The Black Death Essay

Black death was a bubonic plague, which took the lives of millions of people in the mid 1300s. This plague was caused by a bacterium called Yersinia pestis, which lived in fleas. Therefore, transmitting the bacteria to its rodent hosts every time they would feed. The bacteria then killed the rodents leaving the fleas without hosts to feed on and in result they would feed on the humans. (Bailey 7-12) Most people who were infected would last two to three days before they died, no longer than two to three weeks. The plague moved rapidly, medical researchers believe it could have moved as fast as eight to twelve miles a day. The plague was first encountered in China and it spread through Asia and into Europe in a

Within weeks of the plague hitting it killed millions of people sweeping out ⅓ of Europe.(Shapiro 38). (SIP-B) The black plague had two different types of plagues that affected many people together. The two plagues that affected people were the bubonic plague and pneumonic plague. The pneumonic and bubonic had some differences and similarities but the biggest similarity of all was the factor of death. (STEWE-1) The bubonic plague was the plague that spread by a bite from a rat flea that was carrying the disease. So the only way you could be affected by the bubonic plague was from a flea bite that had bitten a rat that spread the disease (“The Black Death"). (STEWE-2) The pneumonic plague was where the bacteria of the black plague spread through the air that would cause an infection in the lungs, making it hard to breathe. The pneumonic plague was easier to contract than the bubonic plague because if you were to breathe in air an infected person with the black plague had recently coughed, it would be more than likely for you to contract the plague (“The Black

The Bubonic Plague, also known as the Black Death, was a fatal disease that affected millions of people. Originated from China, the Bubonic Plague spread throughout Europe and made its way to Italy in 1347. (document 1) The Black Death, which covered the body with dark and livid spots, was difficult to treat. No one knew how to treat the disease nor how it began to spread.

What is the plague? The plague or referred to as the Black Death, according to the CDC (2015), “is a disease that affects humans and other mammals and caused by the Yersinia pestis bacteria. Humans usually get plague after being bitten by a rodent flea that is carrying the plague bacterium or by handling an animal infected with plague”. There are three categories of a plague. There is the bubonic plague, which is the most common form. With this form bacteria infects the lymph system and causes it to become inflamed. Symptoms of this type of plague are fever, headache, chills, and swollen and tender lymph nodes, which are called buboes. Then there is the Septicemic, which occurs when the bacteria multiply in the blood. Symptoms of this type of plague are fever, chills, extreme weakness, abdominal pain, shock, and possibly bleeding into the skin and other organs. Also, skin and other tissues may turn black and die, especially fingers, toes and the nose (CDC, 2015). Then there is the Pneumonic Plague, which is the most serious form of plague and occurs when Y. pestis bacteria infect the lungs and cause pneumonia (NIH, 2015). This is the only form of the plague that can be transmitted human to human. Symptoms of this form of the plague are ever, headache, weakness, and a rapidly

The Black Death consisted mainly of Bubonic plague, but pneumonic plague was also present in the epidemic. Symptoms of the Bubonic plague included high fever, aching limbs, and blood vomiting. Most characteristic of the disease were swollen lymph nodes, which grew until they

The Bubonic Plague, otherwise known as the Black Death, devastated the world between 1347 and 1351. Due to the plague being transmitted through fleas, many people were susceptible to the disease that wiped out much of the population. The plague caused much throughout Europe because of the number of lives lost, the number of people affected, and the limited amount of medical research that came from this period in time. The number of lives lost caused devastation in Europe.

Europe was hit with the Bubonic Plague, also known as The Black Death, in 1347 devastating the European Society. The Bubonic Plague was hard to get away from due to the conditions in Europe and took many lives. The Bubonic Plague also influenced religion and started changing the normal European society into a new one.

The Bubonic Plague was a spreading disease. It infected and killed most of the population of Europe within a few years. The plague began spreading in 1348 when fleas caused this infection when they bit animals such as rats. The bacteria entered the skin through the flea bite which soon infected the lymph nodes. These rats stowed away on trade ships which quickly passed this deadly disease to humans. The Bubonic plague was very disastrous to the European society until it finally began to slow down in 1351. It killed so many people due to its rapid spreading. It lowered the religious belief and trust in God by many people in the community. Also, the local physicians lacked the knowledge of the plagues symptoms and its cure.

