Award: Most improved speaker (overtime DQ)
Raise your hand if you like bread.
Now take a minute and think -- how many sandwiches have you eaten in the last month? 1? 3? 10?
Did you know that you could get ergotism from eating a sandwich?
Ergotism (also known as ergot poisoning), is a caused by ergot, a fungus that grows on rye.
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In 1951, many residents of a small town in France named Pont St-Esprit developed a burning sensation in their limbs, began to hallucinate that they could fly, and did "strange things to their dogs with forks." You might say they were acting a bit, well, weird.
The survivors reported these symptoms...
- Sensing thousands of pin pricks in their arms and head
- Feeling as though insects were crawling under their skin
- Seeing all sorts of deformed animals
- Having visions of fire and blood running down the walls
- Experiencing violent convulsions
One survivor summed it up by saying: "I had a feeling that my body was not mine."
What had happened to their town?
They were experiencing something that had happened hundreds of times before to thousands of people. They had all been poisoned by something they ate. But this wasn't an ordinary type of food poisoning. It was a mild case of ergotism.
There was only one bakery in Pont St-Esprit and everyone bought bread from it until strange things started happening. The scientific cause: the bread had been made with moldy rye flour. But the townspeople were so convinced that the bakery was actually possessed by the devil that the local bishop exorcised it.
It is not hard to imagine how an outbreak of ergot poisoning could lead to paranoid behavior by the victim, as well. The good people of Pont St-Esprit reported "being chased or attacked by horrible beasts," "terror of dark," and burning sensations in their extremities and scalp.
Historian John Grant Fuller actually traces the development of the werewolf legend to an ongoing low level of ergot contamination. The hallucination of being pursued by horrible beasts is one classic element of the story. The tingling and loss of sensation in the extremities may also have been interpreted as the consequence of shape shifting.
It's really not so odd to think of something or someone as possessed. The most famous episode of this hysteria in our own country: the Salem Witch Trials. The women initially accused of witchcraft had hallucinations, convulsions, and behaved oddly. A recent episode of NOVA on KPBS explains why these women were acting weirdly -- the climate conditions, geological record, and firsthand accounts all point to these women having had a mild case of ergot poisoning.
But what happens when you have a not-so-mild case of ergot poisoning?
Ergotism is characterized by constriction of blood vessels, resulting in numbness and the development of gangrene in extremities; it may also affect the nervous system. The common name for ergotism is St. Anthony's Fire.
St. Anthony is the patron saint of lost causes and is associated with diseases such as the plague and miraculous cures because of the manner in which he was tortured by the devil. In the middle ages, hospitals were built all over Europe to honor St. Anthony.
Those with extreme cases of ergotism came to the Hospital of St. Anthony in
Isenheim, Germany. There, they sought the only life-saving treatment available for their rotting limbs. Before undergoing the operation, they would visit the chapel and see the Isenheim altarpiece.
Isenheim Altarpiece by Mathias Grünewald, c. 1515, Oil on wood. Musee d'Unterlinden, Colmar, France.
St. Anthony's suffering --and the faith that kept him alive -- was the inspiration for the Renaissance artwork before you. The altarpiece is a painting in many panels that opens like a cabinet. Note that Christ is slightly off-center, such that when the altarpiece is opened, one of his arms is severed. The smaller image of Christ lying down after being crucified is also off-center, and when the altarpiece opens, his legs are amputated just below the knee. The work would have been a clear message to those suffering from ergotism. The message: pain brings you closer to God -- endure the pain, maintain faith in God, and know that Christ suffered as you are. Do these things and you'll receive the same reward that St. Anthony did -- eternal salvation.
But those were the Middle Ages -- what about ergot today?
Did you know that ergot is the source of LSD? The hallucinations experienced by the residents of Pont St.-Esprit were essentially a very bad acid trip.
I googled "ergot" and learned that it is also used to create medicines that alleviate migraine headaches and stop hemorrhaging. It is used to treat circulatory disorders where muscle fibers of the arteries constrict, causing spasms. And it was actually used by seventeenth century midwives to stop bleeding after childbirth.
Look up "ergot" on the Internet and you'll learn lots about how the contamination of rye flour lead to thousands of deaths from ergot poisoning in the Middle Ages. You'll also learn that in the 6th century B.C.E., the Assyrians used ergot for bioterrorism, poisoning enemy wells with rye ergot.
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Nowadays, you can get pastrami on rye just about anywhere. The fact is, you're probably never going to worry that you're becoming a werewolf or that you'll do strange things to your dogs with a fork after eating rye bread.
But what about those of you who don't eat rye bread?
Let's take a look at the ingredient label for this super-healthy organic sprouted 7-grain bread I bought at Trader Joe's last night: "Organic sprouted wheat berries, organic sprouted oats, organic sprouted rye ..."
I'll bet you never look at a sandwich or bread the same way again.
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