Plague of Marseille

May 25, 1720

The merchant ship Grand-Saint-Antoine, carrying silk and cotton from Syria, unloaded at Marseille despite quarantine. Within weeks a hundred thousand Provencals would die. Bishop Belsunce walked the corpse-strewn streets administering last rites. It was the last major plague epidemic in western Europe, though no one yet knew that. The city lost half its population before the contagion burned itself out over the following two years.