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Charting the Next Pandemic
Ana Pastore y Piontti • Nicola Perra • Luca Rossi
Nicole Samay • Alessandro Vespignani

Charting the Next Pandemic

Modeling Infectious Disease Spreading
in the Data Science Age

With contributions by Corrado Gioannini, Marcelo F. C. Gomes,

and Bruno Gonçalves
Authors
Ana Pastore y Piontti Nicola Perra
Northeastern University University of Greenwich
Boston, MA London
USA UK
Luca Rossi Nicole Samay
Institute for Scientific Interchange Northeastern University
Torino Boston, MA
Italy USA
Alessandro Vespignani
Northeastern University
Boston, MA
USA

Collaborators
Corrado Gioannini Marcelo F. C. Gomes
Institute of Scientific Interchange Oswaldo Cruz Foundation
Torino Rio de Janeiro
Italy Brazil
Bruno Gonçalves
Center for Data Science
New York, NY
USA

ISBN 978-3-319-93289-7    ISBN 978-3-319-93290-3 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-93290-3

© Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2019

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is
concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction
on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation,
computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not
imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and
regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed
to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty,
express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been
made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Printed on acid-free paper

This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer International Publishing AG part of Springer
Nature.
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
This book is in memory of Duygu Balçan, who has been a fantastic
scientist and friend. She was suddenly taken away from us and from
science, but she will always be with us in our dearest memories and
through her outstanding scientific contributions.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

It is the work on many collaborative projects that led to the tools and
methodologies presented in the pages of this volume. We benefited from
more than 10 years of collaborations and scientific exchanges with a long
list of colleagues who helped us in shaping our view and knowledge of
computational epidemiology through invaluable scientific discussions.
First of all, we want to thank Vittoria Colizza for her invaluable scientific
collaborations. She has also been one of the engines behind the development
of the GLEAM framework. We can never thank her enough for the work and
contributions to many of the ideas and concepts illustrated in this book.
We are also grateful to Alain Barrat, Marc Barthelemy, and Romualdo
Pastor-Satorras, who have been early companions in the analysis of global
mobility networks and global epidemics.
Paolo Bajardi, Hao Hu, José J. Ramasco, Daniela Paolotti, Chiara Poletto,
Michele Tizzoni, and Qian Zhang have been key collaborators of ours for many
years and have greatly contributed in many tangible and intangible ways to
this volume. We have grown with and learned so much from them.
Marco Ajelli and Stefano Merler contributed to the development of compu-
tational models and data-driven agent-based models that have literally defined
the state of the art in the field. We are very fortunate to have the privilege of
collaborating and working with them through several common projects.
We are simply honored and humbled by the possibility of collaborating
with pioneers in the field of the caliber of M. Elizabeth Halloran and Ira M.
Longini. We are thankful to them for the many projects and ideas that have
truly shaped our way of looking at epidemic modeling.
We started to think about global epidemics as a data visualization prob-
lem because of Wouter Van den Broeck. He is the one who translated the
GLEAM framework into images in the first place. Marco Quaggiotto is the
one who, for many years, has created the GLEAMviz visual appearance. We
are thankful to them for their constant inspiration and lessons in working with
data visualization as an art.
We thank Dina Mistry for her invaluable comments and careful proofreading
of the book manuscript.
 A special thanks goes to all colleagues, students, and coauthors who have
shared our journey and excitement in the science of epidemic modeling: Luca
Cappa, Claudio Castellano, Ciro Cattuto, Dennis Chao, Matteo Chinazzi, Gerardo
Chowell, Fabio Ciulla, Natalie E. Dean, Laura Fumanelli, Maria Litvinova, Paolo
Milano, Delia Mocanu, Yamir Moreno, Evangelia (Evelyn) Panagakou, Daniela
Perrotta, Piero Poletti, Diana Rojas, Michele Roncaglione, Mauricio Santillana,
Mohamed Selim, Lone Simonsen, Kaiyuan Sun, Alain Jaques Valleron, Piet Van
Mieghen, and Cécile Viboud. We are infinitely grateful for their outstanding
support, ideas, and work.
Vibrant research environments and occasions of discussion with colleagues
of all ages and expertise are the key to good science. We have been very lucky
to be part of the Center for Inference and Dynamics of Infectious Diseases
(CIDID), a NIH-funded Center of Excellence, the Summer Institute in Statistics
and Modeling in Infectious Diseases (SISMID), and the Network Science
Institute at Northeastern University and their wonderful scientific communities.
We also want to thank all those institutions that have supported our work
and the completion of this book. Northeastern University in Boston and the
Institute for Scientific Interchange in Turin have provided the authors of this book
with great environments for their research and work. We are incredibly grateful
to the Sternberg Family for the outstanding support of the MOBS Laboratory
at Northeastern University. Finally we acknowledge the generous funding
support at various stages of our research in the area of predictive epidemic
modeling from the Models of Infectious Disease Agent Study, National Institute
of General Medical Sciences Grant U54GM111274, and the Fondazione-CRT
Lagrange laboratory.

Boston, USA April 2018

Torino, Italy
London, UK
About the authors

Ana Pastore y Piontti is an Associate Research Scientist in the Laboratory for the Modeling of
Biological and Socio-technical Systems (MOBS Lab) at Northeastern University in Boston, USA. Her
research focuses on the characterization and modeling of the spread of infectious diseases, by
integrating methods of complex systems with statistical physics approaches.

Nicola Perra is a Senior Lecturer in network science at the University of Greenwich, UK. His research
interests revolve around the study of human dynamics, digital epidemiology, and network science.

Luca Rossi is a Senior Researcher at the Institute for Scientific Interchange in Torino, Italy. His
research focuses on the mathematical and computational modeling of contagion processes in
structured populations, in particular human transmittable infectious diseases.

Nicole Samay is a Senior Graphic Designer in the Network Science Institute at Northeastern
University in Boston. She works with researchers to develop and adapt data visualizations, with a
particular focus on information design and spreading processes.

Alessandro Vespignani is the Sternberg Family Distinguished Professor at Northeastern Univer-

sity in Boston. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society, member of the Academy of Europe,
and fellow of the Institute for Quantitative Social Sciences at Harvard University. Vespignani is
focusing his research activity in modeling diffusion phenomena in complex systems, including data-
driven computational approaches to infectious disease spread.

This book is also a result of the special support and work at various stages of the editorial process
from three fantastic collaborators:

Corrado Gioannini worked for several years in the private sector, in IT companies, developing
his skills in software development and management. He is now a research leader at the Complex
Systems and Networks group at ISI Foundation, where he coordinates the development of the
GLEAMviz Simulator software framework.

Marcelo F. C. Gomes is a researcher on infectious disease modeling and surveillance at Fundação

Oswaldo Cruz’s Scientific Computing Program (Fiocruz, PROCC). His main research focus is on
combining reported cases from public health agencies and human mobility for the development of
risk analysis and nowcasting tools.

Bruno Gonçalves is a Moore-Sloan Fellow at NYU’s Center for Data Science. With a background in
Physics and Computer Science, his career has revolved around the use of datasets from sources as
diverse as Apache web logs, Wikipedia edits, Twitter posts, Epidemiological reports, and census data
to analyze and model human behavior and mobility. More recently he has focused on the application
of machine learning and neural network techniques to analyze large geolocated datasets.
 CONTENTS INTRODUCTION XIII
OUTLOOK 201

01 INFECTIOUS DISEASE SPREADING: FROM DATA TO MODELS 3

PART I: HOW TO MODEL PANDEMICS

Computational modeling of infectious disease spreading 5

Global Epidemic and Mobility model 8

02 DATA, DATA, AND MORE DATA

Population 12
11

The age structure of the world population 13

Human mobility 14
Mobility patterns and epidemic spreading 18
Diseases 19
Health infrastructures 26

03 DATA MODEL INTEGRATION: THE GLOBAL EPIDEMIC AND MOBILITY

FRAMEWORK 29
Building a synthetic world 30
Moving people around 31
The disease dynamic 34
Synthetic epidemics 39

04 FROM DATA TO KNOWLEDGE: HOW MODELS CAN BE USED

Affected countries 46
45

Invasion tree 46
Epidemic profiles and activity peak 49
Attack rate 51
Risk indicators and severity assessment 51
Containment and mitigation scenarios 53

 05 THE NUMERICAL FORECAST OF PANDEMIC SPREADING: THE CASE STUDY
OF THE 2009 A/H1N1 PDM 55
Modeling the 2009 H1N1 pandemic 56
Calibration and parameter estimates for specific outbreaks 57
Forecast output 58
Invasion tree 59
Pandemic activity peaks 60
Risk and severity assessment 62
Vaccination campaigns 64
Real-time forecast with computational epidemic models 65

PANDEMIC INFLUENZA 73

PART II: PANDEMIC CHARTS

Barcelona, Spain 78
Buenos Aires, Argentina 94
Hanoi, Vietnam 110
Johannesburg, South Africa 142
Melbourne, Australia 150
New York City, USA 158

CORONAVIRUS 167
Barcelona, Spain 170
Guangzhou, China 174
Jeddah, Saudi Arabia 178

EBOLA VIRUS 183

Arua, Uganda 186
Kisangani, Democratic Republic of the Congo 188
Lagos, Nigeria 192

06 COMPUTATIONAL MODELING OF “DISEASE X” 197

Introduction

OUR INTENT IS TO INTRODUCE NON TECHNICAL READERS TO THE

PROCESS THAT, STARTING FROM REAL-WORLD DATA, MAKES IT
POSSIBLE TO DEVELOP SIMULATED SCENARIOS AND REAL-TIME
FORECASTS OF THE GLOBAL SPREADING OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES.

