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Wasn't the origin of the small pox vaccine that people would rub the pustules from one person onto themselves?

There's a historical practice called variolation which involved inoculating healthy people with ground scabs/pus from people with smallpox. They'd make a small scrape on the skin and introduce the material. It was a reasonably protective practice, especially considering the options available at the time.

Iirc, Edward Jenner's smallpox vaccine was based on cowpox, a related but less serious disease.

Yes, which is how we ultimately get to the word vaccine. "vacca" is latin for cow.

From what I recall about 2% of people who got the procedure died. On the other hand actually catching smallpox had something like a 30% fatality rate, so the procedure became fairly popular.

Yes [1]:

> This consisted of transferring to healthy people small amounts of material from smallpox sores, resulting in milder forms of illness and much lower mortality than natural infection. Some sources suggest practices of variolation were taking place as early as 200 BCE.

[1] https://www.who.int/news-room/spotlight/history-of-vaccinati...

It’s a bit disappointing your comment was disliked. It’s on topic and completely relevant.

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