Leprosaria

History

Leprosy seems to have reached the rest of Europe during late antiquity and the early Middle Ages, with the Imperial Roman Christian Church reducing formal restrictions on people with leprosy while setting aside funds for leprosaria where clerics would treat the afflicted. Such leper houses are documented in the Kingdom of the Burgundians at Saint-Oyen, Savoie in 460 and in Francia in Chalon-sur-Saône in 570 and Verdun in 634 (all now in France); their management was often provided by Christian monastic orders. The area of modern Belgium alone may have had as many as 700 or 800 prior to the Crusades.