The Origins of Quaratine

It's a word that we're all too familiar with thanks to the Corona Virus pandemic, but did you know that the word "quarantine" comes from the Italian quarantena and has Venetian origins? It all began in 1448 when Venice - the primary port of entry to Europe and the West for traders sailing from Turkey and the East - decided to extend its isolation period for boats coming to port. It was well known that Turkish trade ships often arrived not only with delicious spices and sweet smelling perfumes, but also with rats carrying disease into a land that had been devastated by the Black Plague in the 1300's. As a way of precaution, the Venetians chose to hold the ships, sailors and cargo in escrow for a set period of days to ensure whatever unwelcome germs arriving with them would whither and die. The number of days was set at 40 (quaranta in Italian), as that was the number of days Christ spent in the desert, so it naturally had to be a most-effective time for purification in the seat of Christianity! The waiting period that ships and their crew underwent therefore became known as quarantina in Venetian dialect, which then became quarantena in Italian, literally meaning "a period of forty days".

Photo taken inside the Monastero delle Oblate di Santa Francesca Romana in Rome

This site is only open 1 day/year and Tess & Giovanni went to visit it!