Letter from Catherine the Great shows her support for inoculations
The First Art Newspaper on the Net    Established in 1996 Saturday, October 5, 2024


Letter from Catherine the Great shows her support for inoculations
A letter from Catherine the Great showing her support for an early form of inoculation is captured in a letter scheduled to be sold at auction in London on Wednesday, Dec. 1, 2021. In it, she instructs a governor-general to ensure that a smallpox prevention method called variolation was readily available in his province. MacDougall Auctions via The New York Times.

by Amanda Holpuch



NEW YORK, NY.- As smallpox outbreaks ravaged communities in the 18th century, one of the first people in Russia to embrace a precursor to vaccines was Catherine the Great, the empress famed for promoting the latest knowledge in the arts and sciences from her throne.

Catherine’s support for an early form of inoculation is captured in a letter to be sold at auction in London on Wednesday. In it, she instructs a governor-general to ensure that a smallpox prevention method called variolation was readily available in his province.

According to a translation of the letter provided by the auction house, Catherine, like many world leaders today, sought widespread protection against an infectious disease that was devastating her empire. “Such inoculation should be common everywhere,” she wrote, “and it is now all the more convenient, since there are doctors or medical attendants in nearly all districts, and it does not call for huge expenditure.”

MacDougall’s, an auction house in London that specializes in Russian art, is auctioning the letter along with a portrait of Catherine by Dmitry Levitsky. In the portrait, the empress wears a small crown and an ermine-lined cloak.

The items together are worth an estimated $1 million to $1.6 million, according to the auction house.

The auction house listing does not identify the current owner of the objects, but it says they are from a private collection in Russia. The painting was previously exhibited in museums in St. Petersburg and Moscow, it says.

A director of the auction house, Catherine MacDougall, said the initial announcement about the auction led to more than 100 interview requests from news organizations in Russia, where there is great interest in Catherine’s inoculation efforts.

The letter is dated April 20, 1787, and addressed to a Russian army officer, Piotr Aleksandrovich Rumiantsev, who was known as Count Zadunaysky. Catherine wrote in the letter that one of Rumiantsev’s most important duties “should be the introduction of inoculation against smallpox, which, as we know, causes great harm, especially among the ordinary people.”




Catherine and her son Pavel Petrovich were inoculated nearly two decades earlier, in 1768.

At the time, people were inoculated using variolation, the practice of exposing people to material from an infected pustule of a patient with smallpox. The process was used for hundreds of years in India and China before being adopted in Europe. Enslaved people from Africa introduced the treatment in the United States. It is similar to, but distinct from, vaccination, which uses a less harmful version of a virus.

Many people were wary of the practice, which sometimes led to deaths or outbreaks of a mild form of smallpox.

These concerns prompted Catherine to show her support for it.

Lynne Hartnett, an associate professor of history at Villanova University, said Catherine was terrified of smallpox, which had infected her husband and killed the fiancée of one of her closest advisers.

She invited an English physician, Thomas Dimsdale, to St. Petersburg to inoculate her, her son and members of her court. “She was doing it as a way to show the Russian people that it was safe and it could keep this disease at bay,” Hartnett said.

Catherine provided Dimsdale with a carriage and protection in case she died and he needed an urgent route out of Russia. Instead, she recovered from the inoculation, and a holiday was declared to celebrate the event.

Afterward, Catherine wrote to her ambassador in Britain, Count Ivan Grigorievuch Chernyshev: “Starting with me and my son, who is also recovering, there is no noble house in which there are not several vaccinated persons, and many regret that they had smallpox naturally and so cannot be fashionable.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.










Today's News

December 1, 2021

Revving Up the Art World Like Never Before

Christie's announces December Design Sales

Andrea Bowers: Her activism animates her art

With $125 million gift, Met Museum jump-starts new modern wing

American Friends of The National Gallery of Denmark raise more than $30.000 for the conservation of Matisse painting

PINTA Miami to be held at new venue during Miami art week

Letter from Catherine the Great shows her support for inoculations

Artsy acquires Greenhouse Auctions and appoints its founder and CEO, Shlomi Rabi, to Artsy's VP of Auctions

Christie's 'A Selection of Fabergé Masterpieces from The Harry Woolf Collection' totals £5,203,250

Izumi Kato joins Stephen Friedman Gallery

Phillips and Poly Auction 20th Century & Contemporary Art & Design Hong Kong sales realise US$86 million

Empire State Building lights up to honor Josephine Baker

Niclas Riepshoff's second solo exhibition with 14a opens in Hamburg

Adolfo, Designer Who Dressed Nancy Reagan, Dies at 98

David Gulpilil, famed Aboriginal actor, dies at 68

Under the Radar festival returns, smaller but still funky

Nye & Company announces online Chic and Antique Estate Treasures Auction

The Jewish Museum of Florida-FIU presents 'Martin Kreloff: A Retrospective'

The Holiday Auction, featuring fine and decorative art, Asian, silver & jewelry goes up for bid

Robert Battle on running Ailey: 'This is my choreography now'

The next Blickachsen exhibition will take place in 2023

New publication in Frick's popular Diptych series focuses on Fragonard's Progress of Love

The Most Interesting Art Objects 2021

The coolest bar stools have these popular characteristics

How to See Incognito History on Android Without Them Knowing?




Museums, Exhibits, Artists, Milestones, Digital Art, Architecture, Photography,
Photographers, Special Photos, Special Reports, Featured Stories, Auctions, Art Fairs,
Anecdotes, Art Quiz, Education, Mythology, 3D Images, Last Week, .

 



Founder:
Ignacio Villarreal
(1941 - 2019)
Editor & Publisher: Jose Villarreal
Art Director: Juan José Sepúlveda Ramírez
Writer: Ofelia Zurbia Betancourt

Royalville Communications, Inc
produces:

ignaciovillarreal.org juncodelavega.com facundocabral-elfinal.org
Founder's Site. Hommage
to a Mexican poet.
Hommage
       

The First Art Newspaper on the Net. The Best Versions Of Ave Maria Song Junco de la Vega Site Ignacio Villarreal Site
Tell a Friend
Dear User, please complete the form below in order to recommend the Artdaily newsletter to someone you know.
Please complete all fields marked *.
Sending Mail
Sending Successful