1. The Great Plague that changed European History

3.  Painting was by Pieter Brueghel the Elder  Allegorically depicts the Black Death’s many devastating effects on life in Europe

4.  A deadly plague in Europe—1346-1352  Bacteria carried by fleas who lived on black rats  Appeared in three forms:  Pneumonic: attacked the lungs  Septicemic: appeared in bloodstream  Bubonic: caused buboes on the body

5.  Across Asia and into Europe  Italian merchant ships brought rats to Europe  First appeared in Sicily

7. Slide #4

8.  People were ignorant of its cause  Blamed the stars, God’s anger, and Jewish communities  They tried ineffective cures  pomanders, flagellation, repentance of sins, flowers and herbs, chopped snake and molasses, etc

10. Rumors were spread that Jewish people poisoned the wells of medieval areas.

13.  Killed one third of Europe’s population  LABOR SHORTAGE  Peasants revolted and demanded more freedom  Working class moved to cities to earn a better wages  Feudalism declined!

14. The Dance Macabre: a new art form influenced by the Black Death

15.  Could a disease like the Black Death happen today? Yes? No? Why?

16.  Wrote a book called The Decameron— setting was the time of the Black Death  From the introduction….  “…rather it was come to this, that a dead man then was of no more account than a dead goat would be today.”  “…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.”  “…everyone felt doomed and had abandoned his property, so that most houses became common property…”  “Although the cemeteries were full they were forced to dig huge trenches, where they buried the bodies by the hundreds.”