The Real Reason Kissing Was Once Banned In Medieval England

Publish date: 2024-05-04

King Henry VI was born in 1421, nearly 75 years after the Black Death first showed up on English soil, but the responsibility of responding to this never-ending disease fell on him. The first official quarantine likely occurred in 1377, so even though people lacked modern scientific awareness and disease-treatment methods, enough had gotten infected that clear patterns had emerged. 

The most obvious of these: Keep distance from the sick. At that time, in England, kissing was a common method of greeting (much like Italy, Spain, or France nowadays). Even though there was no way to universally enforce people to not only maintain distance, but not kiss, Henry VI still made such a rule on July 16th, 1439, according to History and Headlines.

There's no way to know exactly who obeyed (or did not obey) the decree. After all, Henry VI was only 17 at the time. At the very least, though, Parliament played by the rules. By that year, the Black Death had caused the governmental body to stay out of session for nearly a year and a half, but they were forced to convene because of military conflict with France, according to History Daily, and to keep things safe, they politely declined to ceremoniously kiss the king's ring before starting their session. Henry VI was notoriously prudish, and this may have contributed to his making such a decree to begin with, and in the process, may have helped save a number of lives.

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