The "Leper Conspiracy" is a fictional coup that cost the lives of thousands of unfortunate people
Leprosy is a dangerous and intractable disease that has accompanied humanity throughout its history. Today we know almost everything about this disease, but once it was considered "the punishment of the Lord" and "the seal of the devil". Lepers were disenfranchised, persecuted everywhere, and the most ridiculous rumors were spread about them. For example, at the beginning of the 14th century, the "leper conspiracy" was revealed, after which thousands of patients were brutally murdered in France and Spain.
The fact that lepers plan to infect all Christians in France and Spain became known in 1321. It is not known exactly where this rumor originated from, but it had the most serious consequences. This is what the French inquisitor Bernard Guy wrote about it in his book "The Life of John XXII":
The inquisitor assured readers that the plans of leprosy patients were more than serious. At a certain meeting, they not only divided the lands of the king, the church and the feudal lords among themselves, but also appropriated noble titles to themselves. Bernard Guy said that princes, dukes and even archbishops were appointed to the sick rabble.
Now this story seems like some kind of deep stupidity. But in the spring and summer of 1321, the towns and villages of France were gripped by real hysteria. Local authorities caught lepers and anyone suspected of colluding with them. The unfortunate were executed as conspirators and heretics - hung along the roads and burned alive.
A little later, panic seized the royal court. In June, King Philip V of France learned that lepers were being caught and burned at the stake all over Aquitaine. Before the execution, they confessed that they wanted to poison wells, springs and rivers in order to infect Christians. Of course, these confessions were obtained as a result of inhuman torture, but at that time no one cared.
The king quickly became imbued with the idea of a conspiracy and issued a special decree on June 21, 1321. It instructed officials to detain leprosy patients and investigate their role in the atrocity. After the intervention of the monarch, the war with the unfortunate became even more threatening.
The protocols, which have preserved for posterity the details of interrogations of detainees, are very detailed and picturesque. For example, one of the suspects said that he personally attended the meeting of the conspirators. According to him, the leader of the leper community called for revenge on healthy people. He accused them of contempt for the sick, trampling on their rights and other sins.
In the Middle Ages there were no strict quarantine rules. But lepers were rigidly segregated and infringed in every possible way. Then it was believed that the patient deserved his illness by sins and therefore worthy only of contempt. They were also afraid of getting infected, because even then they guessed that leprosy was transmitted from the sick to the healthy.
Lepers had no rights to a home, family and work. Such people lived only by alms. They were doomed to an eternal journey along the roads in a hoodie, a mask covering their face, and with a bell. Hearing the ringing, passers-by ran away, not even wanting to breathe the same air with the "sinner". This attitude towards patients with leprosy was laid down in the Bible.
A leper could only find refuge in a leprosarium. These were special houses located far from cities and villages, where only leprosy patients lived. It is worth noting that there were a lot of accidents. This is evidenced by the fact that in the 12th and 13th centuries, dozens of leper colonies were opened in Europe.
The Third Lateran Council of 1179 humiliated the unfortunate as much as possible. They were ordered to pray in special churches and bury the dead in separate cemeteries.
To understand how disgusting their sick brethren were to healthy Christians, let us turn to the very decree of Philip V of June 21, 1321. In this ordinance, the king used such a phrase as "the putrefaction of fetid lepers." It was from her that he wanted to purify his blessed lands.
The church played a special role in the persecution of lepers. As we have already said, the disease was considered a consequence of sinfulness and was even called a "disease of the soul." To call a person a leper meant to offend him mortally. This is not surprising, because according to medieval laws it was not even a person.
The leper was deprived of the right to alienate his property or give it away, he could not testify in court and claim inheritance, had no right to make a gift, as well as to file a property claim. It was a complete zero. Didn't such people have a reason to hate those who are healthy? Purely hypothetically, it can be assumed that a conspiracy to infect the healthy could have originated among the poor.
But the sick were not long the only "fighting force" of the conspiracy. In the midst of a leper hunt, the king received a letter from a certain baron. It said that a leper of a noble family told that he had been recruited... by Jews. The interrogated man said that a rich Jew handed him a bag of poison and ten livres. The poison had to be poured into wells and reservoirs in one of the French cities. The Jew also promised to pay extra for each recruited patient.
This was already a serious lead and the Jews were also taken into circulation. The documents of the 14th century describe many cases when they were tried and executed or simply killed on the spot because of false accusations and rumors. Special measures have been taken in Spain. There Jews were forbidden to enter the houses of Christians where there were wells. They also had no right to touch products in the markets. That is, everything that the Jew touched had to be paid for by him and taken home.
One fact spoke eloquently about the fact that Jews and lepers were at the same time. The people of this people were extremely rarely sick with leprosy, which means they could fearlessly communicate with outcasts. Perfect accomplices in the darkest affairs! Often, the sick, under torture, slandered the Jews, inventing the most stupid nonsense.
In the famous decree of Philip V, it was prescribed to interrogate lepers and execute those who confessed to participating in the conspiracy. Those who persisted were supposed to be tortured until they confessed, and also executed. As we can see, the poor fellows had very few chances to survive.
The king decided to stop the amateur activity of the feudal lords and ordered the conspirators to be burned. Both men and women could be subjected to fiery execution. Mercy was shown only to pregnant women. They were supposed to be kept in prison until they gave birth. And after that, too, burn at the stake. Children under the age of 14 were kept in prison, and when they reached the age, they were again turned into ashes.
The property, if the patient had it, went to the royal treasury. Therefore, the richer a leprosy patient or a Jew was, the less chance he had of surviving. But often the royal bailiffs did not have time — people organized lynching and simply burned those suspected of conspiracy in their homes.
Surprisingly, the war with the conspirators ended as suddenly as it began. The "conspiracy of lepers" had almost no consequences, only in some places in France the isolation of patients from society was tightened. But it was from 1321 that the fashion for conspiracies appeared in Europe, which is still relevant all over the world.