plague in the Russian Empire in 1770. The plague was somewhat of a constant threat in early modern Europe; no one could be sure where or when it would strike. In 1765, rumors circulated that the plague had traveled north from the Ottoman Empire into Poland. The same rumors echoed over the course of the next year, with the plague also supposedly appearing in Constantinople and the Crimea. There was a false alarm of the plague entering Russian territory, and another false alarm of supposed plague around Moscow that turned out to be smallpox. There were efforts made to keep plague out of Russia by creating quarantine stations on the southern border, but these proved to be ineffective. In December 1770, a Doctor A. F. Shafonskiy, the chief physician at the Moscow General Hospital, identified a case of the bubonic plague and promptly reported it to German doctor A. Rinder, who was in charge of the public health of the city. Unfortunately, Rinder did not trust the former's judgment, and ignored the report. The next day, the Medical Council met and established the fact that the plague had entered the city, and informed the Senate in St. Petersburg. The response of the national government was to send military guards to the hospital in order to quarantine the cases. However, Shafonskiy and Rinder continued to stand on opposing sides, until Rinder denied Shafonskiy's claim in January 1771. Shafonskiy submitted a report in February Riot The plague peaked in September 1771, killing an estimated thousand Muscovites a day (20,401 confirmed dead in September), despite the fact that an estimated three quarters of the population fled the city. Many deaths escaped the statistics: residents, fearing that the infested properties would be destroyed by authorities, routinely concealed the casualties, burying the dead at night or simply throwing them on the streets. Authorities set up chain gangs of prisoners to collect and bury the bodies, but their forces were insufficient even for this single task. Governor Saltykov, failing to control the situation, preferred to desert his station and fled to his country estate; the police chief followed suit. Jacon Lerche, the newly appointed sanitary inspector of Moscow, declared state of emergency, shutting down shops, inns, taverns, factories and even churches; the city was placed under quarantine. Masses of people, literally thrown into the streets, were denied their regular trade and recreation habits. On September 15,