Report on

Black Death and its Impact

SUBMITTED TO:

FARHAT SALEEM JANJUA

FROM:

ASGHAR NAWAB KHAN NIAZI (11738)

YASIR ALI SHAH (11318)

AMAN ULLAH KHAN (45039)

HAMMAD CHAUHAN (45108)

FARAZ ALI (32536)

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Acknowledgement
Above all is ALLAH the almighty who enabled us to translate the mere idea of our project

report, and whose help made it possible for us to complete the report in the desired way. It is

because of Allah that we are feeling proud of all the hard work that we have done in completing

this report.

We are indebted to "Miss. Farhat Saleem Janjua", under whose supervision we are able to

complete this report. We are sincerely thankful for his guidance, illustrious advice and

consideration.

We also thankful to all those people whom give us any kind of information we required for this

“Report on Black Death and its Impact” and all other people who helped us in any manner in the

development of the Report. We also thankful to all those who constantly pray for our success in

each and every step.

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Abstract

The consequences of the Black Death are short and long-term effects of the Black Death on

human populations across the world. This report concerns the biological, social, economic and

religious impact of the Black Death, the plague that devastated Europe during the middle of the

fourteenth century. It explores the effect of the Black Death on the Society and the religious

movements that emerged in response to it. The conclusions drawn here are based on the research

of both primary and secondary sources. The Greek physician and Church played a significant

role during the middle Ages to stopped plague disease. When the Black Death struck Europe in

1347, the Greek Physician and Church struggled to cope with the plague’s damaging

consequences and its reputation suffered as a result. The Black Death was a significant event in

the history of Western society with profound cultural and demographic consequences, and its

impact on the religion in medieval society justifies the study of this topic.

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Table of Content

S.No TITTLE. Page No.

1. The Black Death - Introduction 05

2. The Origins 05

3. Spread of the Disease 06

4. The routes of the Black Death to Europe 07

5. The Black Death in England 11

6. Medieval outlook on the disease 12

7. The church's view of the disease 12

8. How to Spread Disease 14

9. Causes of the disease 15

10. What was the Black Death 16

11. Bubonic Plague 16

12. How the Bubonic Plague was transmitted 18

13. Pneumonic Plague 18

14. Septicemic Plague 19

15. Cures for the Black Death 19

16. Treatments and Cures in Mediaeval Ages 20

17. Treatments and Cures in Modern Ages 22

18. Conclusion 23

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The Black Death - Introduction

The Black Death or Plague was an epidemic which reached Europe in the 1340s although it
started half way across the world.

There had been plagues at various times for thousands of years, some of which may have been
similar to the Black Death. By the time of the Greek and Roman Empires, much better records
were kept and historians described outbreaks of an epidemic disease which was sudden and
deadly. An outbreak of the plague at Constantinople in the 6th century AD may have killed as
many as half the population.

The Origins

Usually thought to have started in China or Central Asia, the plague had reached the trade city of
Kaffa in the Black Sea by 1346. From there, black rats carried it onto merchant ships bound for
Italy. It then spread throughout the Mediterranean and ravaged Europe.

In 1346, the Tatars (Mongols) laid siege to Kaffa. While surrounding the city, the Tatars came
down with plague. The Tatars decided to use this to their advantage. They started loading their
catapults of the infected, dead bodies and began flinging them over the city walls. An outbreak of
plague in the city soon followed. It has been speculated that this operation may have been
responsible for the advent of the Black Death in Europe. The Black Death is estimated to have
killed 30% - 60% of Europe’s population.

The 'Great Mortality'

The outbreak which reached Europe from China in 1348. It spread rapidly with deadly results to
most countries.

From Tudor times onward it was known as the Black Death although at the time it was called the
'Great Mortality'.

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The Culprits

Spread of the Disease

The Black Death of the mid-14th century probably began in Central Asia and spread to China
and India.

The disease is thought to have been carried from these regions by merchants travelling along
the Silk Routes from China. Its spread was so rapid because it was carried by traders, armies
and by ship. The map shows the routes it followed. The quickest route for the disease to be
carried was by ship, many of which were infested by rats.

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The routes of the Black Death to Europe. The plague travelled
fastest by ship along trade routes.

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The disease reached Constantinople in 1347 and moved
westwards to Paris and the south coast of England by
the summer of 1348.

It then spread rapidly to the rest of Europe.

