HISTORY PAGES
Two fisherman were in forced isolation,
made to fish for food for the town. The grim
figures of doctors in ghoulish beaked costumes
walked the narrow alleys. Imagine
the psychological torment of not knowing
when it would be all over — or when you
might be diagnosed as infected and then
isolated in the «lazare barracks» like a leper
waiting for the inevitable death with your
body being the next to be dragged away
into a communal grave. Testing positive in
those days was the equivalent of a death
sentence and the «grim reaper» was so close
that records show that Monegasques felt
they had lost significantly more than 10 %
of their population. In fact, out of a population
of 1000 about 100 died.
It all started in July 1631 when four washerwomen
visited the washhouse on the outskirts
of Monaco. On returning to Monaco
they died shortly after, one after another.
The Plague had arrived. The 34 year old
Prince Honoré II, his wife Ippolita Trivulzio
and son Hercule were escorted to a safe haven
to wait out the Plague with their family
the Dorias near Savona while 25 men
formed a patrol to enforce a lockdown in
Monaco — breach of which was not a 200
euro fine but the death penalty. And the
same dynamic played out just before the
quarantine — police, then in the form of
armed guards at the entrance to Monaco
barring visitors.
Monaco has two powerful legacies from
its quarantines of the past in a street
name and also in an annual procession.
THE TOWER
AND AVENUE
DE LA QUARANTAINE
In the time of Middle Ages the famous harbour of Monaco, now full of luxury yachts was regularily
used as a quarantine zone for ships arriving from the Orient, or in fact from anywhere.
QUARANTINE
PROHIBITIONS
In those medieval times, violating
the quarantine and leaving your
house was punishable by death.
Buying food, outdoor walks, delivery
of restaurant food to the
house — everything was under a
strict ban. Only a meagre food portion was
authorized, delivered to the doorstep of the
house on a long pole in exchange for a fee
handed on a wooden tray. It’s only just possible
now, after experiencing our own quarantine,
to imagine the degree of severity
imposed on everyone.
THE QUARANTINE TOWER
IN MONACO NO LONGER
EXISTS BUT THE VESTIGES
REMAIN TO THIS DAY
IN THE STREET NAME.
There is a curiously named street «avenue
de la Quarantaine» that still exists
in Monaco today by Chemim des
Pêcheurs (and Parking des Pêcheurs by the
Rock). A seafaring and trading nation, Monegasques
were aware that diseases were
global and epidemics could arrive from distant
shores by sea. At the time of writing
France has just proposed a law imposing
quarantine on specified international arrivals.
And so it was in Monaco almost 400
years ago whenever diseases arriving on
ships threatened, particularly those from
China and Japan. There actually existed a
tower built in the XIV century and barracks
(lazare) to enforce quarantine on visiting
seamen. The Quarantine tower no longer
exists but the vestiges remain to this day in
the street name.
Hello Monaco Spring–Summer 2020 / 115
www.hellomonaco.ru