During his twelve-year pilgrimage, Simēon, an Armenian pilgrim from the town of Zamość in Poland, visited prominent holy sites in Istanbul, Jerusalem, and the Surb Karapet Monastery in Anatolia before deciding to call on the tombs of the Apostles Peter and Paul in Rome. Thus, in 1611, after crossing the Ottoman-Venetian border on the eastern side of the Adriatic on his way from Istanbul to Rome and finally arriving, after years of travel, in Christian lands, Simēon found himself suddenly incarcerated in the lazzaretto of Split.

As a passenger who had joined a caravan of merchants with horses and mules loaded with goods, Simēon travelled from Istanbul along the great highway of the Ottoman Balkans to Edirne (Turkey) and then to Plovdiv (Philippopolis, Bulgaria). From Plovdiv, after seven days’ travel along mountainous roads, the caravan arrived in Skopje (Northern Macedonia). After another six days of strenuous journey along the difficult path, the pilgrim arrived in Novi Pazar (Serbia) and then in Sarajevo (Bosnia and Herzegovina). From there, Simēon and the caravan reached the fortress of Klis (Croatia), situated on the mountain pass overlooking the Venetian town of Split (Spalato) on the Adriatic coast. The caravan that arrived at the Ottoman-Venetian border was composed of five or six hundred men. As Simēon recounts, Venetian soldiers arrived to accompany the caravan to Split.

There, on the Ottoman-Venetian border, began Simēon’s extraordinary experience – his first encounter with the practice of quarantine. The soldiers whom he expected would greet him and provide safety, instead deprived him of his freedom and took the whole caravan directly (avoiding the town centre) to the lazzaretto, where Simēon was locked in a cell without any explanation.