The Plague Doctor with the Bird-Beak Mask Is Not Medieval, but Seventeenth-Century

Mention the Black Death, and the internet will inevitably pair it with one image: a person in a black robe, wearing a bird-beak-like mask, holding a stick.

This image is actually not from the Black Death period of the Middle Ages; the Black Death was in the 14th century. The bird-beak doctor is a 17th-century matter, around 1619, a French doctor named Charles de Lorme, who was the doctor of King Louis XIII. It is said that he designed this set of protective clothing, and it was used most in the plagues in Italy later, such as in Rome and Naples in 1656, where there were engravings of such doctors.

The clothing was a waxed leather robe, from head to toe; gloves and boots were all leather; eyes wore glass spectacles; that long bird beak was stuffed with herbs, spices, and dried flowers, because people at the time believed that plague was spread by “foul air,” and spices could filter it.

That stick was used to examine patients, without touching them with hands, and could also be used to push away people who wanted to get close.

Today, looking at it, the spices in the beak are not of much use against germs, but the leather robe and gloves did block some fleas, so those who wore them might have gotten sick less because of that.

This image later became a mask for the Venice Carnival, called “Plague Doctor.” Today every February, in St. Mark’s Square, hundreds or thousands of people wearing bird beaks walk by, and no one remembers its original purpose.

#Paranormal #网络转载 #欧洲民俗