The Black Death, 1348

D e a t h

The Plague occurred in 3 Forms

PPNEUMONIC NEUMONIC PPHASEHASE• Attacked the Lungs• Caused fierce coughing & sneezing fits• Chest pain, Bloody sputum

SSEPTICEMICEPTICEMIC P PHASEHASE• Rarest and Deadliest• Traveled thru bloodstream• Black spots beneath skin• Victims choked on own blood, Excruciating Pain!

BBUBONICUBONIC P PHASEHASE• Most Common• Egg-sized swellings (buboes)• Neck, armpits, groin (dark blisters)• Headaches, Weakness, Nausea/Vomiting• Severe Fever and Delirium

• The Whirligig was not that bad of a torture. It just spun the victim around in circles until he puked, mostly all over himself.

Myth or Fact?(Song)

Ring around the rosie,A pocket full of posies,

Ashes! Ashes!We all fall down!

DEPICTION OF THE PLUBONIC PLAGUEDEPICTION OF THE PLUBONIC PLAGUE

WHY?• Ignorance Surrounded Cause and Cure

• Europeans were Frantic

Blames

• Alignment of Planets

• Infected Clothing, Humans

• God’s Wrath aimed at Sin

• Jews

Cures/Remedies

• Pomanders

• Mixture of Molasses & Chopped Snake

• Repentance

• Flagellants

The Flagellant Brahren

Singing hymns and sobbing, the men beat themselves with scourges studded with iron spikes. Blood gushes from their many wounds, and the spikes embed themselves in the torn flesh. The ritual is performed in public twice each day. Such exhibitions are highly influential. The establishment may focus their attacks on church corruption and their promotion of a wave of savage anti-Semitism. but the masses worship the flagellants as living martyrs. Their deeds are to be admired and their commands to be carried out.

Many Followers massacred Jews believing they had poisoned society.

The burning of Jews in 1349 (from a European chronicle written on

the Black Death between 1349 and 1352)

Black Death

• Carried by Ships throughout Europe

• Rats infested the goods on board

Origins

• Originated in Mongolia’s Gobi desert

• Moved along the Silk Road to Black Sea

• Bacteria carried by fleas, lived on black rats

• Major trade/commercial cities were good hosts

• Sicily in 1347, England 1348, culminating in Russia 1352

• Unstoppable Force

“Victims ate lunch with their friends and dinner with their ancestors in

paradise."

Her keyser euch hilft nicht das swert Czeptir vnd crone sint hy nicht wert

Ich habe euch bey der hand genomen Ir must an meynen reyen komen

Emperor, your sword won’t help you out Sceptre and crown are worthless here

I’ve taken you by the hand For you must come to my dance

At the bottom end of the Totentanz Death calls e.g. the peasant to dance and he answers:

Ich habe gehabt [vil arbeit gross] Der sweis mir du[rch die haut floss]

Noch wolde ich ger[n dem tod empfliehen] Zo habe ich des glu[cks nit hie]

I had to work very much and very hard The sweat was running down my skin

I’d like to escape death nontheless But here I won’t have any luck

Michael Wolgemut

Effect on European Civilization

DISASTER STRIKESDISASTER STRIKESEstimated population of Europe from 1000 to 1352.

•1000 38 million •1100 48 million •1200 59 million •1300 70 million •1347 75 million •1352 50 million

25 million people died in just under five years between 1347 and 1352.

THE TRUE CAUSE OF THE PLAGUE

• The Swiss scientist Alexandre Yersin discovered the true cause of plague.

• The bubonic plague, an infectious disease, are caused by microbes that

invade the human body.

• The microbes that cause the plague are a type of bacteria known as the

Yersinia pestis.

• The bubonic plague, however, does not start in humans.

• Instead it infects only rats and cannot be spread directly from rats to

humans.

• Fleas, which live on the rats for food, abandon the rat when the rat dies.

• If these fleas then find a human the, Yersinia pestis is injected into the

bloodstream.

•Then the disease can spread from man to man.

How it was Transmitted

                                                                                                                         

                 

Yersinia pestis seen at 2000x magnification. This bacterium, carried and spread by fleas, is the cause of the various forms of the disease plague

Flea which carries the yersinia pestis

History of Plague• Justinian’s Plague (541-542) killed ¼ pop. of Mediterranean

• 6th & 8th C. breakouts

• 16th, 17th, 18th C. Pandemics

Italian, London, Vienna, Marseilles, Russia

• 3rd Pandemic (Asian Plague) – 19th, 20th C.

~15 million dead (India, China, Russia)

• Biological Weapon (Japanese, WWII)

Looked at Medieval Styles of Catapulting Infected Bodies into

Castles

Released Infected Fleas in China, Manchuria

Studied Live Subject, Dissecting

WhAt NeXt?

~painful swellings called buboes which commonly  appeared in armpits  and groin area~dark blisters and purple blotches appeared on skin~fever~severe headaches~increasing weakness

SYMPTOMS