10. A Plague of Flagellants Amidst the Plague
Attempts at redemption through flagellation were most popular in times of crisis. It is thus unsurprising that the number of flagellants soared during the Black Death. The Church condemned the practice, but the movement spread like wildfire throughout Europe. Large groups of flagellants – sometimes numbering in the thousands – roamed the countryside. Clad in white robes, they dragged crosses while flogging themselves and each other into a religious frenzy. In one episode, hundreds of flagellants arrived in London from Flanders. They paraded twice a day, stripped to the waist, and flogged themselves bloody with three tailed scourges, some of them knotted and with nails affixed to them. Needless to say, flagellation proved as ineffective as all the other attempts at keeping the plague away. The practice proved itself a temporary fad, and enthusiasm for flagellation waned as suddenly as it had arisen.
