Plague in Seventeenth Century Europe and the Decline of Italy: an Epidemiological Hypothesis

This article compares the impact of plague across Europe during the seventeenth century. It shows that the disease affected southern Europe much more severely than the north. Italy was by far the area worst struck. Using a new database, the article introduces an epidemiological variable that has not been considered in the literature: territorial pervasiveness of the contagion. This variable is much more relevant than local mortality rates in accounting for the different regional impact of plague. Epidemics, and not economic hardship, generated a severe demographic crisis in Italy during the seventeenth century. Plague caused a shock to the economy of the Italian peninsula that might have been key in starting its relative decline compared with the emerging northern European countries.