Baltimore — King Herod, the bloodthirsty Judean ruler who reputedly tried to kill Jesus, died an excruciating death, brought on by kidney disease and finished by gangrene, a medical sleuth said Friday.
"It's a very unpleasant way to die," said Dr. Philip Mackowiak, the director of the Historical Clinicopathological Conference at the University of Maryland medical school.
At the annual conference, doctors apply their diagnostic skills to historical figures whose deaths have not been satisfactorily explained.
Before his death in 4 B.C., Herod suffered an array of symptoms itching, painful intestinal problems, breathlessness, fever, swelling in the feet, convulsions and, finally, gangrene of the genitalia.
Peter Richardson, a religion professor at the University of Toronto, found the description of Herod's ailments in the writings of the first-century historian Flavius Josephus.
Fournier's gangrene, rare today, probably killed Herod, said Dr. Jan Hirschmann of the University of Washington medical school, who examined Herod's case history. The disease would have killed the king in a week or less.
The symptom of itching led Hirschmann to conclude Herod suffered from kidney disease. Itching might have led to the gangrene as well, causing Herod to scratch his skin and open it to infectious bacteria.
Many have speculated that Herod had gonorrhea, but Hirschmann said there's no evidence to support that.
Kidney disease also may explain some of Herod's brutal acts including the executions of family members. The untreated accumulation of bodily wastes can cause mental illness.
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