The First Sexual Epidemic

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By 1490, the population of Europe had recovered to the level it had been at when the Great Plague had killed up to one in three people across the continent. But a mysterious new disease broke out among the French army in 1492, terrifying everyone and sparing no one. New mores of sexual behaviour that emerged during the late medieval period would mean that this epidemic of the pox would not be the last. How did the medical medieval practitioners enact cures and preventions - and what were the beliefs behind so-called miracle treatments? The readers are David Rintoul, Peter Capaldi and Scott Handy.