France, Germany, Italy, and various other countries of Europe,—in fact, the whole inhabited globe,—suffered awfully from pestilence in the years of our Lord 565–66, 583, 587, 589–90–91, 596 to 610: in the course of 580, Antioch was again shaken by a severe earthquake. There prevailed during this period, in the year 589, in Spain, writes St. Gregory, bishop of Tours, a very singular pestilence, the principal symptoms of which were pimples, or pustules, with buboes in the groins: such great havoc did it make, that the houses were as so many tombs, and the town as one vast cemetery: it was supposed that this disease was brought from Marseilles in a vessel, as it had raged there the year previously. St. Gregory, in his ‘History of the Franks,’ also gives these particulars of this pestilential period: “In the fifth year of the reign of king Childebert (A.D. 580), great floods, tempests, earthquakes, hail, and several prodigies, were succeeded by a dreadful plague; for almost every district of France was occupied by a dysentery, in which the patients were affected with violent vomitings, fever, headache, and excruciating pains in the loins: what they discharged from their mouths was green or yellowish.” This epidemic was particularly fatal to infants and children: “Parvulos adolescentes arripuit letoque subegit: perdidimus dulces et charos nobis infantulos,” &c. King Childebert recovered with difficulty, but he lost his two sons. Austrigilda, queen of Orleans, sunk under the disease; she retained to the last the ferocious and vindictive spirit of the times, having exacted a promise from the king Gunthran that her two physicians should be put to death if they did not save her; soon after she expired, both of them were stabbed by the king’s order. The Count d’Angoulême also died of the pestilence; the corpse appeared black and charred, as if it had been laid over coals of fire.
Paulus Diaconus describes the Ligurian pestilence which raged during this period, A.D. 566, in the time of Narses: “Cœperunt nasci inguinibus hominum vel in aliis delicatioribus locis glandulæ in modum nucis seu dactyli, quas mox sequebatur febrium intolerabilis æstus, ita in triduo homo extingueretur: sin vero aliquis triduum transegisset, habebat spem vivendi. Erat autem ubique luctus, ubique lacrymæ,” &c. He concludes with the following passages: “Nulla vox in rure, nullus pastorum sibilus, nullæ insidiæ bestiarum in pecudibus, nulla damna in dominos volucribus. Sata transgressa metendi tempus, intacta expectabant messorem: vinea amissis foliis, radiantibus uvis, illæsa manebat. Nulla erant vestigia commeantium; nullus cernebatur percussor, et tamen visum oculorum superabant cadavera mortuorum. Pastoralia loca versa fuerunt in sepulturam hominum, et habitacula humana facta fuerunt confugia bestiarum.”
Procopius, a Greek historian of Cæsarea, secretary to Belisarius, a general during the reign of Justinian, records some important facts of this pestilence, which ravaged the whole world; it lasted four months at Constantinople, and, when at its height, it is supposed that 10,000 perished daily in that city. Nicephorus also describes this pestilential period, and remarks that “certain little marks appeared on the doors and outside of their houses, on their garments, and on their utensils; some white crusts of a peculiar deposition from the air adhered to all things, as damp moulds do on the walls or dwellings, and dew on grass.”
In the year 590, at Rome, in the time of Pope Pelagius the Second, there was a horribly destructive pestilence prevalent, and also in Spain. The air was observed to be impregnated with a kind of mist and fœtidness, which by irritation induced a sneezing; hence the custom of saluting a person sneezing with the expression “Dominus tecum,” or some similar expression, a practice which has reached our time. The year following, 591, Britain suffered from a severe pestilence, also Turenne, and the provinces of Arragon and Vivares. This disease was called inguinaria, because buboes were formed more particularly in the groin. In the year 610, pestilential small-pox committed great ravages at Mecca.
A.D. 614, epidemic elephantiasis prevailed in Italy, and three years subsequently, an epidemic pestilence, resembling the true plague.
In Syria, Arabia, &c., a great pestilence prevailed A.D. 639 and 640.
A.D. 654, Constantinople was devastated by a severe pestilence.
In the year of our Lord 664, a sudden pestilence (man-cyalm), after depopulating the southern coasts of Britain, infected the provinces of the Northumbrians, and, spreading for a long time in every direction, destroyed great numbers. The year following, 665, it reached Italy, causing great destruction of life. Fordum (Scriptores, xv. vol. iii. page 646) cites a Greek historian to the effect that dire mortality prevailed, A.D. 669, all over Europe, which did not spare the remotest islands, Great Britain and Ireland. England also suffered greatly, A.D. 672, from pestilence, at which period universal disease appeared in Syria and Mesopotamia. England and Ireland were revisited by pestilence, A.D. 679, beginning in the month of July, and continuing until the end of September. Rome suffered from similar ravages the following year, and in A.D. 683, England again suffered from severe epidemic disease, which lasted three years. A.D. 685, Syria and Libya were laid waste by disease. Ireland suffered from a severe epidemic the same year.
From a singular portion of history which has been preserved in the records of the church of Mayo, we find that the ‘ignis sacer,’ or pestilence originating from famine, was similar to and contemporary with the pestilence ‘man-cyalm,’ which raged among the British after the departure of the Romans from Britain (664).
According to the records, two kings of Erin summoned the principal clergy and laity to a council at Temora, in consequence of a general dearth, the land not being sufficient to support the increasing population. The chiefs (majores populi) decreed that a fast should be observed both by clergy and laity, so that they might with one accord solicit God in prayer to remove by some species of pestilence the burthensome multitudes of the inferior people, and thus enable the residue to subsist more commodiously. “Omnes majores petebant ut nimia multitudo vulgi per infirmitatem aliquam tolleretur, quia numerositas populi erat occasio famis.” St. Gerald and his associates suggested that it would be more conformable to the Divine Nature, and not more difficult, to multiply the fruits of the earth, than to destroy its inhabitants. An amendment was accordingly moved, “to supplicate the Almighty not to reduce the number of the men till it answered the quantity of corn usually produced, but to increase the produce of the land, so that it might satisfy the wants of the people.” However, the nobles and clergy, headed by St. Fechin, bore down the opposition, and called for a pestilence on the lower orders of the people. According to the records, God’s judgment immediately fell upon the wicked authors of the petition. The two kings who had summoned the convention with St. Fechin, the kings of Ulster and Munster, and a third of the nobles concerned, were cut off by the pestilence—‘Budhe connail,’ which was by some called ‘pestis flava,’ by others ‘infirmitas icteritia.’