Poisons of the Past

Argues that epidemics, sporadic outbursts of bizarre behaviour and low fertility and high death rates from the 14th to the 18th centuries may have been caused by food poisoning from microfungi in bread, the staple food in Europe and America during this period.

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Did food poisoning cause the Black Plague, the Salem witch-hunts, and other significant events in human history? In this pathbreaking book, historian Mary Kilbourne Matossian argues that epidemics, sporadic outbursts of bizarre behavior, and low fertility and high death rates from the fourteenth to the eighteenth centuries may have been caused by food poisoning from microfungi in bread, the staple food in Europe and America during this period.
“A bold book with a stimulating thesis. Matossian’s claims for the role of food poisoning will need to be incorporated into any satisfactory account of past demographic trends.”—John Walter, Nature
“Matossian’s work is innovative and original, modest and reasoned, and opens a door on our general human past that historians have not only ignored, but often did not even know existed.”—William Richardson, Environmental History Review
“This work demonstrates an impressive variety of cross-national sources. Its broad sweep also reveals the importance of the history of agriculture and food and strengthens the view that the shift from the consumption of mold-poisoned rye bread to the potato significantly contributed to an improvement in the mental and physical health of Europeans and Americans.”—Naomi Rogers, Journal of American History
“This work is a true botanical-historical tour de force.”—Rudolf Schmid, Journal of the International Association of Plant Taxonomy
“Intriguing and lucid.”—William K. Beatty, Journal of the American Medical Association