plague of Justinian, in the 6th century AC.

[dgoodmaniii]

Brandrinn, what did you mean about bathing?

before adequate sanitation comes about, clean bathwater is pretty unrealistic unless it's boiled first. the more people bathe, the more they are exposed to diseases. if Europeans at the same technological level bathed as much as Verdurians, they'd drop like flies.

It really depends on circulation. The Romans didn't have this problem because their water was always circulated. Sure, if you just have bath water festering in a big pool that everybody uses, it's disease waiting to happen. But if it's constantly flushed out (and your careful about your where-you're-allowed-to-excrete laws), through an aqueduct or something, it's no more disease-prone than bathing in a river.