Of course, the plague spawned plenty of conspiracy theories in the day too.
This is a book by a friend of mine
Plagues, Poisons And Potions: Plague Spreading Conspiracies in the Western Alps c.1530-1640 by Naphy, William G. (2002).**
In the case I know best, in 1545 there was an outbreak of the plague and a group of people were accused of being "engraisseurs," meaning people who spread fat. The idea was that they took clothes and such from infected people, put them in a cauldron and boiled them down into a potion (at the behest of Satan of course) and then applied the resulting potion on door handles and around town. Several were executed.
In general, Bill found, when there were outbreaks of plague, accusations of witchcraft diminished, replaced by accusations of plague spreading.
**I think it's time to sell my copy - it's priced at $948 on Amazon. Huh???
