“The End of the World is Near”. Locust Invasions and Their Perception in 14th and 15th Century Central Europe

Invasions of locusts have threatened Central European societies in particular from the 13th to the first half of the 16th century. Most of these invasions came from the great plains of Hungary and afflicted the Alpine valleys of Styria, Carinthia, Tyrol and Carniola, the pre-Alpine lowlands, the Czech lands and Central Germany. The reports in the contemporary chronicles suggest that the people perceived the locusts as divine punishment and portents of the Last Judgement, following the references in the Bible (Exodus, Joel, Revelation and others) closely. Nevertheless, the real economic loss seems to have been not tremendous, because in most cases the locusts only appeared, when the harvest had already brought in. The real damage also depended from the shape of the landscape. The reactions and methods of defence were multifarious: People tried to collect and burn the caterpillars, to bury the dead locusts or to detain them from settling down by making noise. In addition to that, people prayed for God’s mercy making processions and even tried to avert them with magical practices.

Christian Rohr is Full Professor for Environmental History and Historical Climatology at the University of Berne, Switzerland, since 2010. He has studied History, Classical, Medieval and Early Modern Latin at the University of Vienna, Austria, finishing his PhD in 1994 with a dissertation on the panegyric for Theoderic the Great, written by Ennodius of Pavia. From 1997 to 2010 he taught at the University of Salzburg, where he received his habilitation for Medieval History, Auxiliary Sciences and Environmental History in 2007. His habilitation book is entitled “Extreme Naturereignisse im Ostalpenraum. Naturerfahrung im Spätmittelalter und am Beginn der Neuzeit“ (Köln u.a. 2007).