T he first successful weather forecast performed by a digital computer

can be traced back to 1950. Five years later, a joint project by the US Air
Force, Navy, and Weather Bureau began operational numerical weather
prediction in the United States. Nowadays, computer-generated weather
forecasts are at the fingertips of billions of individuals through government
or commercial services, accessible by any mobile platform on the Internet.
Weather forecasts can be very specific, focusing on local area models, or
global. They can span a few hours or several days. They are part of our daily
life and have helped popularize concepts like the “butterfly effect.”1
A non-expert reader might reasonably think that the use of computer
simulations for infectious disease outbreak forecast is as developed as the one

1 James Gleick, Chaos: Making a new science (Viking Press, 1987).

 regarding weather forecast; unfortunately this is far from the case. Although
the birth of mathematical epidemiology dates back to the eighteenth century,
public health scientists and policy-makers started only in the last 20 years or
so to increasingly rely on simulated models to understand epidemiological
patterns and guide control measures in real time. It may come as a surprise,
but while the weather forecast research community has built thousands of
weather stations around the world, put satellites in orbit, and connected large
supercomputing infrastructures, the modeling of epidemic outbreaks has long
suffered from the lack of near-real-time, high-quality data on populations, human
and animal mobility/behavior patterns, and pathogens’ biology. For instance,
the 1985 pioneering work of Ravchev and Longini2 on a mathematical model
for the global spread of influenza had to wait on a shelf for almost 20 years
before a full-fledged implementation integrating the complete International
Airlines database3 saw the light. Similarly, the first cross-comparison of three
different data-driven, individual-based, stochastic models of pandemic flu
examining the consequences of intervention strategies in the United States
had to wait until 2008.4
In the last 10 years, we have seen dramatic advances in data collection
and availability in a number of areas, ranging from pathogen genetic sequences
to human mobility patterns and social media data. These advances, often
dubbed as the “big data” revolution, have finally lifted many of the limitations
affecting epidemic predictive modeling. The big data paradigm is generally
associated with “inductivist” approaches such as statistical modeling, phe-
nomenological models, or machine learning-based methodologies. However,
data availability also allows the development of detailed mechanistic models
based on the construction of synthetic populations that statistically mimic
the real world. They explicitly account for the dynamics of epidemics by cal-
culating the future state of the system from its initial state, through time- and
space-dependent equations, as well as the stochastic simulation of individual
disease transmission processes.
Mechanistic approaches are clearly data hungry, and the amount of data
integration depends on the scale of the model—global, regional, and local—as
well as the level of detail in the population description. The latter can go down
to the level of single households and specifically consider multiple transmis-
sion settings, such as schools or workplaces. It is worth stressing, however,
that mechanistic models contain assumptions and approximations too. The
theory and equations used to describe the system dynamics are often based

2 Leonid A. Rvachev and Ira M.Longini, Jr., “A mathematical model for the global spread of influenza, “ Mathematical
Biosciences, 75:3 22 (1985).
3 Lars Hufnagel et al., “Forecast and control of epidemics in a globalized world,” Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences of the United States of America 101, 15124–15129 (2004).
4 M. Elizabeth Halloran et al., “Modeling targeted layered containment of an influenza pandemic in the United States,”
PNAS 105, 4639–4644 (2008).

xiv CHARTING THE NEXT PANDEMIC

on effective or coarse-grained integration of degrees of freedom that are
informed by the questions the model is set up to answer. No model fits all
diseases or spans all scales and geographical resolutions.
In this context, predictive epidemic modeling is emerging as an inter-
disciplinary field that promises to advance the capabilities of projecting the
course of an epidemic already underway or to anticipate the effectiveness of
possible interventions or clinical trials. Indeed, computational modeling has
been used to support responses to recent outbreaks such as the 2009 H1N1
pandemic, the 2014 West Africa Ebola outbreak, the Zika epidemic in the
Americas in 2016, and the highly pathogenic avian influenza A(H7N9) in 2014
and 2015. Although predictive epidemic modeling is not yet as developed as
weather forecasting, and many practical and foundational challenges still need
to be addressed, the promise of computer simulations to improve epidemic
preparedness and response is now recognized.5
The many types of descriptive and predictive models that were used during
recent, large‐scale outbreaks are often hidden behind the veil of technical
jargon, mathematical and statistical language, and computational implemen-
THE PROMISE OF DATA-DRIVEN
tation. In order to reach out beyond the circle of practitioners and convey the
MODELING APPROACHES
transformative potential of computer simulations for public health preparedness TO IMPROVE EPIDEMIC
and response, this book aims to provide a visual journey through the data and PREPAREDNESS AND RESPONSE
model integration process at the core of large-scale computational approaches. IS NOW RECOGNIZED.
This overview is mostly done by using a storyboard that exemplifies data and
algorithms through concrete examples and illustrations. Our intent is to intro-
duce non technical readers to the process that, starting from real-world data,
makes it possible to develop simulated scenarios and real-time forecasts of
the global spreading of infectious diseases.
In its first part, this book guides the reader in the construction of the modern
frameworks used to project and analyze the global spread of epidemics and
pandemics. The results of these modeling activities are intuitively communi-
cated by powerful infographics; in particular, we present examples of results
obtained from numerical simulations concerning the international spreading of
potentially pandemic pathogens. The second part of this book is focused on a
set of pandemic charts that illustrate, through the infographic tools described
in the first part, the possible scenarios of future pandemics. This atlas is meant
to show commonalities and patterns in emerging health threats, as well as
explore the wide range of possible scenarios that can be used by policy-makers
to anticipate trends, evaluate risks, and eventually manage future events. In
a nutshell, the second part of this book is a visual catalog that captures the
possible evolution of future pandemics and introduces the reader to a vast
range of interventions characterizing the fight against infectious diseases.

5 National Science and Technology Council Report, “Towards Epidemic Prediction: Federal Efforts and Opportunities in
Outbreak Modeling” (2016).

Introduction xv

THE RIGOROUS ANALYSIS AND
DISCUSSION OF PANDEMIC RISK
IS NOW ONE OF THE RESEARCH
FRONTIERS OF COMPUTATIONAL
EPIDEMIC MODELING.
xvi CHARTING THE NEXT PANDEMIC
In order to exemplify numerical epidemic modeling, throughout the book
we used GLEAM, the global epidemic and mobility framework,6 developed
and supported by a team of researchers and institutions around the world. This
framework is by no means to be considered prototypical; however, it integrates
many of the data and concepts common to the many types of descriptive and
predictive models available to the scientific community. We feel this frame-
work conveys to a general audience the kind of work and results that can be
achieved in computer simulated epidemic models. We also refer to several
other models and approaches that attain the same level of complexity and
results that we present here; we apologize in advance to all the colleagues
that have done extraordinary work in this area if their contributions are not
referenced or explained in detail. Indeed, this book is not meant as a technical
review of the field, but rather as an introduction for non-practitioners to the
richness of this approach, showing the potential of looking to the future of
global epidemic modeling through data-driven numerical approaches.
It is also important to stress that the pandemic charts are not to be con-
sidered an exhaustive catalog of epidemic events: a full exploration of all the
possible scenarios, as well as the risks associated to pandemic events, is far
beyond the scope of this book and necessarily involves a large effort from
the entire scientific community.
The rigorous analysis and discussion of pandemic risk is now one of the
research frontiers of computational epidemic modeling, where a number of
major scientific challenges still need to be addressed in the coming years,
as acknowledged in the book’s final outlook chapter. Indeed, we hope that
this book will contribute to fueling the interest in solving these challenges
and advancing numerical epidemic modeling to the point of an operational
framework analogous to the one used for numerical weather forecasting.
6 The Global Epidemic and Mobility model, www.gleamviz.org
PART I

HOW TO MODEL PANDEMICS

CHAPTER 1

INFECTIOUS DISEASE SPREADING:

FROM DATA TO MODELS

W e live in an increasingly interconnected world where every day

one billion cars take the road and more than two billion people travel
each year by plane. Urbanization, growing populations, and global
migrations are creating a new and complex battlefield in the fight against
new and old diseases. As a result, we demand ever-increasing predictive
power to anticipate future epidemic outbreaks and evaluate associated risks.
In scientific terms, this power corresponds to the mathematical description
of patterns found in real-world data needed to develop models that can be
used to predict future events.
In the natural sciences, we are used to predicting the complex properties
of new materials through precise measurements of physical quantities and
the implementation of numerical models or studying the performance of a
new airplane by means of computers before we even assemble one of its
 parts. One of the most successful examples of predictive power is that of
weather forecasts, which are generated using sophisticated simulations on
supercomputer infrastructures which integrate present data and huge col-
lections of previous meteorological patterns into large systems of non-linear
equations. Although weather forecasts may help us plan for our next barbecue,
more importantly the science behind this allows us to prepare for extreme
and disruptive natural events like tornadoes, storms, and hurricanes, saving
countless lives every year.
In sharp contrast, for a long time, achieving predictive power in areas such
as epidemic spreading meant confronting the insurmountable obstacle of a
lack of high-quality data on human behavior and mobility at all scales. In fact,
although mathematical models have been important tools in analyzing the
spread and control of infectious diseases for more than a century, in most cases
it was impossible to gather detailed data concerning individual and collective
behavior and turn those models into real-time predictive computational tools.
In the last 20 years, this foundational limitation has started to lift: indeed, every
1.2 years, more human-driven socioeconomic data is produced than during
all preceding human history.1 This data revolution has started the quest of a

1 James Manyika, Michael Chui, Brad Brown, Jacques Bughin, Richard Dobbs, Charles Roxburgh, and Angela H Byers, “Big
data: The next frontier for innovation, competition, and productivity,” (2011).

