2. What: A Bubonic and Pneumonic
plague epidemic
When: 1330s - 1350s and continuing
sporadically for hundreds of years
Where: Began somewhere in Asia and
spread to Western Europe.
3. The disease was carried by fleas on
diseased rats. Fleas bit and infected
humans.
Human to human spread may also
have taken place.
4. In Asia and the Islamic World, medical
knowledge and sanitation efforts
limited the effects of the plague.
As it spread into Western Europe, its
effects were more devastating. Also
more devastating because of famine.
5. IT’S THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE
KNOW IT!!!
There was no explanation for the
plague, there was no cure, and it didn’t
seem to end.
9. Ring around the rosie, pocket full of
posies, ashes, ashes WE ALL FALL
DOWN!
10. 1/4 to 1/2 of the entire population of Europe
died (about 28 million).
Faith in God increased, but the institution
and leaders of the Roman Catholic Church
were questioned.
11. Jews and other “outsiders” were blamed
for the plague - massacres and
banishments resulted.
Skilled and manual laborers who survived
demanded higher wages or better
treatment. (Serfdom nearly disappeared.)
12. Guilds no longer had the power to control
their crafts.
New scholars (with new ideas) replaced
vacant positions in universities and schools.
13. End of the Medieval Period?
Black Death, along with the Crusades and
the contact with the Islamic World, changes
in the Church, and changes in warfare all
led to a new period in Western Europe.
