Écrouelles is the obsolete name of a disease of origin tubercular patient causing of the purulent Fistule S localized on the lymphatic ganglia of the Cou (Adénopathie). The word derives from the Latin scrofa , sow , which expresses the disgusting aspect of the Symptôme S. It makes doubled bloom with scrofule .

In much of country one grants to the kings a divine capacity. Thus the British sovereigns had the privilege to cure the epilepsy. The kings of Spain delivered had. The kings of Hungary made disappear the jaundice and the kings of Burgundy moved away the plague. The kings of France, for their part, had the gift to cure the scrofula, fatal disease at the time.

The capacity of the king to cure the patients (royal miracle) appeared at the 11th century under Philippe Ier. According to Guibert de Nogent, chronicler of this time, his son Louis VI the Large continued to achieve this wonder as a practitioner the touch on whole tapes people suffering from this disease. At the 13th century, one admitted that this capacity rose directly from the sacring.
The shortly after sound Sacring with Rheims, new the King de France, followed its court, went in pilgrimage on the tomb of Saint Marcoult to the priory of Corbeny located on the way halfway between Rheims and Laon, at the end is Chemin of the Ladies. Since the top the Middle Ages (of the fall of the Roman Empire with Charlemagne), one venerated the relics of this saint who lavished cures with the patients reached of the scrofula. The kings of France, while collecting themselves on the tomb of the saint man, granted this capacity of cure. This gift was hereditary: on his bed of death, the king was to give to his son the secrecy of the formula able to cure this disease.

At the time of the ceremony of the touch of the scrofula, the king Thaumaturge pronounced the sentence traditionally: “The king touches you, God cures you”. The celebration of this ceremony had also the advantage of maintaining the hope cure because this disease often presented natural remissions which made cure only the patient. This capacity confirmed the divine Droit whose the load of the monarch proceeded. It is Louis Hutin which was the first sovereign to be gone to this pilgrimage after its sacring which took place Sunday August 3rd 1315. This rite was followed until the May 29th 1825, date of the Sacre of Charles X.

External bonds

• '' Histoire of the Saint-Marcoul priory of Corbeny, and the cure of the scrofula '' by Mrs. Suzanne Trip hammer