In the 15th and 16th centuries, a mysterious epidemic swept across Europe.
The cold stage lasted from half an hour to three hours, after which the hot phase started.
In the final stages, the victim would collapse and fall asleep, never to wake up again.
The most terrifying aspect of the sweating sickness was the speed with which it killed.
Most victims were dead within 18 hours after the first onset of symptoms.
Only those who survived the first 24 hours went on to make a full recovery.
The sweating sickness came in five major outbreaks between 1485 and the last documented outbreak in 1551.
It killed more than ten thousand people within a single month.
The third outbreak was fatal killing half the population in some areas.
The fourth outbreak broke out in London in 1528 and speedily spread over the whole of England.
The disease made its last appearance in 1551.
A peculiar characteristic of the malady was that it struck especially the wealthy and the upper class.
Dukes, bishops, and mayors, all fell victims to it.
Monasteries were hit the hardest and fatalities among the clergies were high.
The disease even affected the royal household.
Anne Boleyn, the wife of King Henry VIII, is said to have contracted and survived the disease.
Mortality rate is as high as 36 percent.
Another suspect is arbovirus, spread by tick and mosquitoes.
The sweating sickness seemed to appear after periods of prolonged rainfall and extensive flooding in some areas.
Indeed, some contemporary scholars blamed the wet English climate for the disease.
Other hypothesis ranged from food-borne botulism, food poisoning because of a fugus, to anthrax.
In the end, it is difficult to say what exactly was the sweating sickness.
Incidence of hantavirus outbreak in modern times is relatively rare.
One in out of every ten that fell ill, died.
That was the first time the virus was discovered.
Its name comes from Hantan River in South Korea.
Since then, there has only been a handful of cases throughout the world.
