If the first translation of a text on smallpox vaccination in Japan was finished in 1820, how did it take another 29 years for the first mass vaccination campaigns to begin? The answers involve everything from a German doctor accused of being a spy to networks of physicians trying to navigate obscure bureaucracy. And they might remind you more of the last few years than you’d think.
The elimination of smallpox is probably one of the greatest medical accomplishments in human history. The vaccine that made it possible, however, was invented during a time of isolation for Japan. So how did the vaccine make it to Japanese shores, and what does that story tell us about public health, the sharing of information, and the nature of society in late feudal Japan?
This week, we’re taking some material from the cutting room floor of last series to talk about the stories of…
Our final episode of this miniseries will detail the early decades of the Christian persecutions in Nagasaki. Once the religion…
This week, Hideyoshi’s death seems to suggest an end to the persecution of Nagasaki’s Christians. However, the city quickly finds…
This week: Hideyoshi’s ‘friendship’ proves less useful than hoped, resulting in a 1587 ban on Christianity and Nagasaki losing its…
This week, Christian Nagasaki survives its early trials and tribulations to become a Jesuit fortress-town, and a centerpiece of some…
This week, we’re covering the founding of Japan’s most unusual city: Nagasaki, unique among major Japanese cities in being founded…
We’re trapped in a loop this week as Isaac talks about another Isaac: specifically, Isaac Titsingh, a member of the…
This week, we cover the story of Engelbert Kaempfer, who wrote one of the most thorough and best known accounts…