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Venice was great and powerful and had hundreds of thousands of inhabitants. The Venetians dominated the Dalmatian coast, where they established a long line of trading posts along the coast. But the 14th century was also the era of the Great Depression. Something that stopped the trade when the great ships arrived with their loads of wine, silk fabrics and spices from the East.
The word quarantine is a Venetian word that refers to the fact that the ships were forced to lie on the ridge for a full 40 days. In Italian “quaranta” which later gave rise to the word quarantine.
From the beginning, the quarantine was shorter and lasted 30 days. A document of the plague of 1377 ordered the entry to the city of Ragusa, which today is called Dubrovnik and is located in Croatia, both the travelers and the crew had to wait 30 days. In some cases, the sick had to leave. These were isolated on small islands off the coast waiting for the infection to disappear. But the death rate was, of course, huge.
It was not until 1448 that the Venetian Senate decided to extend the period of isolation to 40 days. And only then did “the quarantine” emerge, as the period in Venice is dialectically called.
Venice was the first city who systematically tried to stop the diseases by appointing three people responsible for the city’s medical care. Already in 1403 the first hospital in the city was founded.
After the plague, which ravaged Venice and many other cities for centuries, came a series of other epidemics such as syphilis, leprosy, yellow fever and the Spanish flu a hundred years ago.
Among the historically famous quarantines is that of Tuscany, portrayed by Giovanni Boccaccio in the book Decamerone. Ten people retreat to the countryside to isolate themselves and avoid contagion. To pass the time, spicy stories are told.
Unfortunately, the quarantine has not served its purpose. On the contrary! But both foreign correspondents have to undergo a two-week quarantine today, just as the first space astronauts were allowed to do.
