the black death in early ottoman territories - Bilkent University

Moreover he had to suffer the loss of his mother and two of his three sisters. His
letters reflect the intense psychological shock that people endured who lived in
constant fear of death and experienced the loss of their family and friends :
The surviving sister ... seems still alive. Hovever, she has not stopped
mourning for her sisters, but sits looking at their grave, crying, as if she is
witnessing once more their struggle with death... He who has an eye for
reality will say that I, while alive, am not more fortunate than those that
have died. Because it is already a year that I suffer from dizzyness in the
head, that I feel as if my heart is bursting through my chest. I also suffer
from breathlessness, as if I would suffocate and of insomnia, which drives
me almost insane. All this creates a feeling of constant impotence. 245
Since the first outbreak, his opinion about physicians had not improved:
"My fear is of physicians is stronger than any illness ... they do not even notice
that their learned dietary prescriptions sustain or even aggrevate the illness." 246
flight
Flight and isolation from the plague outbreaks doubtlessly improved a
person's prospects of staying alive. In the Byzantine empire, people sought to
safeguard themselves from plague in monastries, and would continue to do so in
the centuries to come. Their emperors displayed the same behavior. According to
Sphrantzes, the emperor Manuel temporarily transferred his court to the Monastery
of Peribleptos on account of the plague in 1420. Islands too could provide isolation
and a safehaven. 247 Asanes Konstantinos, a friend of Demetrius Cydones
obviously chose this strategy, for Cydones wrote to him rather ironically:
So go on to travel from one island to the next, have a look at their harbours,
sing with the ores and feed yourself with rye bread and garlic. May good
fortune bring you back here, once God has been appeased. 248
245 Kydones, Briefe, 316.
246 Kydones, Briefe, 317.
247 A few centuries later, this was still a popular strategy for those who had the means to do so. As
Lowry, recalls, Oghier de Busbecq wished to leave plague-stricken Istanbul for the island of
Prinkipio in the Sea of Marmara. Lowry, Pushing the Stone Uphill, 127.
248 Kydones, Briefe, 281.
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