Avoid him like the plague! Cops in the English village of Hellesdon are hunting for an unidentified individual who’s been creeping out locals by lurking around town while dressed as a 17th-century ...

Plague doctors, or at least images of plague doctors, are having a bit of a cultural moment again, roughly 300 years after their actual heyday. They’ve become popular motifs for stickers, pins, masks, ...

I first glimpsed a plague doctor years ago, in a framed etching on the wall of a Venetian gift shop. The image was macabre: a sinister, masked figure draped in a dark robe. The head was covered with a ...