In a time of political failure, economic disintegration, and constant religious disagreement, Europe was already entering the Dark Ages. Then, in the 14th century, the Black Death struck. A disease transmitted through infected flea carrying rats, the Bubonic Plague was devastating to European society not only because it was highly contagious and very lethal, but also because it had unknown origins. A highly contagious disease, the Bubonic Plague, spread swiftly throughout European trade routes. It is believed that the disease originated in China, and spread to Europe via the Afro-Eurasian trade network. The great contagion of the black death is reflected in Document 1. The first record of the black death in Europe was on June 30th, 1347, …show more content…
Appropriately nicknamed the “Black Death”, the plague often “began with swellings in the groin and armpit, in both men and women, some of which were as big as apples. (Doc 2)” The disease then “began to take on qualities of a deadly sickness, and the body would be covered with dark and livid spots, which would appear in great numbers. (Doc 2)” These symptoms were quickly followed by death. The lethalness of the disease is expressed in Document 4, which describes the burial of the deceased as “layers of cheese in a lasagna.” In other words, there were too many dead for each one to have his or her own grave. More concrete statistical evidence can be found in Documents 8 and 9. According to Document 8, population decline per region ranged from 20% to 37%, with over 4.5 million deaths in France, 1.2 million in England and Wales, and 16.2 million deaths throughout all of Europe combined. Document 9 also shows similar long term results as Europe’s population fell from 83 million to 60 million between 1345 and 1400. This astronomically high death rate didn’t only impact the emotional and social stability of all who remained alive, but also sent Europe into complete bankruptcy, destroying trade, agriculture, and
The Black Death was devastating and was one of the most significant events in Medieval Britain. The Black Death was also known the plague and bubonic plague it describes the spread of disease that caused mass deaths throughout Britain. The disease itself was carried by fleas and spread across Europe between 1346-1353 leaving towns and city such as Siena Italy with 85% of the population wiped out. This was seen all over Europe including Britain and it can be argued economic factors was the most significant consequences of the Black Death. However there are many factors such as political, social factors and Mortality rates that were also results of the Black Death and perhaps social factors may be more significant.
"The Black Death" is known as the worst natural disaster in European history. The plague spread throughout Europe from 1346-1352. Those who survived lived in constant fear of the plague's return and it did not disappear until the 1600s. Not only were the effects devastating at the time of infection, but during the aftermath as well. "The Black Death" of the fourteenth century dramatically altered Europe's social and economic structure.
History reveals the mid-14th century as a very unfortunate time for Europe. It was during this period when the continent became afflicted by a terrible plague. The source of the pathogen is known today as bubonic but was colloquially known as “The Black Death” to Europeans of the day. The plague caused a tremendous number of deaths and was a catalyst of change, severely impacting Europe’s cultural, political and religious institutions.
Starting in the early 14th century and ending around 1353, the Black Death was a horrific time in history. The Bubonic Plague killed about sixty-seven percent of Europe’s population. People living in Europe at the time of the Black Death responded differently to the devastation around them: many people fled, some stayed to investigate, and others saw it as an opportunity to obtain what others had lost, mostly money.
The Bubonic Plague or the Black Death has been in the history books since the medieval times. This deadly disease has claimed nearly 1.5 million lives in Europe (Gottfried). The Black Death hit Europe in October of 1347 and quickly spread through most of Europe by the end of 1349 and continued on to Scandinavia and Russia in the 1350s. Not only did the plague effect the European population by killing one-third to two-thirds (Gottfried), it also hurt the social and economic structures of every European society.
The Bubonic Plague was one the largest pandemics to sweep through Europe. It occurred during the late 13th century through the early 14th century affecting over 75 million people (“How”). The plague first hit Asia, then Europe, next to Scandinavia, and finally making its way to Russia (McCabe). The Black Death’s- another name for the plague- origin has been speculated by many different scientists over the years, but it has
The Black Death, also known as the Bubonic Plague, was one of the deadliest epidemics among human history. This illness arrived in Europe around 1347 and from there, it ran its course killing millions of Europeans, almost one third of the country’s population. To put this into number form, the population in “1347 was 75 million people and by the time 1352 came, there were only 50 million” people (“The Black Death: Bubonic Plague”). People believe the Black Death started in China and since China was trading with other countries like Asia and Europe it caused the illness to spread. Just to show how horrifying this illness was some reported that when “twelve Genoese ships docked in the Sicilian port of Messina” (“Black Death”), most of the sailors
The Black plagues also known as the Bubonic plague. A violent disease able to kill over hundreds of thousand people, destroy the work force and leave an economic impact all around Europe. The black plague began in the Middle Ages around 1300s. It occurred in china traveling all the way to every country in Europe.
