former name, "The French Disease." He also discussed how he believed that it originated in America, and was brought back with Columbus and his men. This was the popular view of the day, and many researchers still find truth in it. What Fracastor truly believed, at the time, was that the positions of the planets influenced the outbreak of the disease. He believed that they lined up in such a way that provided great conditions for the emergence of the disease. In the poem Fracastor also states that the
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