1. GENERAL INFORMATION What You Should Know The plague was started from a combination of three types of plagues: bubonic, septicemic and pneumonic. The Bubonic plague was caused by fleas. When fleas bite people, the bite will send the bacteria into a person’s lymphatic system. Painful bumps called, buboes, developed in the groin, armpits or neck. If the bump breaks up, people survive; if not they died in less than three days. Septicemic plague was caused when the bacteria infected a person’s bloodstream. The bacteria in the bloodstream multiplied so quickly that there was no time for symptoms to develop. Sometimes people who fine felt would die within hours. Pneumonic plague resulted when a person infected with the plague developed pneumonic and began coughing up blood. People would cough or talk and bacteria was spread to other people’s clothes. When other people touched the person’s clothes they became infected. Pneumonic plague was the deadliest plague. Continued A2 MEDIEVAL TIMES A SPECIAL REPORT ON THE BLACK DEATH A1 WEDNESDAY, MARCH 14, 1350

2. Continued from A1 What You Should Know they spend so much time caring for patients. Thieves steal from dead bodies and rob houses of dead people. Because so many people were dying the countryside and cemeteries were becoming full and cities were burying people under the cities (e.x. The Paris Catacombs, Sedlec Ossuary outside of Prague). Before the Black Death the doctors would just think about the body, but after the Black Death they cut the body to find out more. Before the Black Death, doctors weren’t allowed to cut people’s bodies and ruin them but later the Pope said that they could. Doctors then gathered people who could fix bones and they made a hospital where they could take care of people who are sick rather than where the sick could be confined until they died. Art: Before and After the Black Death Before the Black Death art reflected the values of Christianity (love, kindness, forgiveness). When the Black Death happened artists’ drawings had changed from peaceful Continued A3 A SPECIAL REPORT ON THE BLACK DEATH A2 Fleas and rats helped spread the Black Death more quickly. Trading ships coming from the Black Sea helped spread the Black Death in Europe. Symptoms were swollen lymph glands and dark blotches on the skin, then high fever, throwing up blood, and hallucinating. Usually it was only one to three days from the first symptoms until death. There is no cure. Many people say that burning sulphur and smelling garlic will stop the spread but this method isn’t effective. One- third of all the people of Europe have died. Many priests, nuns and doctors have died because

3. A SPECIAL REPORT ON THE BLACK DEATH A3 Many Lords Lose Money The growth of towns and trades had already weakened the feudal system and the Black Death damaged it even more. Before the Black Death, workers would be born on a manor and would not be able to leave it because all the other manors already had enough workers and there was no room for another worker. So, workers were stuck on their manor and the lord could pay the workers as little as they wanted because the lord knew that the worker could not get a job anywhere else. The Black Death allowed workers move away from their manors because they could find work on other manors. So many workers died from the Black Death that manors did not have enough workers to run the manor. Lords were always Continued from A2 Art: Before and After the Black Death pictures into frightening ones. Depressing images of death and people being judged often showed devils torturing souls in Hell. Death was often drawn as a violent skeleton, sometimes holding a scythe and an hourglass. A famous fresco painted by the Italian artist Triani in about 1350 showed a group of nobles having fun, but they didn’t know the Death was coming to them. An explanation below the painting says that nothing can protect people from the Death, not nobility, riches or wisdom. looking for new workers to replace the ones that died. Because there were now more jobs than there were workers, the manor had to pay more wages so the worker would work on their manor.

4. the Jews have secret anti – Christian rituals. These are only excuses for the Christians to blame the Jews for bringing the Plague. In the French city of Strasbourg the townspeople accused Jews of putting poison in the water. It is also believed that the disease is caused by poor people. This is partly true because many poor people live on the streets, where they can be bitten by A SPECIAL REPORT ON THE BLACK DEATH A4 poor people don’t have clean water and clean clothes and often get sick. The plague effects weak people more easily than healthy people. Many people think that if they stay away from the diseased people than the healthy person won’t get the disease. Often this means that parents will abandon their children if they think that their children are sick. Because no one really knows where the plague came from, many believe the plague is the end of the world as the Bible describes and that God is punishing human beings. To make God happy, people were told to apologize to the God by praying in public and by punishing themselves in public. Some people believed they must give all their money to the church to please God. Continued A5 What Do People Believe? Flagellants, a religious group, believe that the Plague is a punishment from God. Jews are blamed because they have much more money than most people and many lords are in debt to Jews so it is easy to blame the Jews for bringing the plague. The lords in debt to Jews are angry that Jews are more successful than they are. Most Jews are jewelers, money traders, or merchants and have successful businesses. So Jews have enough money to give credit to lords. Because of this, Jews are made to live in a Ghetto where everyone has to wear identifying yellow patches on their clothing and Jews now don’t have freedom like other people. Many Christians blame the Jews for killing Jesus Christ. Also Christians believe that

5. A SPECIAL REPORT ON THE BLACK DEATH A5 The Plague began in China and was Where Has It Come From? by Italian merchants who shipped the Asian goods even farther to Europe. One of these settlements was Kaffa, a walled city along the Black Sea built by traders from Ganea in 1346-1350. It is believed that this is the main entry port to Europe for the plague. As sailors got off the ships and the European people realized that the sailors were sick and dying, the Europeans tried to push the ships back out to the ocean, but it was too late. The sailors had already infected people in Europe. People didn’t want to get sick so they would leave their town for another town, but they were already infected and didn’t know it. So, they would infect the next town. This is partly how the plague spread through Europe. Some people even believe the plague is caused by fog, mist or the wind. They also believe earthquakes cause the plague by releasing bad gases during the shaking. Eating too much fruit, too much drinking, and not enough sunshine helped to spread plague. The planet also caused the spread plague. Some doctors in Paris believed that because Saturn, Jupiter and Mars lined up the disease was caused. carried by Mongolian traders along the Silk Road in the late 1320s. It spread through China and also other parts of Asia. Millions of Asians suffered. It killed 25 million in Asia and India. India lost many people (depopulated). Armena were covered with dead bodies. It first spread into northern China across Central Asia and to the Black Sea. At the western most terminal ports of these trade routes were several trading colonies set up Continued from A4 What Do People Believe?

6. A SPECIAL REPORT ON THE BLACK DEATH A6