Skip to Main Content
Home Books The Bioterrorism Sourcebook

Bioterrorism Timeline

image
Radiation hazard

image
Biohazard

image
Chemical hazard

An historical overview of those events that are felt to have contributed in important ways to the current global threats of biological, chemical, and radiological terrorism.

| Download (.pdf) | Print
image
1500–1200 BC During epidemics, the Hittites of Anatolia send infected animals and people into enemy realms in order to cause outbreaks.
image
1200 BC Poison-tipped arrows are used during the Trojan War (described by Homer in 800 BC).
image
600 BC Solon of Athens puts hellebore roots in the drinking water of Kirrha.
image
1200–500 BC The Byzantines master the use of “Greek Fire” and direct a naptha mixture through long siphons at enemy navies. It is described as “the ultimate weapon of its time.”
image
500 BC Sun Tzu writes the Art of War where he discusses strategies for using smoke and fire against enemies.
image
420 BC An Athenian stronghold is overtaken by Spartan forces with the use of irratative fumes created by the burning of sulfur, coals, and tars during the Peloponnesian War.
image
200 BC Hannibal hurls clay pots filled with poisonous snakes at the ships of King Eumenes of Pergamum.
image
65 BC Mithridates use poisoned honey to incapacitate Pompey’s army who indulgently eats the combs. These combs are probably contaminated with botulinum.
image
90 AD Claims abound that insurgents in and around Rome are speading plague via contaminated pins that they use to prick others.
image
1346 A Tartar attack on the city of Kaffa in which the warriors catapult the corpses of plague victims into the walled city successfully causes an epidemic.
image
1495 The Spanish contaminate wine with the blood of lepers and gives it to the French.
image
1650 The Polish military general, Siemienowicz, reportedly puts saliva from rabid dogs into artillery shells and fires them at his enemies.
image
1763 Sir Jeffrey Amherst, the Commander-in-Chief of the British, orders smallpox contaminated blankets to be distributed to Native American tribes supporting the British during the French and Indian Wars.
image
1895 Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen discovers X-rays.
image
1899 Pierre and Marie Curie discover radiation.
image
1899 The Hague agreement is reached internationally to prohibit the use of projectiles filled with chemical weapons.
image
1905 Albert Einstein, who is working full-time as a patent clerk in Bern, Germany, conceives and derives what is perhaps the most recognizable equation in history: E = MC2.
image
1915 In Ypres, Belgium, the German army uses chlorine gas to attack British and Canadian troops.
image
1916 The Germans develop phosgene.
image
1917 The Germans develop mustard gas.
image
1925 The League of Nations develops “Geneva Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or Other Gases, and Bacteriological Methods of Warfare” in response to the horrors of chemical weapons seen in WWI.
image
1932–1944 The Japanese-maintained Unit 731 performs experimentation with biological weapons on POWs including: anthrax, botulism, brucellosis, cholera, dysentery, gas gangrene, meningococcal infection, and plague.
image
1935–1936 Italy uses mustard gas in its invasion of Ethiopia.
image
1938 Nazi ...

Pop-up div Successfully Displayed

This div only appears when the trigger link is hovered over. Otherwise it is hidden from view.

This site uses cookies to provide, maintain and improve your experience. MHE Privacy Center Close