A MULTIDISCIPLINARY APPROACH TO EPIDEMIC ANALYSIS

01 02
MODELING REAL-WORLD DATA
Elaborate stochastic infectious disease models to Real-world data on population and mobility networks
support a wide range of epidemiological studies, are integrated in structured spatial epidemic models
covering different types of infections and intervention to generate data-driven simulations of the worldwide
scenarios. spread of infectious diseases.

03
COMPUTATIONAL THINKING
The computer is the laboratory. Models run on high-
performance computers to create in silico experiments
that would be hardly feasible in real systems, to guide
our understanding of typical non-linear behavior and
tipping points of epidemic phenomena.
04
TOOLS DEVELOPMENT
Computational tools help in modeling the spread of a
disease, understanding observed epidemic patterns,
and studying the effectiveness of different intervention
strategies. These tools are available to researchers,
healthcare professionals, and policy-makers.

4 CHARTING THE NEXT PANDEMIC

new mathematical and data-driven understanding of human networks and
dynamics and finally ignited a transformative science cycle based on the
following components:

• Collection, acquisition, and integration of human dynamics data from the

individual to the societal scale
• Development of data infrastructures, collaborative information platforms,
enabling the production of knowledge from data
• Identification of general principles and laws that characterize social
THE COMPUTER IS NOT JUST
complexity and capture the essence of human dynamics (data analysis
A NUMBER CRUNCHING TOOL:
and integration) IT ALLOWS RESEARCHERS TO
• Development of mathematical and data-driven models endowed with a SIMULATE AND STUDY SYSTEMS
high level of realism, able to offer novel quantitative understanding and THAT DO NOT FIT IN
predictive power in the area of socio-technical systems A LABORATORY.

The spreading of infectious diseases has been one of the first scientific
areas where this research program has been put in motion. The scientific
community is finally in the position to envision the development of large-
scale models that, by combining theory, data, and computational thinking,
can deliver real-time or near-real-time situational awareness during infectious
disease outbreaks.

COMPUTATIONAL MODELING OF INFECTIOUS DISEASE SPREADING

The development of data-driven models is rooted in the combination of
large-scale data mining techniques, computational approaches, and the
mathematical modeling of infectious diseases. Data-driven computational
approaches have solid foundations on the wealth of data that can be integrated
at different scales, from the biology of the pathogen and the behavior of the
single individual to the “social aggregate,” where the “social aggregate” is a
large-scale social system consisting of millions of individuals whose dynamics
can be characterized in space (geographic and social) and time. Those data
are integrated in mathematical epidemic models, which are adapted to deal
with the multi-scale and complex nature of the real world. In this context, the
mathematical and statistical modeling framework has evolved from simple
compartmental models to structured approaches in which the heterogeneities
and details of the population and system under study are becoming increas-
ingly important features (FIGURE 1.1). Modeling approaches explicitly include
spatial structures consisting of multiple sub populations coupled by traveling
fluxes, while the epidemic within each sub population is described accord-
ing to approximations depending on the specific case studied. This patch,
or meta population modeling framework, has then grown into a multi-scale
framework in which the various possible granularities of the system (country,

Infectious Disease spreading: from data to models 5

HOMOGENEOUS MIXING SOCIAL STRUCTURE
Figure 1.1 | Different scale
structures used in epidemic
modeling
Circles represent individuals and
each color corresponds to a different
stage of the disease. From left to right:
homogeneous mixing, in which individ-
uals are assumed to homogeneously
interact with each other at random;
social structure, where people are
classified according to demograph-
ic information (age, gender, etc.);
contact-network models, in which the
detailed network of social interactions
between individuals provides the
possible disease propagation paths;
multi-scale models, which consider
sub population coupled by movements
of individuals, while homogeneous
mixing is assumed on the lower scale;
agent-based models, which recreate
the characteristic movements and
interactions of any single individual
on a very detailed scale (a schematic
representation of a city is shown).
Adapted from V. Colizza et al., C. R.
Biologies 330 (2007)
6 CHARTING THE NEXT PANDEMIC
CONTACT-NETWORK MODELS MULTI-SCALE MODELS AGENT-BASED MODELS
inter city, and intra city) are considered through different approximations and
combined with interaction networks describing the flows of people and/or
animals. At the most detailed level, the introduction of agent-based models
(ABMs) has enabled the usual modeling perspective to stretch even further
by achieving a full description of the society and a complete characterization
(household, workplace, etc.) of each individual.
The advances in data-model integration have highlighted complex properties
and heterogeneities, which cannot be neglected in the description of epidem-
ics. Although these characteristics have long been acknowledged as relevant
factors in determining the properties of dynamical processes, it is clear now
that the large-scale epidemics often elude the straightforward linear thinking
we are used to and surprise us with tipping points, emergent behaviors, and
unexpected shifts in dynamical regime that characterize complex phenomena.
In this context, the computer plays a fundamental role; on the one hand, it
allows the creation of in silico experiments hardly feasible in real systems,
and on the other hand, it can access and compare quantities and observables
across many different models. This computational approach is the guide for
understanding typical non-linear behaviors and tipping points not accessible
by analytical means. In this way, the computer is not just a number crunching
tool: it allows researchers to simulate and study systems that do not fit in a
laboratory, such as the traffic patterns in a big city or the spreading of a new
pandemic. In this perspective, it has been crucial to introduce computational
algorithms that rely on the repeated computation of stochastic processes. These
techniques, generally named Monte Carlo methods or stochastic algorithms, are
especially useful in studying systems with a large number of coupled degrees
of freedom and where stochastic effects are a fundamental component of the
system. While these algorithms have been first used in physical sciences,
their use in the area of human systems, economics, and social sciences has
become increasingly popular. The possibility of handling significant uncertainty
in inputs and occurrences allows us to finally study large-scale systems where
stochasticity is an intrinsic element of the system.
1.1
INFOBOX
DATA-INTENSIVE COMPUTATIONAL TOOL FOR THE ANALYSIS OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES
The Global Epidemic and Mobility (GLEAM) model is
a publicly available computational framework based
on a metapopulation approach in which the popula-
tion of the world is spatially structured into geolocal-
ized patches or subpopulations (e.g., cities) where
individuals mix. These patches are connected by the
mobility patterns of individuals. GLEAM is capable
of generating stochastic simulations of epidemic
spread worldwide, yielding (among other measures)
the incidence and seeding events at a daily reso-
lution for 3,253 subpopulations in 232 countries and
dependent territories (www.gleamviz.org).
Other high-performance computational tools are
also available to the public for the spatial analysis
and modeling of epidemics. These tools differ in
their underlying modeling approaches and in the
implementation, flexibility, and accessibility of the
software itself.
The Spatiotemporal Epidemiological Modeler
(STEM) is a modeling system for simulating the
spread of an infectious disease in a spatially struc-
tured population. Contrary to other approaches,
STEM is based on an extensible software platform,
which promotes the contribution of data and algo-
rithms by users (www.eclipse.org/stem).
Agent-based models describe the stochastic
propagation of a disease at the individual level, thus
taking into account the explicit social and spatial
structure of the population under consideration. In
this respect, CommunityFlu is a software tool that
simulates the spread of influenza in a structured
population of approximately 1,000 households with
2,500 persons (www.cdc.gov/flu/tools/communityflu).
A larger population is considered in FluTe, a
publicly available tool for the stochastic simulation
of an epidemic in the United States at the individual
level (www.cs.unm.edu/~dlchao/flute). The model is
based on a synthetic population, structured in a hier-
archy of mixing social groups, such as households,
household clusters, neighborhoods, and nation-wide
communities.
The Bruno Kessler Foundation hosts the most
detailed European-wide agent-based model for
infectious diseases (dpcs.fbk.eu). The model
is informed by routine socio demographic data
collected throughout all European countries (e.g.,
school and workplace attendance, household struc-
ture, etc.).
EpiFast involves a parallel algorithm implemented
using a master-slave approach, which provides for
scalability on distributed memory systems. This tool
allows for the detailed representation and simulation
of a disease in social contact networks among indi-
viduals that dynamically evolve over time and adapt
to actions taken by individuals and public health
interventions (www.vbi.vt.edu).
FRED (A Framework for Reconstructing Epide-
miological Dynamics) is an open source modeling
system developed by the University of Pittsburgh
Public Health Dynamics Laboratory. The system uses
agent-based modeling derived from census-based
synthetic populations that capture the demographic
and geographic distributions of the population, as well
as detailed household, school, and workplace social
networks (www.phdl.pitt.edu/index.php/research/
software18).
Infectious Disease spreading: from data to models 7

COMPUTER SIMULATIONS
PROVIDE EXPERIMENTS NOT
FEASIBLE IN THE REAL WORLD
AND ADDRESS THE COMPLEXITY
INHERENT TO REAL-WORLD
HEALTH PROBLEMS.
8 CHARTING THE NEXT PANDEMIC
Computational modeling has led to a qualitative change in the ways we
model epidemic and social contagion processes. Visualization and analysis
tools that are able to cope with multiple levels of representation are being
developed along with computer simulations that provide experiments not fea-
sible in the real world. For the first time, epidemic processes can be studied
in a comprehensive fashion that addresses the complexity inherent to real-
world health problems. Whereas data availability is pointing out the limits of
our conceptual and modeling frameworks, it is also allowing the validation of
results across different modeling approaches, mathematical techniques, and
approximation schemes.
GLOBAL EPIDEMIC AND MOBILITY MODEL
In this book, we want to illustrate the methodology described earlier and
convince you that this approach is mature enough to be encapsulated in
actionable tools for the simulation of case studies, the analysis of risk through
model scenarios, and the forecasts of newly emerging infectious diseases
(INFOBOX 1.1).
In order to tell this story, we use the Global Epidemic and Mobility (GLEAM)
framework. GLEAM combines real-world data on populations and human
mobility with complex stochastic models of disease transmission. This com-
putational model is the product of the multidisciplinary work of a 10-year
collaboration among several teams across the world. The model has been
integrated in a computational platform that can model the world wide spread
of epidemics for human transmissible diseases, offering extensive flexibility
in the design of the compartmental model and scenario setup, including
computationally optimized numerical simulations based on high-resolution
global demographic and mobility data.
In the following chapters, we show the reader the what, how, and why of
the computational approaches to modeling infectious diseases. First, we present
what data we can leverage in informing state-of-the-art modeling approaches.
Next, we show how the data-model integration is made; in other words, we
take a look under the hood of the computational modeling approach. Finally,
and most importantly, we make the case for why computational modeling is
important to support public health decisions and intervention plans. Indeed,
computational modeling does more than forecast and provides rationales and
quantitative analysis in a number of areas that we briefly summarize here.
Preparation and contingency planning
The decision-making process in the fight against diseases relies on a multitude
of options such as vaccination, contact tracing, quarantine, administration of
drugs, and social distancing, which must be implemented in a manner that
addresses the complexity inherent to the biological, social, and behavioral
aspects of health-related problems. Large-scale computational models provide
scenario analysis tools that can be used to inform the policy-making process
quantitatively and to explore the effectiveness of specific strategies and mit-
igation/containment plans.

