The Black Deathby

Logan SmithFor Mrs. Waterbury – Gifted Ed

May 7, 2008

The Black Death What was the

Black Death? Could you avoid it? What caused it? Where did it

spread?

What was the Black Death? The black death was a

plague that almost wiped out Europe.

If you had the black death you would often throw up and get bubo's (large swellings).

If you got the black death there was no way you could stop it.

Once you showed signs of the plague, you were isolated from your family.

Could you avoid it?

Keep mint or pennyroyal on your body.

Keep clothes in a cedar chest Use plenty of soap. Go to an isolated villa to avoid

contact with plague victims. Get armies to do your bidding Bloodletting – cut a vein or artery

to let the “BAD” blood out.

There was really no way to avoid the plague, but medieval people had their own remedies:

If we went back in time, we would: Keep some clean clothes tightly folded and bound up in cloth treated with mint or

pennyroyal, preferably in a cedar chest far from all animals and vermin. At the first whisper of plague in the area, flee any populated town or village and head for

an isolated villa, far from any trade routes, with your cedar chest. Vigilantly clean every last corner of your villa, killing all rats and burning their corpses. Use plenty of mint or pennyroyal to discourage fleas. Allow no cats or dogs to come near you. Once away from all human contact, wash in extremely hot water, change into your clean

clothes, and burn the clothes you traveled in. Keep a minimum distance of 25 feet from any other human being to avoid catching any

pneumonic form spread through breathing and sneezing. Bathe in hot water as frequently as you can. Keep a fire burning in your villa to ward off the bacillus, and stay as close to it as you can

stand, even in summer. Have your armies burn and raze to the ground any nearby houses where plague victims

have resided. Pray to the deity or the saint of your choice frequently and fervently. Stay where you are until six months after the most recent nearby outbreak.

What caused the Black Death? A flea bit a rat that was

infected with the plague. The flea later bit a

human. The flea regurgitated the

rats blood into the human.

The human got the plague.

Where did it spread? There was a very serious

outbreak of the plague in Europe in the 1300s.

It targeted England, France, Germany and Italy.

One out of every 3 people in Europe died from it.

Its main target was Bavaria.

The Flagellants The flagellants were very

religious people who thought that the plague was caused by evil spirits in their body.

They thought if they whipped themselves or each other, the could drive the evil spirits out.

They really only hurt themselves.

It didn’t keep them from getting the plague!

The Black Death – a video

Sources http://www.middle-ages.org.uk/black-death.htm info on the black death http://www.yesnet.yk.ca/schools/projects/middleages2000/blackdeath/blackdeath.html animated

map of black death path in Europe http://www.awesomestories.com/disasters/stories/black_death/images/swollen.node.jpg - picture

of nodes http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/med/marchione.html the account of a person who lived through

the plague http://streaming.discoveryeducation.com/search/searchResults.cfm?N=0&Nty=1&Ntk=All&blnSe

archInit=true&Ntt=black+death&Nr= info on the black death

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/exhibition/perez/drawings/plague.gif - picture of man on rat http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bubonic_plague - info and picture of a flea http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Flagellants.png - info and picture of

the flagellants http://www.gii.in/wallpapers/data/media/80/Grim-Reaper-Tattoos-2.jpg front picture http://www.historyforkids.org/learn/science/medicine/plague.htm - where it spread

THE END