World's first lazaret?

Pictures: Italian Plague Graves Found


Lazaretto

Excerpt:

A lazaretto or lazaret is a quarantine station for maritime travellers. Lazarets can be ships permanently at anchor, isolated islands, or mainland buildings. ... A leper colony administered by a Christian religious order was often called a lazar house, after the parable of Lazarus the Beggar.


Mass Plague Graves Found on Venice "Quarantine" Island

Excerpt:

Ancient mass graves containing more than 1,500 victims of the bubonic plague have been discovered on a small island in Italy's Venetian Lagoon.

Workers came across the skeletons while digging the foundation for a new museum on Lazzaretto Vecchio, a small island in the lagoon's south, located a couple of miles from Venice's famed Piazza San Marco.

The island is believed to be the world's first lazaret—a quarantine colony intended to help prevent the spread of infectious diseases.

The lazaret was opened during the plague outbreaks that decimated Venice, as well as much of Europe, throughout the 15th and 16th centuries A.D.


Comment: My daughter visited Venice earlier this Summer. I had not heard of the term "lazaret" before. Picture from National Geographic (see link above for more!)