The Plague Doctor // Ιατρική Μάσκα Πανώλης

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Product Description
creation plans: Art and science gallery.com
design material:Terracota (hande made)
artist: Eugenia Gerontara
dimensions: 27×15
edition year: 2016
prototype: 17th century
copyright all over the world: Art and science gallery.com

η Μάσκα πανώλης. Τη χρησιμοποιούσαν οι γιατροί τον 17ο αιώνα για να προστατεύονται από την πανώλη. Το εσωτερικό γέμιζε από αρωματικά φυτά. Ένα έργο Τέχνης, πoυ παρουσιάζεται για πρώτη φορά, παγκοσμίως. Ζωγραφισμένο από τη μοναδική ζωγράφο Ευγενία Γεροντάρα, αποκλειστικά για το artandsciencegallery.com

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It is an image that many recognise but few know nothing about it. The plague mask—with its elongated beak and dark, soulless eyes—has been replicated in costume shops around the world . Indeed, so prevalent are these masks at parties and balls, one might be tempted to think it is a design entirely imagined by Italian mask-makers for the Venetian Carnival. But where did this mask originate and what purpose did it serve during plague outbreaks?

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Although the plague ravaged Europe in the 14th century, killing nearly two-thirds of its population, 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 only two holes, one on each side near the nostrils, but that can suffice to breathe and carry along with the air one breathes the impression of the [herbs] enclosed further along in the beak. Under the coat we wear boots made in Moroccan leather (goat leather) from the front of the breeches in smooth skin that are attached to said boots, and a short sleeved blouse in smooth skin, the bottom of which is tucked into the breeches. The hat and gloves are also made of the same skin…with spectacles over the eyes. [1]

From this description, it is tempting to conclude that de Lorme was trying to protect himself against germs by wearing something similar to a modern-day biohazard suit. However, a coherent germ theory did not emerge until the mid-19th century with the experiments of Joseph Lister, Robert Koch and Louis Pasteur. That said, de Lorme was trying to protect himself against something he believed was just as insidious and just as dangerous as we understand germs to be today: miasma, or poisonous vapours associated with decomposition and foul air.

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De Lorme imagined that the herbs stuffed in the end of the beak would purify the air and prevent the plague doctor from breathing in the miasma, while the leather overcoat, breeches, boots and gloves would ensure that the skin was not exposed at any time. The hat [see right] was that which was typically worn by physicians during the early modern period and thus served a purely symbolic purpose. The wooden cane, on the other hand, was likely used to keep patients at a distance, or else direct caregivers on how to move the bodies of infected victims during examinations. It was not used, as some suppose, to beat away the rats who are today widely believed to have carried fleas infected with yersinia pestis, the bacterium better known as plague.

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. Those who did remain behind rarely mention it in their writing, making the mask all the more elusive to historians.

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Today, the plague mask lives on in the imaginations of artists, writers and film-makers [click here for a stunning example]. Through them, it has been transformed into something altogether different, for the plague mask which was once used to ward off death, has now become the very symbol of it.

1. Quoted and translated in Michel Tibayrenc (ed.), Encyclopedia of Infectious Diseases: Modern Methodologies (2007) p. 680. From M. Lucenet, ‘La peste, fleau majeur’ extraits de la Bibliotheque InterUniversitaire, Paris (1994).

Plague doctor costume

Paul Fürst, engraving, c. 1721, of a plague doctor of Marseilles (introduced as ‘Dr Beaky of Rome’). His nose-case is filled with herbal material to keep off the plague.

The plague doctor’s costume was the clothing worn by a plague doctor to protect him from airborne diseases. The costume, originating in the 17th century, consisted of an ankle length overcoat and a bird-like beak mask often filled with sweet or strong smelling substances (commonly lavender), along with gloves, boots, a brim hat, and an outer over-clothing garment.

