Loimic

The title of this translation (περὶ λοιµικῆς) and its preface prove that the Small-pox had been known to the antient Greeks under the name of Loimiké (the loimic or pestilential disease) and even divided into two distinct species. (pp. 20, 21.)

Galen has not left us any distinct history of Loimic diseases; but there are numerous scattered observations in his works respecting them—[…]

Philo, the Jewish philosopher, gives a description of a ‘loimic’ pestilence which occurred during that century, and appositely conveys the mode of diffusion and the circumstances of the confluent small-pox.

[…] a euphemism, therefore, was needful to gild over and sweeten the surface of their hideous and poisonous essence, and none more emphatic than that of Abel, for the works of Cain, whose loimic virus has tinged even their admirer’s pen, and ever since shows him a cruel and sarcastic Mishellene, whereas he is as kind a Philhellene as any prejudiced mortal may be.

A.D. 92. A loimic plague is described by the Jewish philosopher Philo, who believed it to have been caused by hot dust. ‘The clouds of dust suddenly falling on men and cattle, produced over the whole skin a severe and intractable ulceration. […]’