The Black Death

1. The Black Death

2. It so happened that in the month of October in the year of our Lord 1347, around the first of that month, twelve Genoese galleys, fleeing our Lord’s wrath which came down upon them for their misdeeds put in at the port of the city of Messina. They brought with them a plague that they carried down to the very marrow of their bones, so that if anyone so much as spoke to them, he was infected with a mortal sickness which brought on a n immediate death that he could in no way avoid. (Michele de Piazza)

3. Geographic Origins • Most chroniclers agree that the plague came from the East. • Louis Sanctus was convinced it came from India. • Ibn al-Wardi says it spread to India and China (first) from a “land of darkness,” but he is not clear on where that land of darkness was. • Some modern epidemiological studies suggest that the plague bacillus is endemic in the rodent populations of the central Asian steppes. • Al-Maqrizi speaks of torrential rains in the Mongol heartland prior to the outbreak of the plague; it’s possible this forced rodents native to the region into closer contact with humans. • We should also note the prevalence of the fur trade, which included ermine and marten, during this period.

5. Climate Change

6. Ermine Pine-Marten

9. Pathology of the Plague • Yersiniapestis • Bubonic Plague • Pneumonic Plague • Septicemic Plague

10. Plague victims. The illustrator of an early fifteenth- century German chronicle imagined the plague of Egypt—sent by God, according to the Book of Exodus in the Bible, to make Pharaoh “let my people go”—with the same symptoms as the Black Death. In the background, Moses brings the plague down on Egypt by prayer. By implication, prayer and obedience to the will of God could also be remedies for plague.

11. Religious, Medical, Scientific Responses Priests, Friars, and Doctors Muslims and Christians The notion of contagion Flagellants Pogroms Earthquakes

12. Treating the plague. In the mid–fifteenth century, a patron who was probably a plague survivor endowed a chapel in the high Alps at Lanslevillard. The chapel was dedicated to St. Sebastian, adopted by plague victims, perhaps because his arrow wounds resembled the pockmarks and pustules of so many diseases. The scene reproduced here shows the underarm buboes that are also a symptom of bubonic plague, the indiscriminate nature of the disease, its supposed origin as a punishment from God, and physicians’ efforts to cure it by lancing pustules.

13. Flagellants. In 1349, the Black Death inspired thousands of penitents to organize processions and cults of self-flagellation across Europe in an attempt to deflect God’s wrath. Like many others,the Flemish chronicler whose work is depicted here denounced the flagellants for claiming that their penance was a kind of baptism, that it could wipe out sin, and that it was a sacrifice akin to Christ’s death on the cross. The king of France banned flagellation, and the pope outlawed it.

15. Christianity’s Supremacy over Judaism. Church and Synagogue are clearly sisters, but the Church is crowned and upright, while the Synagogue is blindfold, with bare, inclined head. These examples are from Bamberg Cathedral in Germany but the pairing of Church and Synagogue appears, with remarkable consistency, all over Europe. Typically, the Synagogue has a broken staff, while the tablets of the law slip from her other hand. If the sculpture of the Church shown here were undamaged, she would almost certainly hold a cross and a chalice.

16. Social Impact Social bonds and mores. Peasant Status Subjectivity Memento Mori

17. The Wife of Bath. “Thanks be to God, who is for aye alive, / Of husbands at Church door have I had five.” “The Wife of Bath” was a fictional character of about 1400—shown here in a contemporary illustration to the English writer Geoffrey Chaucer’s verses about her. But, like all good satire, she was representative of the society of her times: sexually shameless, irrepressibly bossy, and determined to exert “power, during all my life” over any husband “who shall be both my debtor and my slave.” “Facsimile of EllesnereChaucher, The Life of Bath” 1400–1410. VdA Museum, London. Picture Desk, Inc./Kobal Collection

22. Summary of Effects • Peasants: end of serfdom, many gain freedom, end of labor services, better wages available in the cities • Monarchs take advantage of aristocratic families weakened by the disasters to centralize their power. • Many become more religious, but now more often in personal devotions. • Franciscans: die in enormous numbers because of their care for the sick, but also gain tremendous respect. • Many begin to question the church. • The scapegoating of Jewish and Muslim communities, along with others, rises in Europe. • Economic effects • Initial deflation and economic decline • Desire for luxury goods increases • More and more different opportunities for making money arise. • Economy takes off as population begins to grow again.

23. Effects: Regional Comparison • China • Social and political effects • Massive population loss • Loss of power for Mongols in China by 1368 • Loss of the “mandate of heaven” • Reestablishment of native rule under the Ming • Economic effects • Temporary commercial and trade loss on the Silk Road • Government lost revenues because of lost taxes • Europe • Social and political effects • Massive population loss • Clergy was especially hard-hit • Leveling effect, as all die from plague and famine

24. Islamic World • Social and political effects • Massive population loss • Weakens Il-Khan rule • Economic effects • Worsens an already bad situation resulting from economic mismanagement during the Il-Khan period