Great Plague of Marseille
The Great Plague of Marseille, also known as the Plague of Provence, was the last major outbreak of bubonic plague in Western Europe. Arriving in Marseille, France, in 1720, the disease killed over 100,000 people: 50,000 in the city during the next two years and another 50,000 to the north in surrounding provinces and towns.[1]
While economic activity took only a few years to recover, as trade expanded to the West Indies and Latin America, it was not until 1765 that the population returned to its pre-1720 level.
Pre-plague city[edit]
Sanitation board[edit]
At the end of the plague of 1580, the people at Marseille took some measures to attempt to control the future spread of disease. The city council of Marseille established a sanitation board, whose members were to be drawn from the city council as well as the doctors of the city. The exact founding date of the board is unknown, but its existence is first mentioned in a 1622 text of the Parliament of Aix. The newly established sanitation board made a series of recommendations to maintain the health of the city.[2]
They established a bureaucracy to maintain the health of Marseille. In addition to protecting the city from exterior vulnerabilities, the sanitation board sought to build a public infrastructure. The first public hospital of Marseille was also built during this time period and was given a full-sized staff of doctors and nurses. Additionally, the sanitation board was responsible for the accreditation of local doctors. Citing the vast amount of misinformation that propagates during a plague, the sanitation board sought to, at a minimum, provide citizens with a list of doctors who were believed to be credible.[3]
The sanitation board was one of the first executive bodies formed by the city of Marseille. It was staffed to support the board's increasing responsibilities.
Quarantine system[edit]
The Sanitation Board established a three-tiered control and quarantine system. Members of the board inspected all incoming ships and gave them one of three "bills of health". The “bill of health” then determined the level of access to the city by the ship and its cargo.
A delegation of members of the sanitation board was to greet every incoming ship. They reviewed the captain's log, which recorded every city where the ship had landed, and checked it against the sanitation board's master list of cities throughout the Mediterranean that had rumors of recent plague incidents. The delegation also inspected all the cargo, crew and passengers, looking for signs of possible disease. If the team saw signs of disease, the ship was not allowed to land at a Marseille dock.
If the ship passed that first test and there were no signs of disease, but the ship's itinerary included a city with documented plague activity, the ship was sent to the second tier of quarantine, at islands outside of Marseille harbour. The criteria for the lazarets were ventilation (to drive off what was thought to be the miasma of disease), be near the sea to facilitate communication and pumping of water to clean, and to be isolated yet easily accessible.[4]
Even a clean bill of health for a ship required a minimum of 18 days' quarantine at the off-island location. During such time, the crew would be held in one of the lazarettos/lazarets that were constructed around the city. The lazarettos were also classified in relation to bills of health given to the ship and individuals. With a clean bill, a crewman went to the largest quarantine site, which was equipped with stores and was large enough to accommodate many ships and crews at a time. If crew members were believed subject to a possibility of plague, they were sent to the more isolated quarantine site, which was built on an island off the coast of the Marseille harbour. The crew and passengers were required to wait there for 50 to 60 days to see if they developed any sign of plague.[5]
Once crews served their time, they were allowed into the city in order to sell their goods and enjoy themselves prior to departure.
