Great Plague of Seville

[1] Unlike the plague of 1596–1602, which claimed 600,000 to 700,000 lives or a little under 8% of the population and initially struck northern and central Spain and Andalusia in the south, the Great Plague, which may have arisen in Algeria, struck the Mediterranean side of Spain first.

The disease raged through Andalucía, in addition to sweeping the north into Catalonia and Aragon.

In conjunction with the poor harvest of 1682-83, which created famine conditions, the effects killed tens of thousands of the weakened and exhausted population.

They were: Factoring in normal births, deaths, plus emigration, historians reckon the total cost in human lives due to these plagues throughout Spain, throughout the entire 17th century, to be a minimum of nearly 1.25 million.

[2] The disease is generally believed to have been bubonic plague, an infection by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, transmitted via a rat vector.