Epidemiological explanations
Computational modeling allows the testing and validation of specific assump-
tions of the potential transmission mechanisms of a disease. It also offers the
possibility of defining counterfactual numerical experiments aimed at disen-
tangling the causal mechanisms and effects driving the disease dynamics.
While no model is reality itself, models allow us to have a structured reasoning
framework that through validation and falsification may lead to a coherent
picture of the epidemic unfolding.

Threats and systemic risk

One of the main challenges in assessing the threats of deliberate/natural
disease outbreaks is the choice of key epidemiological parameters and the
natural history of infection. The variability of the parameters creates a wide
range of scenarios for which it is crucial to develop epidemic models able to
gauge the actual threat of diseases with pandemic potential.

Forecast
A more difficult challenge than scenario analysis is the use of mathematical and
computational models for the real-time forecasting of an epidemic unfolding.
Ultimately, forecasting amounts to providing the mathematical description
of patterns found in real-world data in order to develop models that can be
used to anticipate trends, evaluate risks, and eventually manage future events.

Infectious Disease spreading: from data to models 9

CHAPTER 2

DATA, DATA, AND MORE DATA

G iven the decades of success achieved in weather forecasts and the

phenomenal results in the computational modeling of new material
properties, it is natural to wonder why we are at a very different stage
in the quantitative forecasting of the next pandemic or the progression of sea-
sonal influenza. The main difference is that spreading and contagion models
start with assumptions about the behavior of humans and society instead of
the physical laws governing fluid and gas masses. In other words, while it is
possible to produce a complete temperature analysis of the sea surface and
satellite images of atmospheric turbulence, we do not yet have large-scale
knowledge of commuting patterns or precise maps of contact among individuals.
In recent years, however, the tremendous progress made in data collection
and information technology is lifting the limits we have faced for decades in the
gathering of quantitative social, demographic, and behavioral data. Improved
techniques and methodologies support the inter linkage and integration of
digitalized datasets with geo-coding information, economical, and transpor-
tation databases.

SOCIOECONOMIC DATA ARE
THE BRICKS THAT BUILD THE
PILLARS OF ANY COMPUTATIONAL
APPROACH TO THE ANALYSIS OF
INFECTIOUS DISEASES.
Figure 2.1 | Mapping the popula-
tion of the world
Global population distribution from
the Gridded Population of the World
project.
Source: Columbia University’s Gridded
Population of the World
12 CHARTING THE NEXT PANDEMIC
Data-driven epidemic modeling relies on a multitude of datasets, ranging
from population movement records to social and behavioral data, as well as
census and health-related information. These data are the bricks that build the
pillars of any computational approach to the analysis of infectious diseases.
This chapter is dedicated to the illustration of the extraordinary high-quality
datasets that can be leveraged to build those pillars.
POPULATION
The geographical distribution of the population is the first key ingredient of
any epidemiological model. In order to model the spreading of an infectious
disease that is transmitted from person to person, it is crucial to have detailed
data of where individuals are living. Creating high-quality maps of the human
population at the worldwide scale is per se a scientific challenge. Different
projects tackled this problem using advanced techniques that merge different
datasets, ranging from routinely collected census data to satellite imagery
analysis. NASA’s Landscan1, Columbia University’s Gridded Population of
the World2, and the WorldPop3 projects all make worldwide maps available
at different granularities and resolutions. More precisely, in these works the
surface of the world is divided into a grid of cells that can have different res-
olution levels. Each cell has an estimated population value assigned. Data
from the Gridded Population of the World project is shown in FIGURE 2.1. The
bright regions are associated with highly populated locations. Not surprisingly,
1 landscan.ornl.gov
2 sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu
3 www.worldpop.org.uk
0 1.9x10 7
population
 Ages 0 – 4 Ages 70+
0 1.5x10 6 0 1.5x10 6

China, India, and Mexico are extremely visible. These maps make clear how Figure 2.2 | Age structure
heterogeneity
the population is heterogeneously distributed around the globe. Australia and
Population distribution for the age
China are two extreme cases. The first country has just a few highly populated
bracket 0–4 (left) and 70+ (right), in
regions. The second, instead, is the most populated country in the world, and its Europe, Middle East, and Africa.
population is spread across a large part of the country. Historical, geographical, Source: Columbia University’s Gridded
Population of the World
environmental, and political factors are at the root of these heterogeneities
that play an important role in the geospatial diffusion of infectious diseases.

THE AGE STRUCTURE OF THE WORLD POPULATION

The accurate characterization of the structure of social contacts in mathemat-
ical and computational models of infectious disease transmission is another
key element in the assessment of the impact of epidemic outbreaks and
in the evaluation of effective control measures. For instance, the transmis-
sibility potential of a disease and the final epidemic size depend on mixing
patterns between individuals in the population, which in turn depend on
THE TRANSMISSIBILITY
sociodemographic parameters. A critical feature affecting disease spread is POTENTIAL OF A DISEASE AND
the age structure of the population of each country. Furthermore, individuals THE FINAL EPIDEMIC SIZE
of different ages interact differently according to household size, fraction of STRONGLY DEPEND ON MIXING
workers and students in the population, etc. All of these indicators change PATTERNS BETWEEN INDIVIDUALS
consistently across the world. Here, we consider 10 age brackets: 0–4, 5–9, OF THE POPULATION, WHICH
10–14, 15–19, 20–29, 30–39, 40–49, 50–59, 60–69, and 70+ years old. More IN TURN DEPEND ON SOCIO
developed countries typically have larger numbers of the elderly and fewer DEMOGRAPHIC PARAMETERS.
numbers of children and young adults, while the picture reverses itself for
developing countries where we observe a larger proportion of children than
the elderly. This is clear from inspecting the two maps showing Europe and
Africa (FIGURE 2.2 ). Indeed, the density of individuals over 70 is visibly much

Data, data, and more data 13


THE GLOBAL AIRLINE NETWORK
INCLUDES OVER 4,000 AIRPORTS
CONNECTED BY TENS OF
THOUSANDS OF DIRECT FLIGHTS.
Figure 2.3 | Global long-range
mobility network
Each node represents a major trans-
portation hub. Their size is proportion-
al to the population served. Each link
represents a direct flight connection.
Their width is proportional to the
number of available seats.
Source: Official Airline Guide
14 CHARTING THE NEXT PANDEMIC
higher in Europe than in Africa; alternatively, the density of children is evidently
higher in Africa than Europe.
HUMAN MOBILITY
As we go about our daily lives, we come in contact with individuals who can
carry viruses, bacteria, and other pathogens, several of which are capable
of causing disease and infection. Whenever the conditions are favorable,
they may be able to infect us, turning us into a new vehicle for the spreading
of the disease. It is not surprising then that the geographical diffusion of
pathogens is thus intrinsically intertwined with human mobility. Every time
a person moves from home to work, or travels to another city or country,
an opportunity arises for the pathogen to spread to a new population of
potential hosts.
As technology evolves, so do our traveling habits: automobiles, trains,
and airplanes help to shorten physical and temporal distances, for humans
and for pathogens.
Long-Range Mobility
Over the course of 100 years, flying went from an occupation of the eccentric,
to a luxury of the wealthy and finally to a necessity in the life of millions of
passengers every year.
This shift was brought about by the increasing affordability and conve-
nience of air transportation. Once distant cities are now just a few hours apart
CONNECTIONS (PER DAY) SEATS (IN MILLIONS PER YEAR)
LONDON 388 LONDON 86.59 M

PARIS 339 NEW YORK 72.80 M

MOSCOW 311 HONG KONG 64.17 M

FRANKFURT 286 PARIS 59 M

AMSTERDAM 279 BEIJING 56.71 M

ISTANBUL 260 ATLANTA 56 M

NEW YORK 243 CHICAGO 54.27 M

DUBAI 242 SHANGHAI 53.95 M

BRUSSELS 228 LOS ANGELES 53.26 M

CHICAGO 227 TOKYO 49.11 M

whether they are separated by hundreds or thousands of miles. This worldwide Figure 2.4 | Top cities by airline
network evolved organically during the last century through the decentralized traffic and number of connections
List of the top 10 cities by the number
decisions of hundreds of different companies and individuals. As a result, its
of connections per day (left) and
global structure is extremely complex, with many non trivial properties (FIGURE available seats per year (right); data
2.3 ). According to the Official Airline Guide (OAG)4, the global airline network refers to 2012.
Source: Official Airline Guide
includes over 4,000 airports connected by tens of thousands of direct flights.
Chaining different flights through a major hub creates connections between
airports not directly connected. Cities like New York, Atlanta, Frankfurt, or
London have large airports (or even multiple airports in close proximity) that
serve as the hubs connecting destinations that do not have direct flights. The
top 10 cities by airline traffic and number of connections in 2012 are listed in
FIGURE 2.4.
Airline data also refers to the so-called origin-destination flows between
airports. Origin-destination datasets report the actual number of travelers
between airports, regardless of intermediate stops or connecting flights. The
origin-destination flows network has many more links than the airline network,
which only considers non stop connections. This network accounts for the
number of individuals traveling from place to place, thus providing a more
accurate picture of the dispersion of individuals potentially carrying diseases.

