Black Plague And The Black Epidemic

In the year 1348 the world changed forever. The Black Death, which is another name for the Bubonic Plague, laid havoc on the entire world. “The plague chases the screaming without pity and does not accept a treasure for a ransom. Its engine is far-reaching. The plague enters into the house and swears it will not leave except with all of its inhabitants…” (Al-Wardi, #29, 113). The plague did not care if the people were rich, poor, white, black, Muslim or Catholic, it would kill whomever it could. The plague brought out the worst in people because people acted selfishly, people were completely inhumane, and there was no peace.

The Black Death was one of the most life-changing pandemics in history. It was first discovered 550 years later in the 1800s by Alexandre Yersin, a french biologist. In his honor, the plague was named Yersinia Pestis. The plague traveled in two major ways. Yersin discovered that it traveled by infected fleas; the flea would attempt to feed on a human or animal and would then regurgitate the disease into the new host, further spreading the illness. Urban areas across Europe were populous with rats, which were one of the main hosts of the plague. These rodents spread the Black Death throughout cities in days. The unaffected still were not safe if they did not come in contact with an infected flea or rat. The plague also traveled pneumonically, or through the air. It caused large boils full of blood and pus, which would pop and spread. Another symptom was coughing, which was one of the many ways of proliferation. The disease eventually spread throughout Europe and killed a third of it’s population. It’s wrath caused many shortages, loss in hope, riots, and even some good things, such as many changes in art, science, and education. Therefore, the Black Death was one of the most life-changing pandemics in history.

The plague, otherwise known as “the Black Death”, brought on much turmoil and suffering for the habitants of Pistoia. Numerous ordinances were put into effect with the primary goal of limiting the spread of the plague as well as to keep the city as healthy as possible. These ordinances typically focused on confinement, i.e. no one goes to Pisa and Luca and no one from Pisa and Luca is allowed to enter Pistoia (ordinance 1), how death and burials are to be processed (ordinances 3-12), and how butchers were to handle their animals and animal carcasses (ordinances 13-19). Essentially, confinement was targeted in hopes of stopping the spread of the infection while keeping the city isolated. Secondly, how the bodies of plague victims and their

From 1347 to 1352 a string of the bubonic plague lay waste to western Europe, killing millions. In Italy, nearly a third of the population died; in England, half. The plague was a looming presence, always in the back of people’s minds. The symptoms of the Black Death caused great strife for westerners. Giovanni Boccaccio, an Italian writer and poet, described the symptoms he saw during the first outbreak of the plague: “Not such were they as in the East, where an issue of blood from the nose was a manifest sign of inevitable death; but in men a women alike it first betrayed itself by the emergence of certain tumors in the groin or the armpits, some of which grew as large as a common apple, others as an egg, some more, some less, which the common folk called gavoccioli.” Both Italy and England desperately searched for answers, claiming that the Black Death was the cause of a higher force, but realising that the squalor of their countries also played a part in spreading the illness. Although Italy and England both had a common explanation for the cause of the plague and they both implemented better public health standards, they adopted different public health practices after the plague.

Diseases have always been a threat to humans, all throughout history. One of the most destructive disease outbreaks in history was the plague outbreak which peaked in 1346 to 1353, in Europe, commonly known as the Black Death. This plague outbreak was extremely deadly and killed 30-60% of the European population at the time of the outbreak. The outbreak is commonly believed to have been caused by the bubonic plague, but modern evidence suggests that the Black Death was caused by pneumonic plague, a much more contagious and deadly infection.

Sickness times a thousand equals the Black Death. In our world, many disasters have occurred, causing terrible damage emotionally, physically, and mentally. However, I believe that the Black Death is the worst disaster to have occurred throughout our world’s history. It all started in 1348, when trading ships from different countries around Europe settled at the port of Messina, Sicily. Once the ship dropped their anchor many of their sailors were found dead, and the few surviving carried with them the deadly disease so dangerous that it would quickly lead to death. Scientists researched and concluded that the disease started from Central Asia (Mongolia), when fleas on rats boarded the many ships from Europe. The fleas got on the sailors’ skin and started killing them instantly. However, many thought that the disease had originated from the Far East and was spread along many major trade routes. When the people of Sicily finally started finding out what was causing the death, they closed their port and trading system with other countries. (Wikipedia) The ships were forced to anchor somewhere else in other countries, which allowed the disease to spread even more quickly. I believe that the Black Plague was a disastrous event that affected all aspects and the future of European and Central Asian society, their political and economic environment, and their future advancement to medicine.