The disease moved quickly through mainly rural areas

and the short interval between the time of infection and
the death of a victim shows that it was an especially
virulent strain of the disease.

It was known to kill pets, farm animals and even birds The Black Death reached
as well as human beings. Constantinople
(now Istanbul) in 1347.

Many writers at the time were amazed at the devastation

caused by the disease.

They believed that almost all the inhabitants of many

places had died and that very few had survived
unharmed. It was even written that probably the total
population of the city of Florence (100,000) had died.

The shortage of reliable records makes it impossible to

give accurate figures of deaths but it has been shown
that in some areas of Europe as many as half the
population died.

In other areas of Europe, the impact was far less and

some parts such as the Low Countries (the Netherlands
and Belgium) escaped almost completely.

However, they were to suffer in later outbreaks.

Many writers at the time were

amazed at the devastation of the
disease.

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The Black Death in England

The first outbreak of the Black Death reached England

in 1348 through the Dorset port of Melcombe Regis,
brought; it is thought, on an Italian merchant ship. (You
could check this on the map of plague routes shown
earlier). Within a month of its arrival in Dorset, it had
spread throughout the county and across to Devon and
Somerset, reaching Bristol on August 15th. Citizens of
Gloucester, the next large town north refused to allow
anyone from Bristol to enter their city, believing that
the disease spread on people's breath.

This halted the spread of the disease only briefly and it The plague spread from Dorset,
across Somerset, reaching Bristol
reached Gloucester, Oxford and London by late in August. By September it had
reached London.
September.

Despite the belief that it was punishment from God for

excesses in life, monasteries were affected as much as
ordinary villages.

As the first epidemic spread through England, it

immediately caused problems in the villages as workers
died and food production fell. Farm animals wandered
unattended, corn went unharvested and grass grew in
the streets of the cities. A horse which previously could
have been bought for 6 shillings (30p) now cost forty
(£2.00).

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Medieval outlook on the Disease

People were baffled by the disease and it was not until the early years of the 20th century that it
was fully understood and effective treatment became available.

At the time, the connection with rats was not understood. Some people believed that the disease
was caused by various problems which were common at the time, such as bad smells which
poisoned the air. These smells were caused by poor sanitation, rubbish tips, butchers' and tanners'
waste and stinking ditches. Particularly feared were victims' decomposing bodies, or their goods
and clothing.

The Church's View of the Disease

Throughout Europe, the church believed that the Black

Death was a punishment from God for the sins of
mankind.

What were considered to be immoral forms of dress

such as men wearing tights and women in extravagant
dresses were thought to be reasons for the disease
spreading.

The church believed that the

Black Death was a punishment from God.

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Blame was also attached to vanity, envy
and people not doing penance for their
sins. The outbreak was used by church
leaders to bring people back to a more
religious way of life. People turned in
terror to their priests who were often
used as a source of advice in times of
trouble.
This is a close up of the of death you saw earlier.
The advice given was to improve their People are dancing and flirting; blame was attached to
vanity and what was seen
moral conduct, to avoid hot, spicy food as immoral behavior.

and wine and to improve their way of

life by reducing stress and by taking up
activities such as bathing. Because there
was no cure, this change to a better way
of life would, it was hoped, prevent
people catching the disease in the first
place.

People could not understand why what

they saw as both guilty and innocent,
such as children, were dying from the
plague.

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How to Spread Disease

 Towns were dirty places, with narrow filthy streets.

 Waste disposal back in the Middle Ages was very crude. People would simply dump their
trash out the window and onto the streets.
 The filth that littered streets gave rats the perfect environment to breed and increase their
number.

 Typical bathing and cleanliness in the middle Ages was not very good.
 In fact, most people typically only washed their hands and face; limiting baths to once a
year, usually around Easter.
 Additionally, people tended to sleep on beds of hay or sheep’s wool and rarely would
have been changed or cleaned.
 Because of this, people would often have problems with bedbugs, lice and fleas.

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  Having no defense and no understanding to the cause of the pestilence, the men, women
and children caught in its onslaught were bewildered, panicked, and finally devastated.
 Also, the disposal of bodies was very crude and helped to spread the disease even further
as those who handled the dead bodies’ did not protect themselves in any way.

