Black Death: The Bubonic Plague

   

 

In the 14^th century, a deadly epidemic swept across the world. The Black Death, as it became known, was bubonic plague, a terrible disease that begins with fever, causes agonizing black dwellings in the glands, and finally leads to death, usually within a few days of infection. Millions of people died. Terrified people fled infected areas and carried the plague with them. In towns the doors of plague carriers were marked with crosses to warn others to keep away. The dead were collected in carts and buried in mass graves. In Europe about one-third of the population died; a similar number probably died in Asia.

Burying in mass graves

Progress of the plague

The Plague reached the Black Sea from Asia in 1346. From there, it was carried by Italian traders to ports on the Mediterranean. It then spread up rivers and land routes into northern Europe. By 1350, most of Europe was infected.

Some areas, such as Poland and Milan, escaped the Plague, but the reason for this is still a mystery.

Disease Carriers

The Plague Cycle

 

Plague is caused by a bacterium that lives on rodents. The disease was caught by black rats in Asia, which then colonized ships to Europe and spread the disease among people there. An infected person could also pass the plague through the air, by coughing.

Plague bacterium: The bacterium is also called Yersinia pestis, after the Swiss biologist Alexander Yersin, who discovered it. It is common in wild animals such as field mice, marmots and ground squirrels.

 

Flea carriers: The plague bacterium lives in the digestive system of a flea, and causes a blockage there. When the flea feeds, the blockage makes it vomit the newly eaten blood back onto its host, along with plague bacteria, which then infects the host.

Animal carriers: The black rats lived in towns and on ships and scavenged in food stores and rubbish heaps. Rats carry fleas, and when plague-carrying rats died of the disease, their fleas searched for other hosts. If these new hosts were people, they, too, caught the plague.

Human carriers: The plague turned into an epidemic so rapidly because human travellers helped spread it. Mongol nomads and Asian merchants carried it across Asia. The traders of the great Italian cities, such as Genoa and Venice, carried it around Europe in their ships.

Effects of the Plague

The disease was so widespread that many left their families took to the road to try to escape death. Some thought the plague was God’s punishment for the sins of the people, and mercilessly whipped themselves in the streets to show repentance.

Whipping to show repentance

Labour: By the end of the 14^th century, the smaller population of Europe meant that life was better for those who had survived. Because there were fewer peasants, they got higher wages and there was more food to go around. But recurring peasant rebellions showed that they still had grievances.

 

Chantries: People often left money for masses to be said for their souls. These masses were said in special chapels inside churches known as chantries. This chantry is at Winchester, England.

Population Decline: When Pope Clement VI asked how many people had died from the plague, he was told at least 20 million people in Europe, and 18 million in Asia. In comparison, around 8 million soldiers died in World War I.

Tombs: During the plague, people faced death every day. Death is often realistically shown on 14^th-century tombs, where images of skeletons of decaying corpses are common.

Dealing with the plague

 

Some people tried to fend off the plague by using herbal remedies, fumigation, bleeding by leeches, and even bathing in urine. A 14^th-century poem, called The Dance of Death (which states that death comes for people of every rank) was often enacted and painted, to remind people that death and the plague could strike at any time.

The Dance of Death