Contagious Diseases, Faith, Superstitions and the Cult of Saint Charalambos

Abstract

From the first half of the 16th century and almost until the middle of the 19th century, the area of ​​the Balkan Peninsula, inhabited by Serbs, was hit by waves of deadly infections, most often of the plague type. Great mortality and epiphenomena of disease: fear, mutilation, loss of loved ones affected the socio-religious construct, placing the Church in a horizontal social plane and confronting it with special challenges in the process of its missionary work. The sought-after protection from the effects of infections, a pronounced prayerfulness and emphasized forms of piety also influenced the formation of cults of saints. The cult of St. Charalambos, an early Christian martyr from the 3rd century, as a protector against plague and infections, whose mediation was invoked and additionally encouraged the picturesque world of ideas created from dogmatic and liturgical texts and corresponding forms of behavior.