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Black Death was a deadly plague that killed millions. Black Death was a giant problem in the middle ages. Millions of lives were lost. Black Death was also important because it killed so many people, feudalism fell because of it, and it stopped overpopulation. This essay will explain why these three reason are important. ( History; Textbook)
Black Death was first brought to Europe in October 1347 when 12 Genoese trading ships came to Europe from the Black Sea. The folks who came to the dock to welcome the ships saw a shocking surprise. Most of the sailors were dead and the ones that were alive were very sick. They had a bad fever, couldn't keep food in their stomachs and went crazy from pain. Weirdest of all, they were covered in strange black boils that was squirting out blood and mucus and gave their sickness the name: the "Black Death." This plague had a lot of symptoms such as, fever, chills, vomiting, diarrhea, bad aches and pains-and then, of coarse death. The plague was so contagious that even if you touch someone it will spread to them. A person that was completely health could die the next morning.the Italian poet Giovanni Boccaccio wrote, "at the beginning of the malady, certain swellings, either on the groin or under
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The Black Death was so deadly and dangerous that it was also the reason feudalism fell. The plague killed so many people that most of the people who died didn't get any kind of funeral or anything. Most of the people in villages died or fled while their neighbors got sick. In most places, the manor system fell just completely fell apart. Peasants and serfs fled their manors when they got money and there weren't enough people to work on the fields and feudalism just fell apart.
The Black Death (also called the "plague" or the "pestilence", the bacteria that causes it is Yersinia Pestis) was a devastating pandemic causing the death of over one-third of Europe's population in its major wave of 1348-1349. Yersinia Pestis had two major strains: the first, the Bubonic form, was carried by fleas on rodents and caused swelling of the lymph nodes, or "buboes", and lesions under the skin, with a fifty-percent mortality rate; the second, the pneumonic form, was airborne after the bacteria had mutated and caused fluids to build up in the lungs and other areas, causing suffocation and a seventy-percent mortality rate.
In the midst of the chaos it created, the Black Death weakened the archaic system of manorialism by causing an increase in the incomes of peasants. Manorialism was an economic system where a large class of serfs worked in the fields of the nobles in exchange for a small share of the crops. Due to the outbreak of the plague, however, there were not enough serfs for this approach to remain viable. The death of many serfs due to the Black Death meant that the ones who remained were able to ask for larger shares of the crops since their services were rare and thus more valuable. Further adding to the increase, many peasants whose requests were denied would often s...
The Effects of The Black Death on the Economic and Social Life of Europe The Black Death is the name later given to the epidemic of plague that ravaged Europe between 1347 and 1351. The disaster affected all aspects of life. Depopulation and shortage of labor hastened changes already inherent in the rural economy; the substitution of wages for labor services was accelerated, and social stratification became less rigid. Psychological morbidity affected the arts; in religion, the lack of educated personnel among the clergy gravely reduced the intellectual vigor of the church.
The Black Death is considered to be "the most severe epidemic in human history" that decimated Europe from 1347 to 1351 (Witowski). Not only did the Black Death depopulate Europe, but it also had long lasting social and economic effects as well. The social effects consisting of culture, morals, values, and social norms. The economic effects consisting of labor, payment, and the foundation of feudalism. However one would call it, the Bubonic plague, the resulting Pneumonic plague or the Pestilence, the disease scarred the social and pecuniary foundations of specifically the European Middle Ages and some of the impacts even carrying forth into further generations.
The destruction and devastation caused by the 'Black Death' of the Middle Ages was a phenomenon left to wonder at in text books of historical Europe. An unstoppable plague swept the continent taking as much as eighty percent of the European population along with it (Forsyth).
