A.D. 110, a severe earthquake was felt in Shropshire, in England. Four years after, 114, a similar shock, but more extensive, was experienced in China, which caused the destruction of much property and of many lives. During the same period a pestilence prevailed in Wales, which carried off 45,000 of its inhabitants, after a hot summer and an inclement autumn. In fact, in those days there frequently happened great inundations, especially of the river Severn: at one time immense numbers were drowned in their beds, when 5000 head of cattle were destroyed. A.D. 115, a tremendous earthquake laid waste the city of Antioch. Five years after, A.D. 120, Nicomedia and several neighbouring cities were swallowed up; and, A.D. 128, Cæsarea and Necropolis met with a similar fate from a severe earthquake.
A.D. 133, a great drought existed in England, and the Thames was almost dried up. This condition of the seasons was followed by pestilence; and thirteen years after, Scotland was visited with an epidemic, to the great destruction of its inhabitants.
Arabia was ravaged by pestilence in the year of our Lord 158. The disease appeared in Rome during the reign of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus and Lucius Verus, preceded by a more destructive plague in Asia, which the great Ammianus Marcellinus, the philosophic hero, asserted arose from the foul air of a small box which a Roman soldier had opened at the capture of Seleucia. This opinion was in accordance with the superstition of the times. At that period the elements were greatly deranged: commotions of the physical world, inundations of rivers, agitations of the earth, devastations from locusts, caterpillars, and every variety of the insect tribe, famine, putrid vapours, with great inclemencies and irregularities of the seasons, foretold the approach of the awful pestilence which in the same year desolated Rome: its symptoms were, a burning fever and gangrene of the extremities, particularly of the feet. These times were also distinguished by wars and rumours of wars: 450,000 Romans were butchered in Syria and in Cyprus by the Jews. Fourteen cities were destroyed by earthquakes, amongst which was Antioch, with 100,000 inhabitants: 580,000 were supposed altogether to have perished by the sword, famine, and pestilence.
Aurelius Victor, speaking of the emperor M. Antoninus, gives a lucid description of those calamitous times. He says, “Unless he had been born for these times, all the affairs of the Roman empire would have been ruined assuredly as if by one fall; for there was rest no where from arms, and wars burned through all the East, Illyricum, Italy, and Gaul. The motions of the earth, with annihilation of cities, inundation of the rivers, thick pestilences, species of locusts infested the fields; indeed, nothing can be said or conceived, by which mortals used to be wasted with the severest agonies, which have not raged during his administration.”
A.D. 173, there was a severe winter, and consequently a famine in England; a pestilence broke out the summer following, and continued to the autumn and subsequent winter. In this year, as also in 175 and 178, Rome was visited by epidemic pestilence, which committed great ravages among the soldiery. Five years after, it was again afflicted with disease; and in A.D. 195, plague prevailed in all Italy. “A great pestilence,” says the historian, “raged in all Italy, and became most violent in Rome by reason of the great concourse of people assembled from all quarters of the world. The emperor, by the advice of his physicians, retired to Laurentum, a cool place beautifully shaded with laurels, on the supposition that the sweet smell of those plants counteracted contagion. The people of the city were also advised by the physicians to fill their noses and ears with sweet-smelling ointments, and to use perfumes, in order to prevent the action of human effluvia and of the contagious air. These precautions, however, as might have been expected, proved of little avail: the distemper proceeded unchecked, and men and cattle continued to perish therefrom in multitudes. Five thousand died daily in Rome for a considerable time, and famine with pestilence persisted for three years.” (See Herodian, Dion Cassius, &c.)
A.D. 203, there was an eruption of Mount Vesuvius.
In the year 211, a plague, preceded by an earthquake and a great inundation of the river Trent, appeared in the British Isles. A.D. 218, the river Tweed overflowed; and dire pestilence followed four years after, destroying 100,000 lives in Scotland.
Mortal pestilence affected the whole world A.D. 250. Italy, Ethiopia, Egypt, Asia, France, Spain, and various other parts suffered great ravages from disease. “For twelve years subsequently,” says Zosimus, “a pestilential fever followed the Scythians, and devoured the scanty remains of the human race.” “Pestilence has contaminated the face of the earth,” says Jornandes, a learned historian.
A.D. 252, Alexandria and other districts suffered from epidemic pestilence, which continued its ravages with great fury for twelve or fifteen years. This pestilence was not, however, one uniform disorder, but was comprised of several different kinds, such as dysentery, ignis sacer, or scurvy, typhomania, remittent fevers, &c. According to Cedrenus, there were at the time singular exhalations and dews, which resembled the ichors of dead bodies: “hence,” he says, “constant loimoi, with other severe and unmanageable disorders (βαρέα καὶ ἀνίατα νοσήματα), which destroyed multitudes of the people.”
A.D. 262. During the reign of Gallienus 5000 citizens of Rome perished daily. Cyprian, a bishop of Carthage, a man of erudition (see reprint, Fell, fol. Oxon. Amst. 1700), in detailing the symptoms of this horrific pestilence, thus writes: “The symptoms were, a dejection of spirits, exhaustion of strength, incessant involuntary evacuations, violent fever of the bowels, with destruction of the sight, hearing, and feeling.” Aurelius Victor asserts of this pestilence, that it spread rapidly all over Rome, and arose from heavy cares and depression of mind, as well as from a pestiferous state of the atmosphere. We may here recognize all the terrible symptoms of that devastating disease Cholera, which, beginning in the year 1817, ravaged the four quarters of the globe, and continued for a series of years. Several earthquakes were experienced this year in Europe, Asia, and Africa, with three days’ darkness. A.D. 272, there was another eruption of Vesuvius.