Christopher Columbus left us a host of uncertainties. No one is certain of exactly where his first landfall was in the New World, and no one can even guarantee the location of all his remains. Then there is his medical status. He obviously had severe arthritis after his first voyage and was severely disabled by the time of his last one. Episodes of exacerbation were associated with severe photophobia and external signs of inflammatory eye disease (described once as the eyes “running with blood”, whatever that may mean). Urethritis was not mentioned in his journals, but was a condition so common in ships bringing back to the Old World the souvenir of syphilis that it was probably not worth mentioning. If Columbus did indeed have Reiter Syndrome, it may have been a reactive arthritis occurring after gastrointestinal infection, another common hazard in those days, when wine and beer were safer than drinking water.

REFERENCES:

1. Allison DJ. Christopher Columbus: first case of Reiter’s disease in the Old World? Lancet 1980 (Dec); 316(8207):1309.

2. Arnett, F. http://medicineworld.org/cancer/lead/10-2005/arthritis-expert-re-examines-death-of-christopher-columbus.html . Accessed 1/8/2015.

Submitted by Ron Fishman and Linda Lawrence from the Cogan Ophthalmic History Society.