The Black Death critically impacted the economy of Europe.
When the plague hit Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, it killed seventy-five to a hundred million people. It wasn’t rare to see that villages were abandoned and whole families were eliminated due to the plague. There was nobody to grow and harvest crops, trade and traveling stopped, and food and manufacturing goods slowed down, as well. The economy was at a dangerously low point. People had no money, so peasants demanded to get paid more to work. Employers needed the work done to make money, so they met up with the demands of peasants. People had to beg and steal money and food, because of the devastation the plague caused them. The plague broke down social class systems, everyone who was either rich or poor is now considered “middle class.” It took a hundred and fifty years for Europe’s population to be like what it was before the plague hit. The Black Death caused a substantial amount of economic instability in
Europe. The Black Death claimed millions of innocent lives during the fourteenth century. Not only were there people dying, there were people suffering from the dreadful symptoms of the plague. The horrendous symptoms were: fever, muscle aches, vomiting, headaches, diarrhea, and malaise. These symptoms are very similar to the Justinian Plague, that’s why historians believe that Yersinia pestis was the bacteria to blame for both plagues. The mortality rate for victims with the bubonic plague was pretty high. If the victim was being treated for having the plague, the mortality rate was thirty to seventy-five percent. If the victim wasn’t being treated, the victim had an eighty percent chance of dying within eight days. If a person contracted the plague, most likely they were going to die. Throughout all the pain and suffering, it is believed that the Black Death killed twenty to twenty-five million people in Europe, but the death count doesn’t stop there. Historians believe that the Black Death killed seventy-five to a hundred million people worldwide. It is very hard to tell exactly how many people died, but historians have an eyewitness to give them some information. Boccaccio was a writer during the Black death, he wrote, ‘Between March and July of that year (1348), because of the ferocity of the pestilence (Black Death) and the fact that many of the sick were poorly cared for or abandoned in their hour of need by people frightened for their health, killed off one hundred thousand human creatures for certain within the walls of the city of Florence.’ Although Boccaccio didn’t give historians and an exact number of total deaths, he gives them a strong number of those who died during a six-month period. The Black Death strongly affected life and society in Europe and around the world.
In 1665, a terrible plague infected the people of London. The plague began in February of 1665 and within seven months, the plague wiped out twenty percent of London’s population. The plague started spreading from St.Giles church. As we have seen so far, rats and fleas spread the disease to humans, during the Justinian plague and the Black Death, it spread the same way during the Great Plague of London. After spreading from St.Giles, the plague spread to parishes of Whitechapel and Stepney. Finally, the plague spread to the enclosed city of London. The Great Plague only lasted about a year in London. Historians believe that the Great Fire got rid of the plague because it never returned after the fire. The Great Plague greatly affected the city of London. The Great Plague only affected one city severely, London. The plague originated in St.Giles and spread through the dirty, crowded, and rat infested churches of Whitechapel and Stepney. After spreading through Stepney, the plague spread through the walled city of London. Since London was walled in, the plague was contained within the walls of the city, causing it to affect London more than other cities the plague swept through. That’s why the death totals are much lower than the other death totals of the Justinian Plague and the Black Death, the containment of the plague within London, saved millions of people’s lives. Despite that the plague did not spread to other places, it was still a deadly pandemic. After the Great Plague infected London, the economy crumbled. People’s’ lives and businesses suffered drastically because people were scared to leave their homes and they were stuck inside of their homes because they were sick. People were very poor at this time and were forced to steal money and food to provide for their families. The plague has a negative effect on trade, as well. The plague caused extreme fear in people to the point where they wanted to stay isolated within their homes. People were very cruel to one another because they were afraid to get sick. Some people kicked the sick out of their homes, even if it was family, friends, or servants. One positive aspect is the population grew back quickly after the plague died out. More people were getting married and having children. The Great Plague negatively affected society and the economy.
The Great Plague greatly affected the citizens of London. People were in pain and dying everywhere in London. The Great Plague caused people to suffer from symptoms of fever, headache, vomiting, and growth of buboes in the groin, armpit, and neck. Historians are confident that the same bacteria (Yersinia pestis) that killed millions in 542 and 1347, killed thousands in London. In 1665, when people were infected with the plague they were unsanitary. People decided not to quarantine themselves from others when they were sick. In September of 1665, the death rate for infected victims was about eight thousand per week, this is when the plague was at its highest point in London. The total death count for the Great Plague was a hundred thousand people, it seems like the plague started to be less effective towards the end of the pandemic. The Great Plague was still deadly and horrific enough. Eyewitness Samuel Pepys wrote down the horrors he witnessed during the Great Plague. Pepys wrote, ‘the sad news of the death of so many in the parish of the plague, forty last night, the bell always going…either for deaths or burials.’ The bell Mr.Pepys referred to was called a Plague Bell, people would ring it for forty-five minutes to mourn the dead. It is very tragic that people had to live and witness the awful effects of the plague. The Great Plague destroyed people’s lives and the city of London. As you can see, the Black Death was the most disastrous pandemic out of all the pandemics. Although the Justinian Plague and the Great Plague of London were disastrous to society and the economy, the Black Death was much worse. The Black Death killed seventy-five to a hundred million people, spread all throughout Europe, the Middle East, and parts of Africa, and it had the worst effect on the economy. The Black Death was the worst pandemic in the world for all the suffering it caused innocent citizens. Nonetheless, the Justinian Plague, The Black Death, and the Great Plague of London are all connected. Historians believe they are connected because the symptoms for the plague were all the same, rats and fleas spread the disease, and they all had negative effects on society and the economy. The bubonic plague was just starting out in 542, hit its peak in 1347, and started to slow down in 1665. All three of the plagues were certainly tragic events in history, hopefully, they will never occur again.