Short-Range Mobility
Trains, public transportation, and personal automobiles have impacted
short-distance travel in much the same way that accessible airline transpor-
tation has affected long-distance spreading patterns. Now, more than ever,
we can easily cover tens of miles just to go from home to the office or school

4 www.oag.com

Data, data, and more data 15

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 The Tolbooth having been passed, one was again in an open
piazza of tall or tallish houses, nearly as broad as the former piazza,
but farther up the incline, and known indifferently as the High Street
above the Tolbooth or as the Lawnmarket. Here, also, one could not
but note the number of the closes and wynds on both sides, plunging
down the house-laden slopes with break-neck precipitancy from the
vertebral street. At the head of this piazza, however, where it began
to narrow, and where there was an obstruction across it in the form
of a clumsy building called the Butter Tron or Weigh-House, there
was one offshoot to the left of greater consequence than any mere
wynd or close. This was the West Bow, a steep zigzag or spiral kind of
street of antique houses, bringing one down to the deeply-sunk
Grassmarket or Horsemarket, i.e. to a large square space opening out
from the end of the Cowgate, and convenient for the country people
coming into the town with cattle. Refraining from this descent by the
West Bow, and keeping still to the vertebral street, one reached the
last portion of the long causewayed and inhabited ridge. This was the
Castle Hill, a narrowish continuation of the High Street, so steep as
to require climbing rather than walking, but up which, nevertheless,
there was still a plentiful straggling of houses, perched anyhow, with
closes and paved yards reticulating what lateral depth of earth they
could cling to, and with views of dizzying profundity from their back
windows.
All civic Edinburgh thus left behind, and a military portal having
been passed, one entered the precincts of the Castle itself,—the high,
rocky stronghold which was more ancient than anything
recognisable as most ancient in the Edinburgh beneath, which
indeed had fostered that Edinburgh into its first existence and
growth, and in which there were relics of days older than those of
Malcolm Canmore and David I., older than the infancy of Holyrood
Abbey. After the long walk upwards between the two lines of close-
packed houses, with perpetual mouths of mere wynds and closes for
a whole mile, it was something to emerge into the open air, even in
the battlemented exterior esplanade or courtyard of this Castle,
slanting up the hillside to the moat and drawbridge. It was more to
be allowed to pass the drawbridge and the other defences, and so to
pursue the winding, rock-hewn track by which one mounted to the
fortified aggregate of guard-houses, store-rooms, and royal towers,
heaved together on the cliff-bound summit. What a platform then to
stand on, beside the cannon, in any of the ledges of the embrasured
parapet! The feeling for scenery, they say, had not been much
developed in the sixteenth century; but no more in that century than
in this could any human eye have gazed with indifference on the vast
panorama of Scottish land and water that burst into the vision from
Edinburgh’s Castle Rock. To the north there were villages and
farmsteads dotting the range of fields towards the Firth which is now
covered with the streets of the New Town, and beyond these always
the unwearying loveliness of the face of the Firth, with the boundary
of the Fifeshire hills; to the west, the near Corstorphines, and over
these also a tract of varied country, fading away up the course of the
Firth into a purple suggestion of Stirling and the first spurs of the
Highlands; to the south, the Braids and the Pentlands, hiding the
pastoral territory of the Esks and the Upper Tweed, with its sleepy
stretch towards the Borders and England. Scores of castles and
keeps, each the residence of some nobleman or laird of distinction,
could be counted within this sweep of the eye, north, west, and
south, over the immediate vicinity of Edinburgh. But, if one’s interest
were still rather in the town itself, it was the eastward glance that
would help most to complete and define the previous impressions.
The whole sea-approach to Edinburgh by the Firth was now
splendidly visible, with the already described curve of the hither
coast from Berwick Law to Leith; the road from Leith to Holyrood
was plainly discernible; and the Canongate and Edinburgh could be
looked down upon together, and seen in connected shape and
ground-plan.
However slight the defences of the Canongate and Holyrood,
Edinburgh proper, it could now be seen, was carefully enclosed and
bastioned. On the north side, the North Loch, washing the base of
the Castle Rock and filling the valley through which the railway now
runs, was sufficient protection; but all the rest of the town was
bounded in by a wall, called the Flodden Wall. It had been
constructed mainly in the panic after the battle of Flodden in 1513 to
supersede an older and less perfect circumvallation, but had been
much repaired and modified since. It started from the east end of the
North Loch and ran thence along Leith Wynd and St. Mary’s Wynd,
crossing the High Street at the Nether Bow Port, and so shutting out
the Canongate; it then went so far south as to include the whole of
the Cowgate and some space of the heights beyond the ravine of the
Cowgate; and the west bend of its irregular rectangle, after
recrossing this ravine a little beyond the Grassmarket, riveted itself
to the Castle Rock, on its most precipitous side, at the head of the
High Street. There were several gates in the circuit of the wall besides
the Nether Bow Port, the chief being the Cowgate Port, which was
also to the east, the Kirk of Field Port (afterwards Potter Row Port)
and Greyfriars Port (afterwards Bristo Port), both to the south, and
the West Port, just beyond the Grassmarket and the sole inlet from
the west. When these gates were closed, Edinburgh could rest within
herself, tolerably secure from external attack, and conscious of a
reserve of strength in the cannon and garrison of the dominating
Castle. Even if the town itself should yield to a siege, the Castle could
hold out as a separate affair, impregnable, or almost impregnable,
within her own fortifications. Successful assaults on Edinburgh
Castle were among the rarest and most memorable accidents of
Scottish history.
 III.—THE EDINBURGH POPULATION IN 1561
Such having been the fabric or shell of Edinburgh in 1561, what
was the contained life?
The entire population, the Canongate included, was probably
less than 30,000; but, confined as this population was within such
strait limits, obliged to accommodate itself to one such ridgy
backbone of principal street, with off-going wynds and closes and but
one considerable and low-lying parallel, and having to make up,
therefore, by the vertical height of the houses for the impossibility of
spreading them out, its compression of itself within the houses must
have been exceedingly dense. As the political capital of the nation,
the seat of Government and of the Central Law Courts, Edinburgh
not only counted a number of families of rank among its habitual
residents, but drew into it, for part of every year at least,
representatives of the Scottish nobility, and of the lairds of mark and
substance, from all the Lowland shires. Only a few of the greatest of
these, however, had town mansions of their own, with any semblance
of sequestered approaches and adjuncts, whether in the Canongate
or the Cowgate. The majority of the nobles and lairds from the
country, as well as of the habitual residents of highest rank and
means, such as the Senators of the College of Justice, had to be
content with the better portions of those several-flatted or many-
flatted tenements,—insulæ they would have been called in ancient
Rome, but “lands” was and is the special Edinburgh word for them,—
which rose at the sides of the High Street or in the wynds and closes
that ran thence down the slopes. Distributed through the same
“lands” were the families of the “merchants” and the “craftsmen,” the
two denominations that composed between them the whole body of
the burghers proper. There was a chronic rivalry between these two
denominations in the elections to the Town Council and in the
management of affairs generally. The “merchants,” whose business
was ship-owning, the export and import of goods, and the sale of the
imported goods at first hand, affected the superiority on the whole.
There were individuals among the “craftsmen,” however, as opulent
as any of the “merchants.” This was particularly the case with the
craft of the goldsmiths, always a prominent craft in Edinburgh, and
there, as in London, combining the trade of money-lending with the
more especial arts of gold-working, silver-working, and jewellery,
and so allying itself with the merchants and their transactions.
Among the other “crafts,” all regularly incorporated in brotherhoods,
and each with its annually elected head, called the “deacon” of that
craft, were the skinners or leather-dressers, the furriers, the wobsters
or weavers, the tailors, the bonnet-makers, the hammermen or
smiths and armourers, the waulkers or cloth-dressers, the cordiners
or shoemakers, the wrights, the masons, the coopers, the fleshers or
butchers, the baxters or bakers, the candle-makers, and the barbers
or barber-surgeons. Printing had been introduced into Edinburgh in
1507; and there had been a lingering of the craft in the town ever
since by patents or permissions, but on the very smallest scale. To
the “merchants” and “craftsmen” and their families there have to be
added, of course, the numerous dependents of both these classes of
the burghers, called in the simple language of that time their
“servandis.” Under that name were included not only the domestic
servants of the wealthier merchants, but also their clerks and
business assistants, and the journeymen and apprentices of the
master-craftsmen, the last a very unruly portion of the community
and known collectively as “the crafts-childer.” Imagine all these
domiciled, as was then the habit, with their masters, and stowed
away somehow, “up and down in hole and bore,” as one old
document phrases the fact, in the workshops and “lands.” Even then
there remains to be taken into account the miscellany of small retail
traders, in shops and stalls, which such a town required, with the
peripatetic hucksters of fish and other provisions, and the rabble of
nondescripts, living by erratic and hand-to-mouth occupations, and
hanging on about the hostelries. All these too were “indwellers” in
Edinburgh, and housed in the wynds and closes in some
inconceivable manner. Moreover, as we learn too abundantly from
the old burgh records, actual vagrants and beggars, whether of the
able-bodied and turbulent variety, or of the cripple, diseased, and
blind, soliciting alms by obstreperous whining and by the exhibition
of their deformities, swarmed in Old Edinburgh with a persistency
which all the police efforts of the authorities, with examples of
scourgings and hangings for several generations, had been unable to
repress or diminish. Where they lived in overcrowded Edinburgh
only St. Giles’s steeple could now tell.
The overcrowding had its natural consequences. The sanitary
condition of most European towns in the sixteenth century, the best
English towns included, was incredibly bad; Scottish towns generally
were behind most English towns in this respect; but Old Edinburgh
had a character all her own for perfume and sluttishness. It could
hardly be helped. Impressively picturesque though the town was by
site and architecture, its populousness and its structural
arrangement were hardly compatible with each other on terms of
cleanliness. Individual families, within their own domiciles in the
various “lands,” might be as tidy as their cramped accommodations
would permit; but the state of the common stair in each “land,”—and
in the taller lands it was a dark stone “turnpike” ascending in
corkscrew fashion from flat to flat,—depended on the united tastes
and habits of all the families using it, and therefore on the habits and
tastes of the least fastidious. It was worse in the wynds and closes.
Not only did all the refuse from the habitations on both sides find its
way into these, generally by the easy method of being flung down
from the windows overnight; but the occupations of some of the
ground-floor tenants, butchers, candle-makers, etc.,—added
contributions heterogeneously offensive. Hardly a close that had not
its “midding” or “middings” at its foot or in its angles. For
generations the civic authorities had been contending with this state
of things and uttering periodical rebukes and edicts for cleansing.
There were two kinds of occasions on which these cleansing-edicts
were apt to be most stringent and peremptory. One was the expected
arrival of some illustrious stranger, or company of strangers, from
England or from abroad. Then the inhabitants were reminded of the
chief causes of offence among them, and put on the alert for their
removal, so as not to shame the town. More strenuous still were the
exertions made on any of those periodical outbreaks of the Plague, or
alarms of its approach, of which we hear so frequently in the annals
of Edinburgh, as of other towns, from the fourteenth century to the
seventeenth. Then the authorities did bestir themselves, and the
inhabitants too. But, after such occasions of spasmodic sanitary
effort, there always came the relapse; and, though there was a
standing order obliging each householder to see to the tidiness of his
own little bit of precinct, the general apathy and obtuseness
prevailed. It was providential when the heavens themselves
interfered, and some extraordinary deluge of rain sent torrents down
the closes.
Fortunately, the population did not need to remain within doors,
or in the obscurities of the wynds and closes, more than it liked. It
could pour itself out of doors into the main street; and it did so daily
with a profusion beyond all modern custom. Any morning or
afternoon about the year 1561 the High Street of Edinburgh, from the
Castle to the Canongate, must have been one of the liveliest and most
bustling thoroughfares in Europe. Need we cite, for witness, that
chapter in The Abbot in which Scott takes occasion to describe it, just
about this date, when he brings young Roland Græme for the first
time into Edinburgh under the convoy of Adam Woodcock the
falconer? Scott is so excellent an authority in such matters that his
account may pass as hardly less authentic than that of a
contemporary. We can see, with Roland Græme, the populace
“absolutely swarming like bees on the wide and stately street”; we
can see the “open booths projecting on the street,” with commodities
of all sorts for sale, and especially Flanders cloths, tapestry, and
cutlery; we can pick out in the crowd its most representative figures,
such as the “gay lady, in her muffler or silken veil,” stepping daintily
after her “gentleman usher,” or the group of burghers standing
together, “with their short Flemish cloaks, wide trousers, and high-
caped doublets.” Nor are we much surprised when there come upon
the scene the two parties of richly dressed aristocratic gallants, with
their armed retinues of serving-men, meeting each other with frowns
in the middle of the causeway, and immediately falling upon each
other in a desperate tulzie or street fight, in vindication of their right
of way, and of the hereditary feud between their families. Scott
required such a tulzie for his story, and therefore brought it in where
it suited him best. But, though Edinburgh was famous for its tulzies
or causeway-fights between noblemen and lairds at feud, they were
hardly everyday occurrences. Once a week or once a month was
about the rate in real history. For greater authenticity, therefore, we
may seek glimpses of the High Street of Old Edinburgh in Scottish
literature of earlier date than the Waverley Novels.
The Scottish poet Dunbar has left us two pieces picturing very
distinctly the Edinburgh of 1500–1513, which he knew so well. He
calls it “our nobill toun,” as if patriotically proud of it all in all; but it
chances that in both the poems he is more sarcastic than
complimentary. One is an express address of objurgation to the
merchants of Edinburgh for their disgraceful neglect of the “nobill
toun” and its capabilities. Why, he asks, do they let its streets be
overrun by beggars, so that “nane may mak progress” through them;
why do they let the fairest parts be given up to “tailyouris, soutteris,
and craftis vyle”; why do they let the vendors “of haddocks and of
scaittis,” and minstrels with but two wearisome tunes, which they
repeat eternally, go everywhere bawling up and down? He complains
more particularly of the High Street. He speaks of the projecting
fore-stairs there as making “the houssis mirk”; he declares that at the
Cross, where one should see “gold and silk,” one sees nothing but
“crudis and milk,” and that nothing is sold in all the rest of that lower
piazza but poor shellfish or common tripe and pudding; and he is
positively savage on the state of the blocked isthmus between the two
piazzas beside St. Giles’s Church and the Tolbooth. There, where the
merchants themselves most resort, and where the light is held from
their Parish Kirk by the stupid obstructions which they permit, they
are hampered in a malodorous honeycomb of lanes, which may suit
their tastes for exchange purposes, but is hardly to their credit! To
these particulars about the High Street from one of the poems we
may add, from the other, linen hung out to dry on poles from the
windows, cadgers of coals with wheeled carts, cadgers of other
articles with creels only slung over their horses, and dogs and boys in
any number running in and out among the carts and horses. All in
all, Dunbar’s descriptions of Edinburgh are satirical in mood, and
sum themselves up in this general rebuke to the Edinburgh
merchants in the first of the two poems—
Why will ye, merchants of renown,
Lat Edinburgh, your noble town,
For laik of reformatioun,
The common profit tine and fame?
Think ye nocht shame
That ony other regioun
Sall with dishonour hurt your name?

