The Plague of Athens and the Cult of Asclepius: A Case Study of Collective Behavior and a Social Movement

During the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta, several waves of a plague killed an estimated one-third of the civilian Athenian population and one-fourth of its army. Thucydides account of the plague (430-426 BCE) and the subsequent rise of the cult of Asclepius can be examined as perhaps the earliest case study of collective behavior and a social movement. In his account of the plague, Thucydides reveals a sociological imagination and concepts including anomie and escalating stages of collective behavior. Social movements often arise in times of sudden changes and social unrest, becoming a source of spiritual and political empowerment. The cult of Asclepius rose to prominence after the plague as a redemptive and reformative social movement. In the wake of the plague, the cult established new religious norms of healing and supported the growth of Hippocratic medicine throughout the ancient Mediterranean world.