Plague doctors, or at least images of plague doctors, are having a bit of a cultural moment again, roughly 300 years after their actual heyday. They’ve become popular motifs for stickers, pins, masks, ...

CC0 Usage Conditions ApplyClick for more information. It’s the beak that lends the attire of the medieval plague doctor its surreal quality, but it wasn’t there ...

I first glimpsed a plague doctor years ago, in a framed etching on the wall of a Venetian gift shop. The image was macabre: a sinister, masked figure draped in a dark robe. The head was covered with a ...

Putting on a mask to protect oneself and others against disease is nothing new, nor is resistance to mask-wearing, but mask designs have changed considerably from their first iterations. A 1619 ...