Get the Popular Science daily newsletter💡 Breakthroughs, discoveries, and DIY tips sent six days a week. Wealth confers privilege, and for many people during the Middle Ages, this privilege extended into the afterlife. For centuries, rich Christians often flaunted their money by purchasing gravesites as close to their church as possible. The trend often mirrored their relationship with religion before their deaths, too—nobility and knights frequently ensured they sat in the front pews of services. Money is only one facet of social relations, however. Communities have long discriminated against and ostracized residents with debilitating illnesses—especially those with outward physical effects. And in Europe, the medieval era was particularly disease-ridden. But what happened when money and social stigma collided? To find out, an international research team recently surveyed skeletal remains from five medieval cemeteries in Denmark—three in urban areas and two in rural regions. They were especially interested in identifying bodies with clear indications of two of the era’s most prevalent and highly infectious diseases: tuberculosis and leprosy. Although a person can host a tuberculosis infection …