The first major European outbreak of the plague occurred 1347 in Italy. The plague is a bacterium carried by fleas. It likely originated in Asia, but shipboard rats carried diseased fleas to Europe where the densely populated and unsanitary conditions made it catastrophic. The most common bubonic plague results in dark colored buboes (swollen lymph glands in the armpits and groin). These black or dark spots led to the name Black Death because most people who had the swollen dark spots died. The medicine available to people during this time was of no affect. In fact in his popular book, In The Wake of The

It was a type of plague that was spread via the bite of infected rat fleas. The initial cause of the plague was diseased rats, with the bacteria Yersinia pestis, in their bloodstream as seen in source 1. Fleas lived on rats and when a flea bit the infected rat, the bacteria would enter the fleas stomach and multiply as seen in source 1. Due to the sudden decrease in the rat population (from disease), many fleas needed a better source of food, so they jumped onto people and bit them. This in turn is how people caught the plague. In the 1320’s a great famine broke out in china, and this caused many rats to die, also resulting in the quick spread of the plague. The name black death came from the swollen buboes (glands) in the victim’s neck, arm pit, and inner thigh that turned black as they filled with blood. Victims often died within 12 hours to 7 days of being bitten. Due to lack of hygiene and living in close, dirty and crowded proximity, rats were very common, making the disease easily contagious. The black death was a combination of three different streams of plague – bubonic, pneumonic and septicaemic. The bubonic plague was the most common form of the plague and was caused by infected fleas biting people. As seen in source 2, sufferers would have large lumps covering their body, as well as have a fever or headache. Soon after the victim would have slurred speech and vomit blood. Pneumonic was deadly

The Black Death wasn’t some minor disease, but a disease so deadly and widespread at the time, that it greatly impacted Europe’s population, economy, and political structure. Carried by fleas and infected rats, the plague entered Europe through trading. According to C. Warren Hollister, “none can have emerged from the ordeal unaffected…” This portrays the severity of the plague, and how even if your life was spared by the “hands” of the Black Death, your life was changed in some way. Many people died in their homes, in hope of surviving the plague. Although many perished, those who survived were exposed to many opportunities. According to

The Black Plague was one of the world’s most deadliest diseases. The Black Plague had many effects on the people back then when the Plague was most common. The effects we’re abandonment, burning of certain types of people, for example: The Jews, and over a third of Europe was killed because of the plague. The Black Plague caused major mortality rates to drastically increase. People believed that the plague was an act of god, sending it down as a test for the human’s survival.

In “The Black Death” the author Phillip Ziegler attempts to fully describe the Plague that struck Europe in 1338 and remained until 1665. The year of the great Plague of London Ziegler tries to give an unbiased account of the Plague by compiling information from contradictory sources. Ziegler begins the book with the Tartans catapulting diseased corpses into Genoese as the Genoese escape back to Europe. Following this, the author provides some insight into the Plague in Italy, Germany, and France, in which he highlights the persecution of Jews, who became the scapegoat for the Plague in Germany. The majority of the book discusses the Plague in England, dealing with the people that died.

The Bubonic Plague erupted in 1320 in the Gobi Desert in central Asia. This plague was passed through rodents to other animals and then to humans through flea bites. This plague has three different names, The Bubonic Plague, The Black Death, and Yersinia pestis. Y. Pestis was named after one of its co-founders, Alexandre Yersin. It’s called the Black death because your blood dries underneath of the skin and turns it black, you can also get skin sores that turn black.

The word plague means a dangerous disease that quickly spreads and causes death. Alexander Yersin identified the cause of the bubonic plague. He discovered that the disease was being caused by a deadly bacterium which he named after himself, Yersinia pestis. Yersin worked with a scientist named Pasteur in France to develop a treatment to fight the plague. Yersin was the first to suggest that rats and fleas were the main cause for the spreading of the plague. Symptoms of the plague emerge after one to seven days which include fever, swelling in the regional lymph nodes in the groin, armpit, or neck. In most cases the bacterium spread to the bloodstream and central nervous system resulting in death 100 percent of the time. There are actually three types of plague; the most common was the bubonic plague. “The disease in humans has three clinical forms: bubonic pneumonic and septicemia. The Bubonic plague is the best known form in popular lore, and indeed it constitutes about three-fourths of plague cases” (Encyclopedia Britannica 3). The bubonic plague is the blame for causing the Black Death of the fourteenth century. The symptoms of the bubonic plague strike rapidly within two to five days of being bitten by a flea or rat. The first stage of symptoms includes; fever, chills, severe headache, sore throat, and muscle aches. The second stage of symptoms include; vomiting, diarrhea, seizures, and respiratory failure. The bacterium travel to the immune system and began to break it