The bubonic plague of the thirteen hundreds swept through Europe, claiming the lives of one-third of its ' population in merely three years. This was the most horrific epidemic the world has seen to date. Poor sanitation practices, improper burial of corpses, and insufficient systems for waste removal were important factors in allowing the plague to manifest (Byrne 31). Infected fleas and rats, brought by trade ships and the Mongols, initially brought the disease and allowed it to spread throughout Europe with immense speed and terror (The Plague). Infection brought vomiting, multi-organ failure, black boils and even blackened limbs which inspired the term "black plague" (Eastman 10). Many sought answers as to why they were being cursed with the black death and looked for ways to channel their despair. Religious zealots looked for answers outside of Roman Catholicism which created a divide in the church (Boccaccio 8). Emotional turmoil and a search for a cure led to a revolution in art and medicine that brought the world into the Renaissance. While the far-reaching black plague vanquished much of Europe, it also brought about positive changes to society.
The Black Death arrived in Europe in 1347. It was brought there when twelve Genoese trading ships stopped at the Sicilian port of Messina after their extensive quest through the Black Sea. The townspeople who met on the docks were in for a rude awakening: Almost all of the sailors were dead. The sailors who were still alive were suffering from intolerable pain. What the people of Europe did not know was that over the next few years their continent would be over run by this mysterious disease which in time, would kill over 20 million people (Black Death). This was the start of the greatest impact on Europe; The Black Death.
In the case of English plague history, this feature has been underlined by Oxford historian Paul Slack. "We must look at it on a plague-by-plague basis.". Victims of the disease were covered with dark blotches due to damage to the underlying skin and tissue. This implies that that around 50 million people died in the Black Death. This was a widespread epidemic of the Bubonic Plague that passed from Asia and through Europe in the mid fourteenth century. Those groups most ravaged by the Black Death had already suffered from famine earlier in the fourteenth century as storms and drought caused crop failures. In the span of three years, the Black Death killed one third of all the people in Europe. Medieval descriptions of the Black Death sound like the hemorrhagic fever caused by an Ebola-like virus, the authors say. A ship that left Oslo at the beginning of June would probably sail through the Sound around June 20th and reach Elbing in the second half of July, in time to unleash an epidemic outbreak around August 24th. History books have long taught the Black Death, which wiped out a quarter of Europe's population in the Middle Ages, was caused by bubonic plague, spread by infected fleas that lived on black rats. In the wake of the first outbreak, Europeans learned that quarantining infected families for 40 days was effective in stopping the spread. This traumatic population change coming into the Late Middle Ages caused great changes in European culture and lifestyle. The River Thames brought more ships and infection to London which spread to the rest of England. The bubonic plague is actually the weakest strain of known plagues. The outbreak of the Black Death in the Prussian town of Elbing (today the Polish town of Elblag) on August 24th, 1349, was a new milestone in the history of the Black Death. Outbreaks included the Great Plague of London (1665-66), in which one in five residents
The bubonic plague or “Black Death” is caused by the bacteria Yrsinia pestis (Y.pestis.) The disease is carried by fleas on the back of mice; once the infected mice dies the flea moves onto a human host, bites the host and infects them with the bacteria. The Black Death left a majority of the known population of the world during 1348-1349 dead with a thirty to fifty percent mortality rate. The plague not only brought death all around the population of this time but also creased a mindset in which people became numb to the death around them but scared to die and obsessed with their death and the manor in which they were treated after death.
The Black Death, which was not recognized as the Bubonic Plague until the mid-1300s, is a disease that killed a large majority of Europe’s population. “Plague that first struck Europe in 1347 and killed perhaps one-third of the population”
In 1347, an epidemic termed the “Black Death” disturbed Europe in the Fourteenth Century. Triggered by the bacteria “Yersinia Pestis,” the illness reached humankind from mosquitos feeding off of rodents. Symptoms included apple-sized growths on the neck, groin, and armpit, black blotches, and bleeding underneath the skin. The plague was fatal, killing an estimated one third of the population in Europe. Consequently, the Black Death led to a host of reactions, meaning events and occurrences that sprung from the plague. To name a few, feudalism’s structure crumbled, education developed rapidly, the Church’s influence weakened, public health expanded, and economic advances
The Black Death is the name that was given to a global epidemic of the bubonic plague that occurred in medieval Europe during the 1350’s. It was brought to Europe when twelve ships arrived filled with people either infected or dead from the disease, and it spread quickly. The disease wiped approximately 60 percent of Europe’s entire population, which is more than any other known pandemic up until that time. Although the black plague had drastic effects on Europe’s population and social structure, it also had many positive outcomes such as leading to the growth of cities, strengthening the immune systems of plague survivors, and increasing technological innovation.