author
Pichatty de Croislainte
An early 18th-century civic official in Marseille, he left behind a vivid firsthand record of the city’s struggle during the plague of 1720. His journal stands out for its immediacy, capturing both public crisis and the machinery of local government under extreme pressure.
1 Audiobook
About the author
Pichatty de Croislainte is known for A Brief Journal of what Passed in the City of Marseilles, while it was afflicted with the Plague, in the Year 1720, a firsthand account drawn from the municipal record of Marseille during one of the most devastating outbreaks in the city’s history.
Contemporary editions describe him as a counsellor and orator of Marseille and as the King’s attorney in matters relating to the city’s government. That official role gives his writing a distinctive perspective: it is not just a personal memoir, but a close-up view of how civic leaders responded as fear, illness, and disruption spread through the city.
Very little biographical detail appears to be readily confirmed beyond his public office and his connection to this journal. Even so, the work has lasted because it offers something rare and powerful: a direct voice from inside a historic emergency, written by someone who was involved in the effort to govern through it.