Death, Social Change, and Liberty in Europe, 1315 - 1381

1. Death, Social Change, and Liberty in Europe, 1315 - 1381

2. The “Silk Road”: Trade Routes between China, India, the Middle East, and Europe Allowed for the circulation of goods, money, and people “Silk Road” c. 800 CE…a very well-established network, even this early

3. The “Silk Road”: Trade Routes between China, India, the Middle East, and Europe “Silk Road” c. 1300

4. But the “Silk Road” also allowed for the circulation of disease

5. And rapid circulation, at that

6. A description of the impact of the plague: Excerpts from Giovanni Bocaccio, The Decameron, c. 1370 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. From the two said parts of the body this deadly gavocciolo soon began to propagate and spread itself in all directions indifferently; after which the form of the malady began to change, black spots or livid making their appearance in many cases on the arm or the thigh or elsewhere, now few and large, then minute and numerous. And as the gavocciolo had been and still were an infallible token of approaching death, such also were these spots on whomsoever they shewed themselves.

7. Population decline in England, as a result of the plague

8. Excerpts from Giovanni Bocaccio, The Decameron, c. 1370 It was the common practice of most of the neighbors, moved no less by fear of contamination by the putrefying bodies than by charity towards the deceased, to drag the corpses out of the houses with their own hands…and to lay them in front of the doors, where any one who made the round might have seen, especially in the morning, more of them than he could count… Quite a considerable number of such cases occurred, one bier sufficing for husband and wife, two or three brothers, father and son, and so forth. And times without number it happened, that as two priests, bearing the cross, were on their way to perform the last office for some one, three or four biers were brought up by the porters in rear of them, so that, whereas the priests supposed that they had but one corpse to bury, they discovered that there were six or eight, or sometimes more. Nor, for all their number, were their obsequies honored by either tears or lights or crowds of mourners rather, it was come to this, that a dead man was then of no more account than a dead goat would be to-day.

9. 14th Century depiction of the plague…can the priests help us?

10. Or if not the priests, then maybe God will help us directly?

11. Death as a great “leveler” of hierarchy Excerpts from Giovanni Bocaccio, The Decameron, c. 1370 [home] owners, seeing death imminent, had become as reckless of their property as of their lives; so that most of the houses were open to all comers, and no distinction was observed between the stranger who presented himself and the rightful lord...

12. Pieter Bruegel, The Triumph of Death, 1562 Skeleton “priests” King

13. Death as a great “leveler”: Triunfo della Morte (Triumph of Death), c. 1446 priest Bishop King

14. Death, Chaos, and the Need for Answers Excerpts from Giovanni Bocaccio, The Decameron, c. 1370 In this extremity of our city's suffering and tribulation the venerable authority of laws, human and divine, was abased and all but totally dissolved for lack of those who should have administered and enforced them, most of whom, like the rest of the citizens, were either dead or sick or so hard bested for servants that they were unable to execute any office; whereby every man was free to do what was right in his own eyes.

15. For some, the “answer” was blaming (and burning) “others,” especially Jews and Muslims.

16. The Plague’s Aftermath: England as a Case Study England land divisions, c. 1300s Still primarily an agricultural economy, England needed to keep cultivating the land in order to rebuild after the plague. And since the land was still owned by only a handful of noble families, and thus divided into huge estates, these landowners needed a lot of laborers to work the land.

17. The Plague’s Aftermath: England as a Case Study England land divisions, c. 1300s BUT, remember, a drastic reduction in England’s population meant a drastic reduction in England’s supply of workers. Population decline in England, as a result of the plague So, according to “the market”and its “law of supply and demand,”laborers were now more precious, and they could therefore demand more for their services. Whereas they were competing with each other for work before the plague, now employers ought to be competing for them.

18. The Plague’s Aftermath: England as a Case Study BUT, the English government passed a series of laws between 1349 and the 1370s meant to keep “peasants” from demanding higher wages, as well as to regulate what these laborers could or could not purchase. example: the Statute of Laborers passed in 1351, which prohibited increasing wages and prohibited workers from moving from home in search of better wages. AND, to raise money for rebuilding and for funding a war against France, the government passed a series of taxes. These were collected in 1377, 1379, and 1381. In theory, the taxes were to apply to all citizens, but in practice the “peasants” were the ones who had to pay.

19. The Plague’s Aftermath: England as a Case Study Depiction of the 1381 “Peasant Revolt” What did all this government taxation and intervention in “the market” create? A lot of angry laborers. When the third tax was levied, in 1381, the laborers (with the help of some nobles also upset with King Richard II) revolted.

20. The Plague’s Aftermath: England as a Case Study The revolt was eventually put down by Richard II. BUT, this revolution serves as an early example of a new (for us) idea about the relationship between a government and its citizens. Instead of the republican emphasis on government, and participating in government, as being a way to secure freedom, the language of the peasant revolt was that government interfered with freedom. The killing of Wat Tyler, one of the leaders of the revolt. What the laborers wanted was freedom fromgovernment. In other words, they wanted “liberty.” Instead of republicanism, then, this is a new political language of LIBERALISM.