Bubonic Plague

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In the early 1330s an outbreak of the deadly bubonic plague occurred in China. Plague mainly affects rodents but fleas can transmit the disease to people. Once people are infected they infect others very rapidly. Plague causes fever and painful swelling on the lymph glands called buboes, which it how it gets its name. The disease also causes spots on the skin that are red at first then turn black. From 1347-1352, about twenty-five million people (one-third of the population) died in Europe during the Black plague. The dramatic loss in Europe’s population permanently changed the socio-economic culture of Europe, leading to demands for higher wages from the survivors. 

Since China was one of the busiest of the world’s trading nations, it was only a matter of time before the outbreak of the plague in China spread to western Asia and Europe. In October 1347, several Italian merchant ships returned from a trip to the Black Sea, one of the key links in trade with China. When the ship docked in Sicily, many of those on board were already dying of the plague. Within days the disease spread to the city and to the surrounding countryside.

By the following August, the plague had spread as for north as England where people called it the Black Death because of the black spots it produced on the skin. While in winter the plague abated because the carrier flees were dormant, each Spring the plague attacked again. Altogether, some twenty-five million people were killed—one-third of Europe’s population. 

Even when the worst was over, smaller outbreaks continued for centuries. The survivors lived in fear of the plague’s return, and the disease did not disappear until the 1600s.

Medieval society never recovered from the results of the plague. So many people died that there were serious labor shortages all over Europe. Peasant revolts broke out in England, France, Spain, Belgium, and Italy for higher wages. Even the Church suffered because people were distraught that their prayers had not been answered. Political turmoil and philosophical questioning derived from this calamity.

Estimated population of Europe from 1000 to 1352

• 1000 38 million

• 1100 48 million

• 1200 59 million

• 1300 70 million

• 1347 75 million

• 1352 52 million

One eyewitness report

“Death was everywhere. Fathers abandoned their sick children. Lawyers refused to visit the dying and make out their wills.  Friars and nuns were left to care for the sick; monasteries and convents became deserted. Bodies were left in empty houses, and there was no one to give them a Christian burial.”