In the summer of 1575, plague struck Venice. The city fathers tried to stem the contamination by requiring crews suspected of infection to stay on the island of Lazzaretto for forty days. These quaranta giorni are the origin of the term quarantine.
It was overkill: the incubation period of the Black Death is much shorter—three days or so. They were thinking of all the forties of time in the Bible, periods of purification: the Children of Israel in the desert for forty years, Jesus fasting for forty days.
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Susannah Black Roberts
Susannah Black Roberts is senior editor at Plough. She is a native Manhattanite. She and her husband, the theologian Alastair Roberts, split their time between Manhattan and the West Midlands of the UK.
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