Source A: Guy de Chauliac, a French doctor

1. Medieval explanations for the spread of the Black Death • Source A: Guy de Chauliac, a French doctor • The cause was the close position of the three planets Saturn Jupiter and Mars. … Such coming together of planets is always a sign of wonderful, terrible or violent things to come. • Source B: de Smet • It was thought that the whole area was infected through the foul blast of wind that came from the south. • Source C: A monk living in Flanders • In the East, near India there were horrors and storms for three days. On the first day, frogs, snakes, lizards and scorpions fell from the sky. On the second day there was thunder and lightning. On the third day, fire and stinking smoke came down from heaven. This killed all the remaining men and animals. • Source D: Matthew of Neuenberg. • A person rose and read a letter out loud. In it, the angel said that Christ was displeased by the wickedness of the world, and named many sins; not observing Sunday, not fasting on Friday, blasphemy, usury (money-lending, adultery. • Source E: Jean de Venette. • The plague spread because of contagion: if a healthy man visited a plague victim , he usually died himself. It spread invisibly from house to house and finally from person to person.