This is hardly the Edinburgh of subsequent romance, as we see

it in Scott’s Abbot; but that Scott had good warrant for what he wrote
there, other than his own imagination, appears from a supplement to
Dunbar furnished by Sir David Lindsay. The Edinburgh which Sir
David Lindsay knew was the Edinburgh of a later generation than
Dunbar’s, say from 1513 to 1555; and, whether from this lapse of time
or from difference in the tempers of the two poets, Sir David
Lindsay’s Edinburgh is liker Scott’s than Dunbar’s. Thus, in one
poem of Lindsay’s,—
Adieu, Edinburgh! thou heich triumphant town,
Within whose bounds richt blithefull have I been,
Of true merchánds the root of this regioun,
Most ready to receive Court, King, and Queen!
Thy policy and justice may be seen:
Were dévotioun, wisdom, and honesty
And credence tint, they micht be found in thee.

In another of his poems he describes Edinburgh on a gala day, when

there was a procession through its High Street, such as he himself, as
Lyon King of Arms, might have marshalled. The occasion was the
entry into Edinburgh in May 1537 of Magdalene, daughter of Francis
I. of France, the young bride of James V.; and the dirge-like form of
the description,—that of an indignant address to Death,—is
accounted for by the fact that the poet is looking back on the
splendours of her welcome into the Scottish capital when the too
swift close of her fair young life, only a few weeks afterwards, had
turned them into matter of mournful recollection,—
Thief! Saw thou nocht the great preparatives
Of Edinburgh, the noble famous town?
Thou saw the people labouring for their lives
To mak triumph with trump and clarioun:
Sic pleasour never was in this regioun
As suld have been the day of her entrace,
With great propinis given to her Grace.

Thou saw makand richt costly scaffolding,

Depaintit weell with gold and silver fine,
Ready preparit for the upsetting;
With fountains flowing water clear and wine;
Disguisit folks, like creatures divine,
On ilk scaffold, to play ane sindry story:
But all in greeting turnit thou that glory.
 Thou saw there mony ane lusty fresh galland,
Weell orderit for ressaving of their Queen;
Ilk craftisman, with bent bow in his hand,
Full galyartly in short clothing of green;
The honest burgess cled thou suld have seen,
Some in scarlot, and some in claith of grain,
For till have met their Lady Soverane;

Provost, Bailies, and Lordis of the town,

The Senatours, in order consequent,
Cled into silk of purpur, black, and brown;
Syne the great Lordis of the Parliament,
With mony knichtly Baron and Banrent,
In silk and gold, in colours comfortable:
But thou, alas! all turnit into sable.

Syne all the Lordis of Religioun,

And Princes of the Priestis venerable,
Full pleasandly in their processioun,
With all the cunning Clerkis honourable:
But, theftuously, thou tyrane treasonable,
All their great solace and solemnities
Thou turnit intill duleful dirigies.

Syne, next in order, passing through the town,

Thou suld have heard the din of instruments,
Of tabron, trumpet, shalm, and clarioun,
With reird redoundand through the elements;
The Heralds, with their aweful vestiments;
With Macers, upon either of their hands,
To rule the press with burnist silver wands.

