Measures Against the Plague and Other Contagious Diseases in Serbia in the First Half of the 19th Century

Abstract

The paper provides an introduction covering the absence of measures against the plague and other contagious diseases in the Ottoman Empire, the measures practiced in the Austrian Empire, the terminology used for measures against the spreading of the disease in the Serbian language, etc. This is followed by a section that covers the plague during the First Serbian Uprising and the remembrance of its disastrous consequences. The central part of the paper focuses on the measures against cholera and the plague taken by the Principality of Serbia, starting the 1830s. Regulations modeled after the Austrian counterparts passed in 1839 and 1841, establishing a cordon sanitaire toward the Ottoman Empire.