To Quarantine The Black Plague

The Black Plague, also known as the Black Death, was a devastating pandemic that affected Europe and Asia during the Middle Ages. It was caused by the bacterium Yersinia Pestis and was primarily spread by infected fleas carried by rodents, but this was not known to the people of the medieval period, as it was only identified in 1894 CE. It was also known as Bubonic Plague. The Black Death wiped out millions of people in Europe between 1347 and 1352. It was one of the most fatal pandemics in human history. As many as 50 million people lost their lives, which was perhaps 50% of Europe’s 14th century population.

Prior to that 1894 CE, the plague was attributed primarily to supernatural causes – the wrath of God, the work of the devil, the alignment of the planets and, stemming from these, “bad air” or an unbalance of the “humors” of the body which, when in line, kept a person healthy. Basically, there was no cure…just fear. That fear left only one solution…quarantine. In an effort to protect the general population, the cases in Italy, once diagnosed, were sent to a small island in the Venetian lagoon. The island housed a hospital, now abandoned. The decrepit complex of buildings has been abandoned for a long time and basically left to rot. In an effort to slow the progression of the Plague, the island once served as a quarantine district during various phases of the Plague and its recurrences. For the victims housed there, unfortunately, quarantine did not slow the Black Death. They were quarantined from the public, but not from each other. Instead, the quarantine patients were kept in large dormitories with others at various stages of the disease. Even those who weren’t infected when they arrived but rather sent there because they had symptoms that worried the doctors, but once there, they had a good chance of being infected too. For many of the 160,000 infected patients who set foot on the island, it became their final destination. The victims were buried in mass graves or cremated after their death, and their ashes were spread on the island where they lie to this day.

After its use as a quarantine station ended, Poveglia opened an isolated mental hospital there in 1922. The hospital went from bad to worse, reportedly torturing its patients. They were also subjected to unnecessary, barbaric procedures like electroconvulsive therapy and lobotomy. They were physically restrained, beaten, and sometimes left in a solitary cell for long periods of time. Even after the hospital closed in 1968, the island wasn’t closed down. It remained open to the public until 2014. The bleak reputation of the hospital continued. It was finally decided that it needed to be closed. Of course, it was then rumored to be one of the most haunted places in Europe. I don’t believe in hauntings, but I’m sure that just the knowledge of how many people lost their lives there is gruesome ways, made it seem creepy for sure. Despite the reputation, the landowners have continued to try to sell the island for development, or maybe even a tourist destination. No one has taken the bate, because it seems too creepy to try to monetize an island whose soil may be comprised of human bones and ashes.