As usual, I had trouble sleeping the other night and passed the time with a mind numbing and endless Wikipedia search of things that generally interest me. One of them being the Black Plague. Ever since reading old Camus back in 9th grade, completely not realizing his Plague was an allegory of war, I've been more obsessed with it than even the average morbid chick. But I had never seen this before.
At first, I thought it was just an old, spooky sketch of death personified, but death personified being yet another thing I'm real into, I decided to investigate. That's when I learned something that made the me have my own petite muerte. This was not the personification of death - not literally at least - no, this was in fact the garb that 'plague doctors' wore. So when someone you are lying in your death bed in 14th century Europe, you know, the peak of our world's existential crisis, one of the last people you see is this sinister stranger. Who will be examining you solely with the use of his cane.
It was an early Hazmat suit, really. A long black coat, boots, and shoes were waxed to try and keep off any dirt or dust from the victims, the goggles to protect the eyes, and that long 'beak' was really filled with flowers and herbs that they hoped would protect their noses and mouths. They also carried canes In an unusual twist of human morality, the majority of these plague doctors weren't even physicians; most of the real doctors fled Europe having the funds to do so and not knowing how to help anyway. Sadly, these doctors could only really do two things - confirm that someone had the plague, and, more importantly, rampantly spread the plague
from quarantined homes to the city. Nice going, heroes.
Now you can buy the costumes for big costume festivals like Mardi Gras or Carnival or etc. And yes, they do look like spy vs. spy.
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