1721Reputable sourceWell documented
Variolation: The First Inoculation
On the timeline · around 1721 · The Rise of Medicine
What happened
Long before vaccination, people in Asia, Africa, and the Ottoman world practised 'variolation' — deliberately infecting a healthy person with material from a mild case of smallpox to induce lifelong immunity. In 1721 the practice reached the West on two fronts: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, who had seen it in Constantinople, had children inoculated in England, while in Boston the enslaved African Onesimus described the technique to Cotton Mather, who promoted it during an outbreak.
Why it matters
Variolation was humanity's first deliberate method of preventing an epidemic disease. Risky but effective, it paved the way for Jenner's far safer vaccine — and its arrival in the West owed much to knowledge from Africa and the Islamic world.
Sources
- U.S. National Library of Medicine. Smallpox: Variolation · Reputable source