Causes of the Disease

The plague bacteria live in wild rodents

and their parasites, especially the black
rat and its flea. A diseased rat may
infect the flea which feeds on its blood
and, once the rat dies, the flea then will
move to feed on another creature.

Because rats live close to humans, the

flea may move to live on them and will
carry the disease to people. The plague bacteria live in wild rodents and
their parasites.
Today, experts believe that this was the
most common cause of the infection
spreading.

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What was the Black Death?

The Black Death is categorized into three specific types of plague caused by the same bacteria,
yersinia pestis:
- Bubonic Plague (infection in the lymph nodes, or buboes)
- Pneumonic Plague (the infection in the lungs)
- Septicemic Plague (the infection in the blood [also the most deadly of the three])

Bubonic Plague
The first and most important
was bubonic plague, which was the
type most common in Europe in late
Medieval times. This type occurred
when the fleas infected humans by
biting them. For those affected by this
form of the disease, the death rate was
up to 75%. Most died within a week of
catching the disease which was
most virulent in the summer, usually
being worst in September.
The bubonic plague, one of three types, was
spread by fleas.
In London and other European cities,
many people left town during the
summer to try to escape the effects of
the disease.

The bubonic plague was the most commonly seen form during the Black Death. The classic sign
of bubonic plague was the appearance of buboes in the groin, the neck and armpits, which oozed
black pus and bled. The term 'bubonic’, refers to the characteristic bubo or enlarged lymphatic
gland. It had a mortality rate of thirty to seventy-five percent and symptoms including a high
fever, headaches, painful aching joints, nausea and vomiting, and a general feeling of discomfort.
Of those who contracted the bubonic plague, 4 out of 5 died within eight.
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How the Bubonic Plague was Transmitted

Pneumonic Plague

Pneumonic plague was the second most commonly seen form during the Black Death, with a
mortality rate of ninety to ninety-five percent. Symptoms included fever, cough, and blood-
tinged sputum. As the disease progressed, your lungs basically start to liquefy and the sputum
became free flowing and bright red.

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Septicemic Plague

Septicemic plague was the least common of the three forms, with a mortality rate close to one
hundred percent. Symptoms were high fevers and purple/black skin patches. Your blood would
simply not do its job of bringing oxygen to your body and also would not clot. As a result, your
skin started to die and you tended to bleed uncontrollably all over your body.

This type was most common in the winter and was spread by coughs and sneezes from a person
already infected. There was a 95% death rate with victims dying within three days of catching
the disease.

How did they prevent the Black Death?

Cures for the Black Death

In the 1347 - 1350 outbreaks, doctors were completely unable to prevent or cure the plague. For
those who believed in the Greek humours there were a range of cures available. ‘Blood-letting’ –
deliberately bleeding a vein – was a way of reducing ‘hot’ blood, whilst blowing your nose or
clearing your throat was a way of getting rid of too much ‘cold’ phlegm. Mustard, mint sauce,
apple sauce and horseradish were used to balance wet, dry, hot and cold in your diet!

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 A source from 1380 presents a cynical view of their work:

Some of the cures they tried included:

 Rubbing onions, herbs or a chopped up snake (if available) on the boils or cutting up a pigeon
and rubbing it over an infected body.

 Drinking vinegar, eating crushed minerals, arsenic, mercury or even ten-year-old treacle!

 Sitting close to a fire or in a sewer to drive out the fever, or fumigating the house with herbs to
purify the air.

 People who believed God was punishing you for your sin, 'flagellants', went on processions
whipping themselves.

 In the 1361 - 1364 outbreaks, doctors learned how to help the patient recover by bursting
the buboes.

 Doctors often tested urine for color and health. Some even tasted it to test.

Treatments and Cures in Mediaeval Ages

Of course, if medieval physicians had known about these factors, as well as the fact that the
plague was caused by germs infesting fleas, they might have been able to prevent, or at least
slow, the disease’s spread. However, the sad fact is that they were completely ignorant of the
plague’s causes and modes of transmission. Because modern doctors do know these facts, they
can explain why attempts by their medieval counterparts to treat the illness failed.
Doctors working in the 1300s most often followed the cures and treatments advocated by the
second-century ancient Greek physician and medical researcher Galen. He was important in his
own day because he did extensive medical research when most other physicians did not.
However, doctors in later ages, thinking his word was final on medical matters, did little or no
research of their own. They blindly accepted his assertions that illness resulted from factors such
as a person’s personality traits, the temperature or “purity” of the air, and/or eating or drinking
too much.