This outgoes Scott himself for the possible pomp of Old

Edinburgh, and is poetically authentic. Later records, however,
enable us to tone down Lindsay’s description of the High Street on a
great gala day by the sight of it on any ordinary market day.
Since the reign of James III., it appears, there had been an
authorised distribution of the markets for different kinds of
commodities through prescribed parts of the town, with the general
effect that, while live stock and such bulkier commodities as wood
and fodder were sold and bought only in the Grassmarket and its
low-lying purlieus, the markets for all other commodities were
divided mainly between the two piazzas of the High Street, each
having its own “tron” or weighing apparatus. Of late years, however,
there had been encroachments by each piazza on the market rights of
the other, with a good deal of mutual complaint and bad feeling. We
hear more particularly that, about 1559, in consequence of temporary
dilapidations in the lower piazza by recent English and French
ravagings of the town, the upper piazza, or High Street above the
Tolbooth, had drawn into it far more than its statutory share of the
market traffic. The complaints of this by the inhabitants of the lower
piazza had been such that the Provost, Bailies, and Council passed an
order on the subject, which may be read in Dr. Marwick’s admirable
Extracts from the Burgh Records. “Upoun consideratioun of the
thraing of mercattis abone the Over Tolbuth, and that the passage
upon all mercat dayis is sa stoppit be confluence of peple that nane
may pas by are uther, as alsua upoun consideratioun that the saidis
landis and fore-tenementis be-eist Nudryis Wynde [i.e. in the lower
piazza] ar almaist desolait and nocht inhabitit, beand the fairest and
braidest parts of the toun, for laik of merkattis and resort of peple
thairto”: it was decreed that in all time coming the markets for hides,
wool, and skins should be specifically in the lower piazza. For a while
the order took effect; but, by the “procurment of certane particular
personis having thair landis abone the Tolbuth,” the upper piazza
had again obtained the advantage. Things seem to have rectified
themselves eventually; but about 1561 there was still this war of the
markets between the two piazzas, with a continued overthronging of
the upper.
Whether in one of the piazzas or in both, one has but to imagine
the litter that would be left on market days, and to add that to the
litter disgorged into the street upwards from the closes, or flung
down into the street from the fore-stairs, to see that a good deal of
Dunbar’s earlier description must be allowed to descend through
Lindsay’s intermediate and more gorgeous one, as still true of the
ordinary Edinburgh of the date of Queen Mary’s return.
No one really knows a city who does not know it by night as well
as by day. Night obscures much that day forces into notice, and
invests what remains with new visual fascinations, but still so that
the individuality of any city or town is preserved through its
darkened hours. Every town or city has its own nocturnal character.
Modern Edinburgh asserts herself, equally by night as by day, as the
city of heights and hollows. From any elevated point in her centre or
on her skirts, if you choose to place yourself there latish at night, you
may look down upon rows of lamps stretched out in glittering
undulation over the more level street spaces; or you may look down,
in other directions, upon a succession of tiers and banks of thickly
edificed darkness, punctured miscellaneously by twinkling window-
lights, and descending deeply into inscrutable chasms. More
familiar, and indeed so inevitable that every tourist carries it away
with him as one of his most permanent recollections of Edinburgh, is
the nightly spectacle from Princes Street of the northern face of the
Old Town, starred irregularly with window-lights from its base to the
serrated sky-line. Perhaps this is the present nocturnal aspect of
Edinburgh which may most surely suggest Old Edinburgh at night
three hundred years ago. For, though we must be careful, in
imagining Old Edinburgh, to confine ourselves strictly and exactly to
as much of the present Edinburgh as stands on the ancient site, and
therefore to vote away Princes Street, the whole of the rest of the
New Town, and all the other accretions, this aspect of the Old Town
at night from the north cannot have changed very greatly. A belated
traveller passing through the hamlets that once straggled on the
grounds of the present New Town, and arriving at the edge of the
North Loch, in what is now the valley of Princes Street Gardens,
must have looked up across the Loch to much the same twinkling
embankment of the High Street and its closes, and to much the same
serrated sky-line, lowering itself eastward from the shadowy mass of
the Castle Rock. If the traveller desired admission into the town, he
could not have it on this side at all, but would have to go round to
some of the ports in the town-wall from its commencement at the
east end of the North Loch. He might try them all in succession,—
Leith Wynd Port, the Nether Bow Port, the Cowgate Port, the Kirk of
Field Port, Greyfriars Port, and the West Port,—with the chance of
finding that he was too late for entrance at any, and so of being
brought back to his first station, and obliged to seek lodging till
morning in some hamlet there, or else in the Canongate. He could
perform the whole circuit of the walls, however, in less than an hour,
and might have the solace, at some points of his walk, of night views
down into the luminous hollows of the town, very different from his
first view upward from the North Loch.
 While the belated traveller was thus shut out, the inhabitants
within might be passing their hours till bed-time comfortably
enough, whether in the privacy of their domiciles, or in more or less
noisy loitering and locomotion among the streets and wynds. If it
were clear moonlight or starlight, the wynds, and especially the
stately length of the High Street, would be radiantly distinct, and
locomotion in them would be easy. But even in the darkest nights the
townsmen were not reduced to actual groping through their town, if
ennui, or whim, or business, or neighbourly conviviality determined
them to be out of doors. Not only would they carry torches and
lanterns with them for their own behoof, especially if they had to find
their way down narrow closes to their homes; not only were there the
gratuitous oil-lights or candlelights from the windows of the fore-
tenements in the streets and wynds, sending down some glimmer
into the streets and wynds themselves; but, by public regulation, the
tenants of the fore-stair houses in the principal thoroughfares were
bound to hang out, during certain hours of the evening, lamps for the
guidance of those that might be passing. One has to remember,
however, that people in those days kept very early hours. By ten
o’clock every night Auld Reekie was mostly asleep. By that hour,
accordingly, the house-lights, with some exceptions, had ceased to
twinkle; and from that hour, save for bands of late roysterers here
and there at close-mouths, and for the appointed night-watches on
guard at the different ports, or making an occasional round with
drum and whistle, silence and darkness reigned till dawn.
The Provost of Edinburgh in 1561 was Archibald Douglas of
Kilspindie, a well-known laird of the great kin of the Angus
Douglases. He had held the office continuously by annual election
since 1553, with only two years of break. The four Bailies under him,
answering to the Aldermen of an English town, were David Forster,
Robert Ker, Alexander Home, and Allan Dickson, all merchant-
burgesses. It would be possible, I believe, even at this distance of
time, to give the names of as many as 1000 or 1500 other persons of
the population, with particulars about not a few of them. In a town of
such a size all the principal inhabitants must have been perfectly well
acquainted with each other, and must have been known, by figure
and physiognomy at least, to the rest of the community. We will
name at present but one other inhabitant of the Edinburgh of 1561,
who must have been about the best known of all. This was John
Knox, the chief minister of the town, and the stated preacher, always
on Sundays and often on week-days, in the great Church of St. Giles.
His house, or the house of which he occupied a portion, if not then
that very conspicuous projecting house of three storeys in the Nether
Bow which visitors to Edinburgh now go to see as having been his,
was certainly somewhere in that neighbourhood. From this point of
what we have called the lower piazza of the High Street there is a
direct view upwards to St. Giles’s Church, about 300 yards distant;
and the walk in the other direction, down the Canongate, to
Holyrood Abbey and Palace, is perhaps about twice as much. Divide
a half-mile of sloping street into three equal parts, and Knox’s
residence in Edinburgh, the house in which he sat on the day of
young Queen Mary’s return among her Scottish subjects in August
1561, is to be imagined as just one-third down such a slope from the
great Church of St. Giles, with the other two-thirds descending
thence continuously, houses on both sides, to the Palace in which
Mary had taken up her abode. Mary and Knox were to meet ere long.
 ROBERT ROLLOCK AND THE BEGINNINGS OF
EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY[2]