The Black Plague came to Europe at a time referred to as the late middle ages. At this time, the quality of living was looking better than in the past
Bubonic death, also known as “the Black Death, arrived in Europe by sea in October 1347 when 12 Genoese trading ships docked at the Sicilian port of Messina after a long journey through the Black Sea.” (quoted on History.com) As the people who gathered on the docks went to meet those who aboard the ship, they were met by an awful surprise. Majority of the sailors on the ships were dead, and those who were still alive were near death. Those affected by bubonic plague were overcome with fever, in extreme pain from the boils on their skin, and were unable to keep food down. Their skin was covered in weird black boils. The boils oozed of blood and pus which gave the illness its name: the “Black Death.” In panic, “The Sicilian authorities hastily ordered the fleet of “death ships” out of the harbor, but it was too late: Over the next five years, the mysterious Black Death would kill more than 20 million people in Europe, almost
"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.
The Black Death started in China in 1331; it was then carried across the Asian caravan to southern Russia on merchant ships. In 1347, ships brought it to Italy. It then steadily spread throughout the rest of Europe. The bacteria,Yersinia Pestis, that caused the disease was carried in the stomach of a flea that lived on black rats or other small rodents. The Black Death is formally known as the Bubonic Plague, although there was three more variations of the Black Death, the Bubonic was the most prominent during these times. The living conditions of this time made it perfect breeding grounds for the rats, the streets were narrow, and filled with garbage, mud and human excrement. There was also a shortage in housing, causing six to eight people sleeping in one bed; this was a true fact for aristocratic families too. Personal hygiene was a problem too, water was contaminated so few people bathed, these conditions led to people being sick many having diarrhea which lowered people’s resistance to the disease.
So the peasants were extremely poor at that time. After the Black Death, population decreased, serfs and peasants were able to move around and they had much more freedom than before. They were no longer belong to the lord, and had choices of who they would work for. Most peasants chose to work for high paid jobs. The landowners, in order to attract people to work for them, provided the workers tools, housing and land. “The worker farmed all he could and paid only the rent.” The better treatment of serfs weakened the manorialism, as well as the decline of nobles.The plague killed so many people, and even nobles could not escape. The wealthy families were incapable of continuing growing, because their descendants died. So their position could not be passed on. Many families extinct. To fix this problem, the government setted up a new inheritance law which allowed both sons and daughter inherited property.
The “Black death or Plague” was a horrible pestilence that killed millions of people in the middle ages and it's hard to believe but this disease is still around today. This disease caused families to split up by parents having to send their children away to slavery just so they wouldn't starve, it caused entire villages to be destroyed in a matter of days because this horrible disease spread like wildfire. All in all the black death was horrible in which they way it caused families hardships, to how quickly it spread from town to town although it led to gained medical knowledge, and then to the rebellion and downfall of society.
Because the Black Death killed so many people, peasants saw a rise in job opportunity, higher wages because of their value and free tools and resources. This is significant because it gave peasants much more power and helped them gain money and live more luxurious than before. It also made the population of landowners decrease. This was because some landowners couldn’t attract peasants to work on their land. They were forced to sell their land. Peasants became essential and really valuable. Although the Black Death massacred millions of people, it wasn’t all bad. Some of the surviving people, especially peasants, really benefitted from
One of the most important results of the Black Death is the end of feudalism. The labor force was so low that workers could refuse to work, demand a wage, and the aristocrats had no choice but to listen. Peasant revolts in France and England also played an important role in the end of feudalism. The French government, in an attempt to pay ransom to England for the return of their king, spiked tax rates on the French residents. The peasants at the time felt that the government was weak, and the increased taxes infuriated them, resulting in a rebellion that came to be known as the Jacquerie. Similar events took place in England a generation later. In 1381, peasants rebelled against high tax rates and frozen wages by marching on London an...
“I think a rat just climbed up my leg, Dad. And I’ve got fleas, too.” “John, there’s all this Black Death and all you care about is a few fleas and a rat.
... middle of paper ... ... Consequently, the Black Death helped to eliminate serfdom in Europe. Which would contribute towards the collapse of the feudal system and change the face of the Europe’s economy. Europe’s social structure in the Middle Ages consisted of feudalism.