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The cholera epidemics of the 19th century have recently received much historiographic attention. One of the major questions raised by that discussion concerns the social stratification of the cholera victims. This paper contributes to that discussion by giving an analysis of the epidemics of 1855 and 1867 in Zürich, Switzerland. Sources are a great problem. Therefore a definite answer to the question of the social status of the cholera victims is only possible for the later, more serious outbreak of cholera. The problem of social stratification is connected with the problem of poverty. How is the usage of this term and its meanings determined by the actual social inequality of the cholera victims? The medical doctors in Zürich were interested in the relationship between poverty and cholera, albeit from different perspectives: the doctors of the 1850s regarded poverty primarily as a moral problem. Their advice on public health measures centered on traditional ideas of quarantine and (moral) education of the poor. In contrast, the doctors of the 1860s thought of poverty as a social problem. They hoped that sanitary reforms would be the answer to the social problems of Zürich.