Malaria and Rome: A History of Malaria in Ancient Italy by Robert Sallares (beach read .TXT) 📕

convallibus; tum propiora Tiberi, in Meridiem, atque Occasum solis spectantia, minus salubria a peritioribus habentur.

¹⁸ Doni (1667: 6). Doni’s work was partly written in response to the sixteenth century book of Alessandro Petronio (translated into Italian by Paravicini (1592) ), a doctor from Cività Castellana who worked in Rome. He acknowledged that quotidian fevers and lethargy were common in Rome ( si vedano spesso—Paravicini (1592: 200) ), although he thought that semitertian fevers were rare, but nevertheless suggested that fevers as a whole were much less frequent in Rome than the ailments upon which he wished to concentrate, namely excess of humours in the head ( capiplenio) and indigestion! He wished to concentrate on ailments which could possibly be influenced by his focus on diet, lifestyle, and exercise. Of course headache and indigestion are much commoner than major infectious diseases in all human populations, but the fact remains that only major infectious diseases have significant demographic consequences!

¹⁹ e.g. Donatus (1694: bk iii. ch. 21, pp. 273–4): Quaedam alia de Vaticano memorantur, haud sane firmis auctoritatibus nixa, praeter frequentia in eo campo sepulchra, et insalubre Coelum, quod noster aetas propter Civium, tectorumque frequentiam salubrius experitur.

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30. Via della Reginella, connecting Via del Portico d’Ottavio to Piazza Mattei, is a relic of the old Jewish Ghetto in Rome, a district that was walled until 1848. Despite its location, close to the River Tiber, and the poor living standards of its inhabitants, there was little or no malaria there.

This may be attributed to the densely packed houses, with no gardens between them, and so a lack of mosquito breeding sites.

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were fairly healthy. However, that does not prove that a high human population density by itself is enough to defeat malaria, and the comments of the ancient medical writers (to be discussed shortly) indicate that that was not the case in ancient Rome. The classic example given in early modern discussions of malaria in Rome was the Jewish ghetto. This district remained walled until 1848. It had a high population density and was free of malaria even though it was situated close to the Tiber, in the vicinity of Isola Tiberina. The key to understanding the situation in the ghetto is not the human population density as such, or the height of the buildings in it, but the absence of gardens in between the buildings. Irrigated gardens where Romans grew vegetables during the heat of the Mediterranean summer made a significant contribution to feeding the population of the city. However, they also furnished ideal breeding sites for mosquitoes, and this was explicitly noted in both ancient and early modern literary sources. For example, the anonymous author of a discourse on mal’aria written near the end of the eighteenth century observed that gardens were one of the deadliest producers of ‘bad air’ and noted the abundance of mosquitoes in gardens.²⁰ Similarly in antiquity Pliny the Elder noted the abundance of mosquitoes ( culices) in well-watered gardens and recommended measures to try to drive them away.²¹ This is a crucial piece of evidence because it identifies irrigated gardens, particularly those in which trees or bushes provided resting and hiding places for mosquitoes, as important breeding sites for mosquitoes in and around the city of Rome.²² The elimination of gardens from many parts of Rome during the development of the modern city, as it changed in the direction of the modern situation in which most people live in blocks of flats without gardens, was an important factor in the eradication of malaria from Rome.

The observations of the early modern authors as a whole prove the importance of malaria not necessarily as a regular direct agent of mortality (although there certainly were some major epidemics from time to time), but as a determinant of settlement patterns ²⁰ Anon. (1793: 56): zanzare, e tutti gli animali indicatori e propagatori della corruzione. Tommasi-Crudeli (1892: 127) discussed the connection between malaria and market gardening in Rome.

²¹ Pliny, NH 19.58.180: infestant et culices riguos hortos, praecipue si sint arbusculae aliquae; hi galbano accenso fugantur (Mosquitoes also infest irrigated gardens, especially if there are some shrubs; they are driven away by burning the resin of galbanum.).

²² Pliny, NH 36.24.123 noted the abundant supplies of water to gardens in Rome.

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in the city of Rome (at a time when the urban population was much smaller than during the Roman Empire). For example Gian Girolamo Lapi argued in the eighteenth century that intermittent fevers were no more frequent in Rome than in many other Italian cities and that it was safe to visit Rome in summer, even though he acknowledged that the air of the Roman Campagna was very unhealthy. However, even Lapi admitted that a majority of the citizens of Rome ( la maggiore parte) were afraid of ‘bad air’, being unwilling to sleep in the villas in and around the city or even to move from one district of the city to another.²³ Malaria forced people to congregate in the healthier districts of the city, at a time when the unoccupied sections of the city amounted to about two thirds of the area within the Aurelian walls. Ellis Cornelia Knight mentioned a law in early modern Rome banning landlords from expelling tenants during the summer, so that no one should be forced to end up living in the dangerous parts of the city in summer.

Her words clearly show malaria acting as a determinant of settlement patterns even though she believed, like Lapi, that those parts of the city where people congregated were safe.

Seldom any rain falls during the months of July and August, and the air is perfectly calm . . . mephitic exhalations abound at this season of the year in the neighbourhood of any stagnant waters, and in the unfrequented parts of Rome, particularly over the catacombs. The few inhabitants who remain there are subject to fevers and agues, but their number is very inconsiderable;