Bubonic Plague in Early Modern Russia

A wave of bubonic plague swept through Eastern Europe in the late eighteenth century. It made its way through the Balkans into the landmass of the Russian Empire and wrought its heaviest damage in Moscow. John T. Alexander's study of the plague years dramatically highlights how the Russian people reacted to the dread disease, and shows how the tools of modern epidemiology can illuminate the causes of the plague's tragic course through Russia. When the plague struck, it caught the Russians unawares; the country had not experienced such an epidemic in more than a generation. The disease stymied medical experts and perplexed officials. Many of the countermeasures they hoped would stem the wave of sickness and death actually exacerbated the problem. At the height of the pestilence, violence erupted; thousands of angry and frightened Muscovites overrode police and public authorities during the "plague riot" of September 1771. Alexander's searches through many eyewitness accounts have enabled him to depict the plague's effects on the gamut of society, from Empress Catherine to the mendicant clergy and the convict gravediggers. Bubonic Plague in Early Modern Russia makes contributions to many aspects of Russian and European history: social, economic, medical, urban, demographic, and meterological. It is particularly enlightening in its discussion of eighteenth-century Russia's emergent medical profession and public health institutions, and, overall, should interest scholars in its use of abundant new primary source material from Soviet, German, and British archives.