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The mask had glass openings for the eyes and a curved beak shaped like that of a bird. Straps held the beak in front of the doctor’s nose.The mask had two small nose holes and was a type of respirator which contained aromatic items. The beak could hold dried flowers (including roses and carnations), herbs (including mint), spices, camphor, or a vinegar sponge.The purpose of the mask was to keep away bad smells, which were thought to be the principal cause of the disease in the miasma theory of infection, before it was disproved by germ theory. Doctors believed the herbs would counter the “evil” smells of the plague and prevent them from becoming infected.

The beak doctor costume worn by plague doctors had a wide-brimmed leather hat to indicate their profession.They used wooden canes to point out areas needing attention and to examine patients without touching them.The canes were also used to keep people away,. to remove clothing from plague victims without having to touch them, and to take a patient’s pulse..
History
Medical historians have attributed the invention of the “beak doctor” costume to Charles de Lorme, who adopted in 1619 the idea of a full head-to-toe protective garment, modeled after a soldier’s armour. This consisted of a bird-like mask with spectacles, and a long leather (Moroccan or Levantine)or waxed-canvas gown which was from the neck to the ankle. The over-clothing garment, as well as leggings, gloves, boots, and a hat, were made of waxed leather.The garment was impregnated with similar fragrant items as the beak mask.The costume may have older roots as some authors have described fourteenth-century plague doctors as wearing bird-like masks.

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Lorme wrote that the mask had a “nose half a foot long, shaped like a beak, filled with perfume with only two holes, one on each side near the nostrils, but that can suffice to breathe and to carry along with the air one breathes the impression of the drugs enclosed further along in the beak”.

This popular 17th-century poem describes the plague doctor’s costume.

As may be seen on picture here,
In Rome the doctors do appear,
When to their patients they are called,
In places by the plague appalled,
Their hats and cloaks, of fashion new,
Are made of oilcloth, dark of hue,
Their caps with glasses are designed,
Their bills with antidotes all lined,
That foulsome air may do no harm,
Nor cause the doctor man alarm,
The staff in hand must serve to show
Their noble trade where’er they go.

The Genevese physician Jean-Jacques Manget, in his 1721 work Treatise on the Plague written just after the Great Plague of Marseille, describes the costume worn by plague doctors at Nijmegen in 1636-1637. The costume forms the frontispiece of Manget’s 1721 work. The plague doctors of Nijmegen also wore beaked masks. Their robes, leggings, hats, and gloves were made of morocco leather.

This costume was also worn by plague doctors during the Plague of 1656, which killed 145,000 people in Rome and 300,000 in Naples.The costume terrified people because it was a sign of imminent death. Plague doctors wore these protective costumes in accordance with their agreements when they attended their plague patients.
Culture
A beaked Venetian carnival mask with the inscription Medico della Peste (‘Plague doctor’) beneath the right eye

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The costume is also associated with a commedia dell’arte character called Il Medico della Peste (the Plague Doctor), who wears a distinctive plague doctor’s mask.The Venetian mask was normally white, consisting of a hollow beak and round eye-holes covered with clear glass, and is one of the distinctive masks worn during the Carnival of Venice.

Reference

Byrne, Joseph Patrick, Encyclopedia of Pestilence, Pandemics, and Plagues, ABC-CLIO, 2008, ISBN 0-313-34102-8
Carmichael, Ann G., “SARS and Plagues Past”, in SARS in Context: Memory, history, policy, ed. by Jacalyn Duffin and Arthur Sweetman McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2006, ISBN 0-7735-3194-7
Center for Advanced Study in Theatre Arts, Western European stages, Volume 14, CASTA, 2002,
Dolan, Josephine, Goodnow’s History of Nursing , W. B. Saunders 1963 (Philadelphia and London), Library of Congress No. 16-25236
Ellis, Oliver Coligny de Champfleur, A History of Fire and Flame, London: Simkin, Marshall, 1932; repr. Kessinger, 2004, ISBN 1-4179-7583-0
Goodnow, Minnie, Goodnow’s history of nursing , W.B. Saunders Co., 1968, OCLC Number: 7085173

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Paul Fürst, engraving, c. 1721, of a plague doctor of Marseilles (introduced as ‘Dr Beaky of Rome’). His nose-case is filled with herbal material to keep off the plague.

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