The Chirurgeon’s Apprentice
on the disturbing origins of raven-nosed masks, which were worn by
so-called “plague doctors” during times of mass death in Early Modern
Europe:
The earliest textual description of the mask dates from
the 17th century. Charles de Lorme, chief physician to Louis XIII and
likely inventor behind the design, wrote:
The nose [is] half a foot long, shaped like a beak,
filled with perfume with one [hole] on each side near the nostrils, but
that can suffice to breathe and carry along the impression of the
[herbs] enclosed further along in the beak.
A coherent germ theory did not emerge until the mid-19th century – de
Lorme was trying to protect himself miasma, or poisonous vapours
associated with decomposition and foul air.
It is difficult to know how ubiquitous the plague mask was in the
17th and 18th centuries. Most physicians fled the city during outbreaks,
leaving the dying to fend for themselves.
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