Aim How did the Black Death change medieval

Aim: How did the Black Death change medieval Europe? Do Now: Let’s play Ring around the Rosy! Ring-a-ring the rosy, A pocket full of posies, Ashes, ashes We all fall down!

I What was the Black Death? The Black Death (Bubonic Plague) was a painful, deadly plague in the middle ages. The Black Death of medieval Europe was NOT the first major plague! The Plague of Justinian began in 541 CE. A plague is a highly contagious, epidemic disease that spreads quickly and has a high death rate.

Black Death in Art

II Causes of the Black Death A) The Black Death was spread by fleas on rats. B) Beginning in 1331, it spread from east Asia westward along overland maritime trade routes. C) Due to the Little Ice Age which reduced the average temperature of Europe, more people were staying indoors. Combined with poor hygiene and sanitation, the Black Death spread rapidly. Ibn al-Wardi, a Syrian writer who would later die of the plague himself in 1348, recorded that the Black Death came out of "The Land of Darkness, " or Central Asia. From there, it spread to China, India, the Caspian Sea and "land of the Uzbeks, " and thence to Persia and the Mediterranean.

As of 1200, China had a total population of more than 120 million, but a 1393 census found only 65 million surviving. Some of the missing were killed by famine and upheaval in the transition from Yuan to Ming rule, but millions died of bubonic plague.

III Symptoms of the Black Death Painful black swellings size of an egg oozed blood and pus. Death usually occurred 1 -3 days after catching the disease.

IV Trying to Stop It A) Doctors often bled you by cutting or applying leeches. They wore masks filled with dried herbs to protect themselves, and discouraged bathing. B) Priests prayed to God. C) Flagellants whipped themselves as they believed the Black Death was due to their sins. “We, the Members of the College of Physicians of Paris… [suggest] everyone should guard against exposure to wet weather … Bathing is injurious. Men must preserve chastity [no sex] as they value their lives…” George Deaux, The Black Death: 1347

Trying to Stop It Continued… “They marched naked in a file one behind the other and whipped themselves with these scourges on their naked and bleeding bodies. . . ” Sir Robert of Avesbury

Trying to Stop It Continued… D) In 1347 some Italian ports began turning away ships suspected of coming from infected areas. March 1348 authorities in Venice closed the city’s waters to suspect vessels, and forced travelers and legitimate ships to 30 days’ isolation. This period was extended to 40 days some years later - hence the term quarantine.

V Effects of the Black Death A) Jews were blamed for the Black Death. Thousands were massacred. B) 1/3 of Europe died. C) The Mongolian Yuan Dynasty’s end was hastened. D) Approximately 75 million people died worldwide. Image of a pogrom against Jews blamed for the plague. The Egyptian scholar Al-Mazriqi noted that "more than 300 hundred tribes all perished without apparent reason in their summer and winter encampments, in the course of pasturing their flocks and during their seasonal migration. " He claimed that all of Asia was depopulated, as far as the Korean Peninsula.

Effects of the Black Death Continued… E) Due to a labor shortage, many lords switched from farming crops to raising sheep (requires less human labor). As a result, many serfs were able to leave the manor. John Gower, a farmer from Kent, wrote about the problems caused by the shortage of labour: "The shepherd and the cowherd demand more wages now than the master-bailiff. . . labourers are now such a price that, when we must use them, where we were wont to spend two shillings we must now spend five or six. . . They work little, dress and feed like their betters, and ruin stares us in the face. "

Boccaccio’s Decameron Giovanni Boccaccio's The Decameron takes place in 1348 Florence, when the Black Death struck. It is a book of stories in which seven young women and three young men of Florence leave the city for the hills. “…such terror was struck into the hearts of men and women by this calamity, that brother abandoned brother, and the uncle his nephew, and the sister her brother, and very often the wife her husband. What is even worse and nearly incredible is that fathers and mothers refused to see and tend their children, as if they had not been theirs… The city was full of corpses…”

Summary Questions 1. What was the Black Death and how do you know it was a plague? 2. What were the main causes of the Black Death? 3. Describe the symptoms of the Black Death. How was it treated in medieval Europe? 4. What were the short and long term consequences of the Black Death? 5. Read the excerpt from Boccaccio's The Decameron. How did he describe people’s reactions to the Black Death? Do you think people would react to a similar plague today? Explain your answer. 6. Why do you think the Regents has mostly focused on the impact of the Black Death in Europe and not Asia or Africa? Should this change?

Key Vocabulary Black Death Boccaccio's Decameron Bubonic Plague Flagellants Little Ice Age Plague The Decameron Quarantine