“Bless You”

1.     Common English expression, used to wish a person blessings in various situations, especially as a response to a sneeze, and also, when parting or writing a valediction.

2.     The practice of blessing someone who sneezes, dating as far back as at least AD 77, however, is far older than most specific explanations can account.

3.     Gregory I became Pope in AD 590 as an outbreak of the bubonic plague was reaching Rome. In hopes of fighting off the disease, he ordered unending prayer and parades of chanters through the streets. At the time, sneezing was thought to be an early symptom of the plague. The blessing ("God bless you!") became a common effort to halt the disease.

4.     This saying originated in Europe around the time of the bubonic plague.