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Accordingly, doctors faced with the Black Death told their patients they could avoid the
contagion by moving to places where the air was drier and cooler. They also admonished people
not to bathe.
This, they said, was because bathing would open the pores and thereby allow “bad” air to enter
their bodies.
As for treating those already sick with plague, some doctors prescribed bed rest and drinking
plenty of fluids. This was good advice, although by itself it was not enough to cure a disease as
dangerous as the plague. Unfortunately for patients, doctors more often bled patients. This
consisted of opening one or more veins, especially those located near buboes, and allowing
“tainted” blood to drain out into a pan. Needless to say this only made the patient weaker. Also
common was opening and draining the buboes, not realizing that many bacteria still remained
inside and continued to multiply.

The treatments of Greek physician Galen were often followed in the 1300s to treat plague
victims.

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Treatments and Cures in Modern Ages

Transmission

Y. pestis is found in animals throughout the world, most commonly in rats but occasionally in
other wild animals, such as prairie dogs. Most cases of human plague are caused by bites of
infected animals or the infected fleas that feed on them. In almost all cases, only the pneumonic
form of plague (see Forms of Plague) can be passed from person to person.

Diagnosis

A health care provider can diagnose plague by doing laboratory tests on blood or sputum, or on
fluid from a lymph node.

Treatment

When plague is suspected and diagnosed early, a health care provider can prescribe specific
antibiotics (generally streptomycin or gentamycin). Certain other antibiotics are also effective.

Left untreated, bubonic plague bacteria can quickly multiply in the bloodstream, causing
septicemic plague, or even progress to the lungs, causing pneumonic plague.

Prevention

Antibiotics

Health experts recommend antibiotics if you have been exposed to wild rodent fleas during a
plague outbreak in animals, or to a possible plague-infected animal. Because there are so few
cases of plague in the United States, experts do not recommend taking antibiotics unless it's
certain a person has been exposed to plague-infected fleas or animals.

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Vaccine

Currently, there is no commercially available vaccine against plague in the United States.

Research

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) conducts and supports
research on the diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of infections caused by microbes, including
those that have the potential for use as biological weapons. The research program to address
biodefense includes both short- and long-term studies targeted at designing, developing,
evaluating, and approving specific tools (diagnostics, drugs, and vaccines) needed to defend
against possible bioterrorist-caused disease outbreaks.

For instance, NIAID-supported investigators sequenced the genome of the strain of Y. pestis that
was associated with the second pandemic of plague, including the Black Death. This will provide
a valuable research resource to scientists for identifying new targets for vaccines, drugs, and
diagnostics for this deadly pathogen.

NIAID-funded scientists have developed a rapid diagnostic test for pneumonic plague that can be
used in most hospitals. This will allow health care providers to quickly identify and isolate the
pneumonic plague patient from other patients and enable health care providers to use appropriate
precautions to protect themselves.

Many other plague research projects at NIAID are focusing on early-stage vaccine development,
therapeutics, and diagnostics. Y. pestis bacterium is a high priority with funded efforts ranging
from basic science research to final product development.

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Current research projects include:

 Identifying genes in Y. pestis that infect the digestive tract of fleas and researching how
the bacteria are transferred to humans.
 Studying the disease-causing proteins and genes of Y. pestis that allow the bacteria to
grow in humans and learning how they function in human lungs.

NIAID is also working with the U.S. Department of Defense, the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention, and the U.S. Department of Energy to:

 Develop a vaccine that protects against inhalationally acquired pneumonic plague.

 Develop promising antibiotics and intervention strategies to treat and prevent plague
infection.

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CONCLUSION

By 1350, the survivors of the plague began to realize their nightmare was coming to an end. The

immediate consequence of the Black Death was a massive reduction of the population; however,

the plague also had many long term effects. Many of the scholarly people of the time died. This

led to a decline in colleges and many were destroyed. In addition, a decline in trade occurred

because people were fearful to trade good with a once plague infested country. All of these

factors contributed to Europe’s period of reduced prosperity. During the middle ages, the plague

was known as all-destroying. One third of a countries population cannot be eliminated over a

period of three years without considerable dislocation to its’ economy, Church life, and family

life. Through these losses, a tiny insect toppled Europe’s social structure and altered medieval

society forever.

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