The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in history. Many Western Europeans were living with this disease for nearly four hundred years. The disease was able to spread rapidly and affected Europe in many ways. Since this disease was rapidly spreading throughout Europe it scared many of the people during this time. Many historians considered the Black Death in the fourteenth century a turning point in Western European history. According to Streissguth, “Before the epidemic of bubonic and pneumonic plague died out three years later, it would kill more than one-third of the continent’s population.” Hundreds of thousand people died from this horrific disease which changed Europe forever. Near the end of the fourteenth century it was obvious to the people living during that time that the plague had become a regular and destructive aspect of life. The plague had left many rural areas untouched after the late 1300’s but the epidemic began almost every decade. When the Black Death began to spread across Europe it caused unimaginable fear, panic, and chaos for the people. The Black Death was an important turning point in Europe, where the economics, politics, and society would never be the same. The Black Death spread rapidly across Europe causing many people to become ill and die which resulted in social, economic, and religious upheavals.

The Black Plague began in central Asia. It originated from southern China and went along the Silk Road. It crossed through central Asia, India and also into the middle East. (Stock Vol.4) Later on, scientists found out the cause of the Black Plague to start was ships and carriers, which had rats onboard that were infested by fleas. India was deeply affected by this, resulting in 13 million deaths. (Wells 1097) The most common disease during the Black Plague was the bubonic plague. A person can only obtain it when a flea, that is already infected, bites a person or when there’s a cut in the person’s skin for bacteria to go through. People who had been infected can get fevers, headaches, and chills. (Wells 1097) The bubonic plague was painful and had swollen lymph nodes. Inside of it was black, full of blood

25-50 million people. That is the amount of casualties caused by the Black Death, it was brought to Europe in the 1340’s by ships returning from the eastern side of the world. However, most of the men on the ships were already dead or nearly dead, sick with the terrible virus. Although the Black Death is very lethal and difficult to survive, they have now found ways to prevent the virus from infecting anyone else.

The black plague was a deadly disease that started in the mid-fourteenth century. There were many ways of the disease spreading throughout Europe. In 1346, Janibeg decided to cut off Kaffa’s trade routes by harboring in the ocean around it. Kaffa was on the verge of dying, but most of Janibeg’s soldiers aboard the ships had died from the plague, so his remaining soldiers gathered the dead diseased bodies, threw them over Kaffa’s walls. Kaffa then placed all the bodies into the river, took their ships and fled to Italy, but it was too late because they were already infected and carried it with them. It was mostly spread by the sailors that were on ships because the rats on the same ships had the disease. The rats were bitten by fleas, so the fleas then gained the disease and moved onto a human host after their rat host died. They would bite the human and let the disease flow into their bloodstream. The sailors then came home to their families with the disease and because of that, the sickness spread. Many of the doctors that would treat the ill, would end up coming down with the same disease by the end of the day. The Black Plague had a big impact on history because after the plague

The black death was a silent, but deadly disease that was killing off people, with no cure. Research shows that the horrific black plague was caught and spread by rats. The plague doctors thought is was spread by smell, which was why they wore haunting masks. Instead, it was spread by rats because when the people drove out the rats from the sewers the disease spread rapidly. In other words, when there were more rats closer to people the plague was caught and spread faster. The plague was stronger than ever and nobody knew how it spread Additionally, when they killed of the rats the spread of the plague began to die off. This proves that once there were less rats to spread the horrible disease, it died off. Therefore, the plague was spread

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 Plague changed everything about life in the European world. Politics were affected23 by the plague. Politicians were not showing up to important things and some were passing away. This made politics a very hard thing to handle during this thime. The economy was in a tough situation. Inflation was out of hand and taxes weren’t being paid. This made the economy crash. The plague caused cultural reprocussions24. Society was losing its traditions and moral values. The plague casted a shadow over the beliefs of the European people. They couldn’t communicate and live the ways they used to because they were so secluded from one another. The communication between other had almost vanished at this point in time. Once again, the art began to be dark and gloomy26 to represent the struggle everyone was facing. Skeletons filled the canvas of painting to express the everyday deaths of hundreds of people. The church had lost most of its believers27. Everyone blamed the church for the death and pain. There was no reason to go to church because they could nothing to help. Through these things, European people were shaken and

People in the time of the black plague didn’t know how the plague was spreading so they continued to move and didn’t properly quarantine people to prevent the plague from further spreading. No one has been able to identify exactly where the Black Death started but scientists today believe that it began in central Asia and then spread to the rest of the world. The Black Death was spread by infected fleas who had bitten rats that had the disease. Some scientists believe that the Black Death was pneumatic and not bubonic because of how it could spread from one person to another. If pneumatic plague manages to make it into the lungs of a person that then coughs or sneezes it would then spread the disease. In the attempt to save themselves or even sometimes their child people would abandon children in the attempt to save them making it extremely hard for them to survive because of the lack of food and care that a child needs. This is how the movements of people impacted the spread of the black

The Black Plague is known as the most fatal disease in the worlds history! The disease killed nearly one-third of Europe’s population in the fourteenth century. The Black Plague is also known as the Black Death and was transmitted to humans by rodents such as rats and spread due to extremely unsanitary living conditions. European cities such as Paris and London were most devastatingly affected by the Black Plague