The Great Pox marked the early modern era. Not only did this chronic disease lead to long-term shifts in medical knowledge, but it also reached across the social spectrum to touch individuals, families, and communities of all guises. As such, pox infection reflected the complexity of managing symptoms that were at once medically and socially evaluated. This article explores the social and cultural meanings attached to the poxed body through an analysis of Spanish medical, literary, and patient sources. How was the poxed body understood in everyday contexts? How did social concerns affect medical discourse on the disease? What strategies did the ill use to navigate the socially-charged repercussions of visible symptoms? Ultimately, patients developed techniques of obfuscation and ambivalence to manage the social framing of their diseased bodies evident in medical and popular literature.
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