The University of Edinburgh dates its existence from the year

1582, when James VI. was sixteen years of age and had been for
fifteen years King of Scotland. Till that time there had been but three
universities in Scotland,—that of St. Andrews (1413), that of Glasgow
(1454), and that of King’s College, Aberdeen (1494). The want of a
university in the metropolis had been long felt. Especially after the
Reformation, people residing in or near Edinburgh had begun to
think it a hardship that they had to send their sons over to St.
Andrews, or away to Glasgow, or as far off as Aberdeen, to complete
their education. Why should not Edinburgh have a university for
itself? The Magistrates and Town Council of Edinburgh were
particularly zealous in the project; and, as far back as the reign of
Mary, they had, with the Queen’s sanction, taken some steps towards
carrying the project into effect. They had fixed on the site of the
intended new College. It was the site on which the University now
stands, but was then a kind of suburb of gardens and straggling
buildings, partly old church edifices, known by the name of St. Mary
in the Fields, or, more shortly, Kirk o’ Field. They had purchased a
certain right of property here; and here, accordingly, amid the old
tenements that have been long swept away, as well as in the gardens
and bits of green field which covered what is now the thoroughfare of
South Bridge Street, we are to fancy the Edinburgh magistrates and
ministers of Queen Mary’s reign, and perhaps John Knox himself,
pottering about sometimes in their afternoon walks, looking at this
and that, and anticipating the College that was to be established. But
years passed on, and there were difficulties in the way. Funds were
wanting, and there was strenuous opposition from the already
existing universities; and, before any college-building could arise on
the site of Kirk o’ Field, that site had been made unexpectedly
memorable by one of the ghastliest of deeds. It was close to what is
now the south side of the University quadrangle that there stood the
fatal tenement in which Darnley was lodged on his return from
Glasgow when he was recovering from the small-pox, and the
explosion of which by gunpowder, on the night between the 9th and
10th of February 1567, hurled his corpse and that of his servant over
the adjacent town-wall, and left Mary a widow. With other thoughts,
therefore, than of the intended seat of learning, for the uses of which
the ground had been partly purchased when this tragedy blackened
it, must the citizens of Edinburgh for many a year afterwards have
sauntered hereabouts in the evenings. But shocks of the kind are
transient; and, when, in the quieter though still agitated days of King
James, certain liberal citizens began to move anew for the
foundation of the much-needed university,—chief among whom were
Mr. James Lawson, Knox’s successor as minister of Edinburgh, Mr.
William Little, afterwards Lord Provost, and his brother, Mr.
Clement Little, an Edinburgh lawyer,—there was no dream of any
other site for it than that which had been already chosen. With
creditable quickness the Town Council proceeded to convert the
long-cherished design into a reality. Masons and carpenters were set
to work; and, what with the patching-up of old buildings already on
the ground, what with the erection of frugal additions, a kind of
make-shift beginning of a College was at last knocked together. A
charter from King James, dated “Stirling, 14th April 1582,” made all
right. It empowered the Lord Provost, Magistrates, and Town
Council of Edinburgh to found and gradually complete within the
city what should be to all intents and purposes a true University, or
Studium Generale. King James, as has been said, was then still in his
boyhood. His unhappy mother was in the fourteenth year of her
captivity in England.
A material fabric for lodging the University of Edinburgh having
been thus roughly provided, all that was further necessary was to
procure teachers. There are now between thirty and forty chairs in
the University of Edinburgh; but it is not to be imagined that the
Magistrates and Town Council of Edinburgh had to make that
number of appointments in 1582 in order that their new College
might begin operations. They were content with a much smaller
equipment. They merely looked about for one qualified man to begin
with; and, when they had got him, they could consider the institution
fairly launched. This may require a little explanation.
The Charter of the new College contained provisions for its
being eventually a university of complete dimensions, with not only a
General Faculty or Faculty of Arts (then usually called the Faculty of
Philosophy), but also the three special or professional Faculties of
Theology, Law, and Medicine. But, though the Magistrates and Town
Council looked forward, no doubt, to the attainment of this
perfection by the University at some time or other, they were not so
ambitious at first, and, indeed, had to accommodate their aims to the
meagreness of their means. They thought that, if they succeeded in
founding the general faculty, or Faculty of Arts, the most important
part of their work would be done, and the rest might gradually
follow. They gave all their attention at first, therefore, to the one
Faculty of Arts. To set up this Faculty alone would, according to
recent ideas of what is essential to its equipment, require at least
seven appointments. Since 1858 the professorships of Latin, Greek,
Mathematics, Natural Philosophy, Logic and Metaphysics, Moral
Philosophy, and Rhetoric and English Literature have been, as it
were, the Seven Golden Candlesticks of the Arts Faculty in the
University of Edinburgh,—the seven chairs in that faculty privileged
coequally above the rest in the curriculum for graduation. In those
old days, however, there was no notion that even as many as seven
separate candlesticks were needed. Latin was pre-eminent as the sine
qua non for all the rest. It was the language in which all the formal
instruction within every university was then given, and with which,
so far as concerned the power of understanding it, speaking it, and to
some extent writing it, all students were supposed to be acquainted
before they commenced their university course. Further, in the other
subjects, which were all taught through this medium of Latin, there
was no such division of labour as at present. Mathematics and
Natural Philosophy had not then attained such dimensions in the
world of knowledge, nor were Moral Philosophy and Rhetoric so
extricated from Logic and Metaphysics, nor was proficiency in any or
all of those subjects deemed so incompatible with a competent
knowledge of Greek, but that one and the same professor could be
expected to take students through the whole series of studies by
himself. Now it would be but a sad jumble of superficialities that
would result from such a system of individual professorships of
everything; but in those days the totum scibile had not come to be so
monstrous or heterogeneous an aggregate but that it might be
supposed capable of being carried with tolerable compactness under
one able man’s hat, and of being taught by such a man more or less
effectively by means of a series of established Latin text-books. The
supposition, though absurd enough even then, was the less absurd
because the subjects were made to follow each other in a regular
order through a university course of four years. The professor began
in his first year with the simpler subjects, and then carried the same
students, in their second, third, and fourth years, through the more
difficult subjects, until, at the end of the fourth year, he had fitted
them for their graduation, or, as it was called, their “laureation,” in
Arts. By this method, it will be seen, the number of Arts professors in
every university required to be but four at the most,—each professor
making his four years’ round with the same students till he had seen
them made Masters of Arts, and then returning to receive a new class
of freshmen or entrants with whom to repeat his round. In fact, in
each of the already established universities of Scotland there were
four such principal Arts professors, or Philosophy professors. In
some universities, it is true, there were special professors in addition,
relieving the general professors of particular kinds of work; but the
four general or circulating professors were the essential complement
of the Arts Faculty. They were called “regents,” by way of distinction.
It will be obvious now that, though the newly-founded
University of Edinburgh required at least four Philosophy professors
or regents before even its Arts Faculty could be considered fully
equipped, yet one regent was enough to start with. All that was
necessary was that one fit professor should be ready to receive the
first set of students that should present themselves. For the first year
this single professor could do the whole of the University work; and
only when he had carried his students through the first year of their
course, and had to pass on to the second year with them, would it be
necessary to appoint a second regent, to follow him with the new set
of students who would then come to the University doors. The third
regent might be appointed the year after that, and the fourth not till
a year later.
All this the Magistrates and Town Council of Edinburgh, anxious
for the success of the new institution, but bound to be careful of
expenses, had calculated beforehand. It was, of course, a most
serious question with them who should be the first regent. No one
could tell how much depended on that. A bad appointment might
wreck the University at the outset.
Fortunately, through the recommendation of that same Mr.
James Lawson, Knox’s successor in the ministry of Edinburgh, who
had already had so much to do with the founding of the University,
the Magistrates and Town Council selected a man whose
appointment neither the City nor the University had any cause
afterwards to regret. This was Mr. Robert Rollock,—the Rev. Robert
Rollock would be now the designation,—then one of the Philosophy
professors in the University of St. Andrews. He was a Stirlingshire
man by birth, had been educated at St. Andrews, was twenty-eight
years of age, and had already won good opinions among those who
knew him. A deputation having been sent to St. Andrews to invite
him to the new post, he came to Edinburgh in September 1583 to
offer himself for inspection; and on the 14th of that month an
agreement was signed between him and the Lord Provost,
Magistrates, and Town Council. Rollock, on his part, agreed to “enter
to the Colledge newly foundit within the burgh,” and to “exerce the
office of the Regent of the said Colledge, in instructioun,
governament, and correctioun of the youth and persones whilk sall
be committed to his chairge,” faithfully attending always to the rules
and injunctions to be given him by the Provost, Bailies, and Council;
“for the whilkis causis” they, on their part, “binds and oblesis thame
and their successoris thankfullie to content and pay to the said Mr.
Robert the soume of fortie pundis usual money of this realme, at twa
termis in the yeir, Candlemes and Lammes, be twa equall portionis,
and sall susteine him and are servand in their ordinar expensis....
Attour [i.e. moreover] the said Mr. Robert sall repare and have, for
his labouris to be takin in instructing everie bairne repairing to the
said Colledge, yearly, as followis: to wit, fra the bairnes inhabitants of
the said burgh, fortie schillings, and fra the bairnes of uthers, nocht
inhabitants therein, three pundis, or mair as the bairnes parentis
please to bestow of their liberalitie.” Further prospects of
remuneration and promotion were held forth to Mr. Rollock, and
there was every disposition to make him comfortable.
 An original portrait of Rollock now hangs in the Senate Hall of
Edinburgh University. It is but a poor specimen of the painter’s art,
and it does not suggest that Mr. Rollock can have been an Apollo. It
exhibits, however, a very distinct physiognomy,—a physiognomy so
distinct, so unlike anybody’s else, that, were Mr. Rollock to reappear
any afternoon now in the Canongate or in Princes Street, there would
be no difficulty in recognising him. The complexion, as the portrait
tells us, and as we learn from a contemporary biographic sketch of
him, was ruddy, or ruddy with a mixture of white (colore rubido cui
candor quidam admistus); and the hair and beard,—both cut short,
so as to give a character of round compactness to the head,—were of
reddish hue (comâ subrufâ). The biographic sketch, which is by one
who knew him well, adds that he was of middle stature and of rather
weakly health, and bears testimony to his piety, conscientiousness,
peaceful disposition, and pleasant sociability.
It was on the 1st of October 1583 that this round-headed,
reddish-haired man, of Stirlingshire birth, but of St. Andrews
training, opened the first session of the University of Edinburgh by
an address delivered in the public hall of the new premises in the
presence of a crowded audience of citizens and others. Next day,
when he received the students who came to enroll themselves in the
first class in the new University, their number, what with those
supplied by Edinburgh itself, what with those attracted from other
parts of the country, was found to be far greater than had been
anticipated. Very soon, however, it appeared that this was not
altogether a cause for congratulation. The motley body of the
entrants had not been manipulated by Rollock for more than a week
or two when he had to marshal them into two divisions. A
considerable number had broken down in Latin,—were found to be
so ill-grounded in that indispensable preliminary that it was hopeless
to go on with them as members of the first University class proper,
the teaching of which had to be through the medium of Latin. To
meet this exigency Rollock proposed to the Town Council that they
should at once appoint a second regent, and that this regent should
have committed to his charge all who were backward in Latin, to be
formed into a preparatory or Humanity class, and drilled as such for
a year, while he himself should go on with the others in the first
proper Arts or Philosophy class. Were that done, then, next year,
when he himself should be carrying on his students into the second