Medieval Epidemics of the Burning Disease as Told by Historians in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century

The historians that focused on Saint Anthony's Fire and ergotism from the nineteenth century onwards (in historiographical terms the two diseases tend to be considered as one and the same) drafted precise timelines for the occurrence of epidemics throughout history, starting in the early Middle Ages. They considered medieval sources and sometimes also works by early-modern authors, who had in turn retransmitted medieval accounts. The interpretation of these sources from two different periods somewhat inevitably led to inaccuracies. Firstly, it is not always possible to trace the original narrative source used by sixteenth and seventeenth-century historical authors who retranscribed descriptions of medieval epidemics that occurred at a regional or national level. Secondly, even when the source is known, the more recent version is not always an exact transcription of the medieval text, often taking shape as a summary padded out with arbitrary additions. Thirdly, there are changes in the medical lexicon as a result of interpreting the disease with different nosographic references from those used by the medieval authors. The dating of events is also revised in some cases.

The Frenchman Jean Bouchet serves as a prime example of the way in which medieval sources were interpreted by historians in the early modern period. In his sixteenth-century Annales d’Aquitaine, written in French, he focuses extensively on the Life of St Hilary and its accounts of miracles during his lifetime and post mortem.