Drugs, Health, Bodies and Souls in the Tropics ... - Ines G. Županov

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Be careful that their foul smells and their infirmities do not disgust you and
make you sick because it is your sins that make you sensible to these smells;
Christ was not revolted when he ascended the Mount of Calvary where he
washed away your sins. 137
In addition, he was responsible for reporting to the physician how much the patient ate
and how he felt. He was responsible for keeping clean clothes for the patients in a
special chest. And finally, once a week he had to read the rules prescribed for his
office.
These rules were, in fact, job descriptions, and in Europe and Rome they were
to be found under the title of "Common Rules" important in organizing "the domestic
discipline" of the professed house. 138 The number of such rules grew almost out of
hand as each Jesuit institution, large or small, petitioned to have rules of their own.
Jeronimo Nadal, the indefatigable interpreter of the Constitutions, traveled extensively
in the mid-1550s in order to shore up enthusiasm for their implementation and to
explain and clarify the finer points. However, after visiting Córdoba in 1554, a Jesuit
reported that Nadal had left more than three hundred rules and regulations. Eighty of
those were destined for the rector, who did not have the time to read them. 139
Jesuit Emergency Sanitary Measures: Epidemics in Goa
In Goa, Jesuit know-how in rationalizing the administration of things,
institutions and humans meant that they were in great demand by the secular
authorities. When, in 1570, one of the bairros of Goa was struck by an epidemic
disease and more than nine hundred people were infected, it was the Jesuits who
brought the situation under control. The center-piece of the report written by a Jesuit,
Duarte Leitão, was a detailed presentation of the emergency procedure organized by
the Society. 140 Significantly, it all began with taking a census of the sick in the
affected suburbs (rol dos doentes que avia em cada bairo). 141 Then, they consulted the
gentile doctors who were mostly in charge of these people, before turning to the
fisico-mór, Dimas Bosque, "a great friend of the [Jesuit] house" (grande amigo da
casa), who, incidentally, had aslo been a good friend of Garcia de Orta. Finally, they
recalled Pedro Afonso, who had moved to the Salsete region in the south of Goa
following the transfer of the Hospital of the Poor Natives. The efficient and
systematic organization of Leitão's report appears to correspond to the public
performance of the Jesuits in a health emergency.
First he discussed the causes and proposed various explanations based on the
humoral conception of the disease.
"Different causes are proposed for this disease. The majority said that it was
due to corrupted air because an elephant died there and they left it rot without
removing it, and the foul smells corrupted the air and provoked this pestilential
disease (doença como peste). In the beginning, it started with fever and then
137 Regras de casa jerais da ordem do bom Jesu noso Salvador, written by Gaspar Barzaeus (rules for
the college of St. Paul in Goa), Sept or Oct. 1552, ARSI, Goa 10 II, ff. 489v490r.
138 Manuel Ruiz Jurado, Orígines del noviciado en la Compañía de Jesús, Rome, 1980, pp. 6 4-65.
139 O'Malley, p. 338.
140 Duarte Leitão to the members of the Portuguese province, Goa, Nov. 16. 1570, Biblioteca Nacional, Lisbon,
Fundo Geral, 4532, ff, 80r-83r.
141 Duarte Leitão to the members of the Portuguese province, Goa, Nov. 16. 1570, Biblioteca Nacional, Lisbon,
Fundo Geral, 4532, ff, 81v-82r.
Ines G. Županov, CNRS, Paris