I provvedimenti dei Conservatori della Sanità a Pavia al tempo della peste di San Carlo

Between 1576 and 1577 the plague struck Pavia. It was the epidemic known as the plague of San Carlo Borromeo, at the time Bishop of Milan, who committed himself with great dedication to assisting the sick, also making use of his personal substances. To deal with the epidemic, the Health Conservatories and the Podestà of Pavia implemented a series of measures, partly borrowed from those that had been taken in Milan, where the disease had already spread a few months earlier. Actions to try to stem the plague finally culminated in a general quarantine that lasted about 70 days. The city was shortly thereafter declared free of the plague. Through the documentation relating to these measures and the edicts of the Bishop of Pavia, Ippolito de Rossi, it is possibleto trace a history of the terrible two years experienced by the city, between the desperate action of the authorities to counter a terrible danger, the state of medical knowledge of the time, the collateral damage of restrictive measures but also, againstthe light, fear and cowardice, self-sacrifice and courage