Keep that under yer hat will ya - I've been trying to downplay that ever since I emigrated, which was after Columbus did his bit mind.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/1350154/Pox-ridden-monks-disprove-Columbus-theory-of-syphilis.html ''EVIDENCE of syphilis among medieval English monks has exploded the centuries-old theory that the sexually transmitted disease was brought to Europe by Columbus's sailors returning from the New World. Research carried out on skeletons at an excavated priory in Hull has unearthed evidence of the disease in many of the 14th-century monks. It had been widely assumed that syphilis had its origins in America as little trace had been found elsewhere before 1492. However, radio carbon dating of a male skeleton, possibly a friar, with the most obvious signs of syphilis, has shown that the remains belong to the mid-1340s. Anthea Boylston, who led the six-year project at the University of Bradford, said: "This discovery changes our views about the history of syphilis. There had been a couple of skeletons around the country with signs of syphilis that could have pre-dated Columbus, but the interesting thing about this burial site is that there are cases of the disease in many individuals. That makes us think that syphilis was present in medieval England." The disease first attracted public attention soon after 1494, following a severe outbreak among French soldiers occupied in the siege of Naples. The "Great Pox" spread rapidly, afflicting victims with suppurating sores that ate away flesh and bone, followed by bone deformation, insanity and finally death. In 1525 the chronicler Fernandez of Oviedo first raised the possibility that it had originated in America. Charlotte Roberts, an expert in palaeopathology, said: "American academics had always insisted that the disease came from there, but how could this be the case if a pre-Columbian man showed such obvious signs of it? The signs include pocking of the skull and a hole in the soft palate. They can be mistaken for leprosy but there is no doubt here."
