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The Spread of the Black Death
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Medicine Through Time – The Black Death, c. 1325-1450
In this course, Professor Miri Rubin (Queen Mary, University of London) explores the Black Death. Firstly, we look at what the Black Death was and where it came from. We then have a look at the social and economic effects of such a vast mortality. After this, we examine how medieval society dealt with the Black Death and how it transformed how death was viewed. Finally, we look at the Black Death's effect on public health in the centuries that followed.
The Spread of the Black Death
In this module, we look at some of the fundamental questions in relation to the Black Death: (i) what was it?; (ii) where did it come from?; (iii) and what was its effect?
Hi, I'm Mary Ruben.
00:00:05I'm professor of mediaeval and early modern
00:00:07History at Queen Mary University of London.
00:00:09Now, during the covid year or year and a half,
00:00:13I've often been asked about the black death.
00:00:16It's not surprising
00:00:19this came upon us and people want to understand.
00:00:21Um, is there a historical precedent? What can we learn
00:00:24I'm very keen to talk about the black death,
00:00:28and I still shall with you in this series of short lectures.
00:00:30But the thing to really emphasise is that
00:00:34even though there has been so much loss and so much suffering and so much anguish,
00:00:38we simply cannot imagine on the basis of our covid experience, Um,
00:00:43what really the black death was like in terms
00:00:49of the levels of mortality and dislocation and despair.
00:00:52So it takes us really to another place
00:00:59in terms of understanding human responses to terrible,
00:01:01terrible loss.
00:01:06On the other hand, in terms of, uh, certain types of aftermath to the black death,
00:01:07there will be, uh, parallels that we can draw fruitfully.
00:01:13But first of all, what is the black death?
00:01:17So the black death used to be studied very much as a European phenomenon
00:01:20of a second great wave of plague after the great
00:01:25plague that affected the Mediterranean of the sixth century under
00:01:29Emperor Justinian.
00:01:33And, uh, it was usually described well 13 47 to 13 51 more or less.
00:01:35It reached Italy than from Italy, which is a big hub of trade through ships.
00:01:42It reached all parts of Europe,
00:01:48even as far as Scandinavia at different points of time,
00:01:50but literally the last decade of research.
00:01:56And here I must mention, the most brilliant scholar who is Monica Green.
00:01:59American scholar
00:02:03has shown that the disease, the plague, was long in coming,
00:02:05that if we take a Eurasian view,
00:02:14we can see its its emergence in certain types of changes
00:02:16in the environment that occurred in China in the 13th century.
00:02:22We start seeing in a way, it's travelling across Asia westwards with,
00:02:26uh with with with outbreaks in various parts of Central Asia and features
00:02:33gaining the features that ultimately became the features that we saw in Europe.
00:02:39Now this is really important.
00:02:43This importance is important because any response to
00:02:45plague to mortality of this of this kind,
00:02:48and I should say this is a bacterial disease, not a viral disease.
00:02:52Um is something that can only be understood within environments within global
00:02:56environments and through the coming together
00:03:02of scholars from very different directions.
00:03:04So we are now in a very exciting moment of understanding, uh,
00:03:07the black death in Europe as a motor in European
00:03:11history and indeed for your course in British history,
00:03:15where we But we have to do so as part of a sort of deep global understanding.
00:03:19Indeed, we're even beginning to find signs that there may have been a black death.
00:03:25The black death may have also affected that
00:03:29same wave of mortality has affected Africa,
00:03:31which was never known before.
00:03:35So bearing that in mind and also the
00:03:37fact that scholars from archaeology from Chinese history,
00:03:40Indian history, history of Islamic communities,
00:03:44European ist Mediterranean ists, Africanist,
00:03:47all working together to piece together a picture of transmission effect
00:03:50and in a very over a very long arc of development.
00:03:57So this has really changed the way that we're thinking
00:04:02about the movement and the effects of this disease.
00:04:05Nonetheless, for the purposes of this particular course,
00:04:08it's useful to remember that it just came unknown, uh,
00:04:13to Europe And it did come from Asia Minor,
00:04:19where there were large concentrations of turkey of today,
00:04:23large concentrations of, um,
00:04:26uh, merchants from the great maritime trading cities of Italy,
00:04:29whose business since the 12th century for sure,
00:04:35maybe even earlier their business brought them to Asia as far as China.
00:04:40Remember Marco Polo, for example, in his family that Venetian, uh,
00:04:45traveller and merchant and storyteller
00:04:50they were in contact with Asia.
00:04:54And along the way they had certain centres where they had sort of
00:04:57like settlements with offices with warehouses and so on and Asia Minor.
00:05:01Many cities in Asia Minor, the greatest of all Constantinople,
00:05:06Istanbul of today had these sort of outposts of these Italian cities.
00:05:10So obviously they are connected to Asia.
00:05:16They are also mightily connected to all parts of Europe because what
00:05:19the Italian merchants brought from Asia and from the near East Uh,
00:05:24the spices, the silks of the rare rare objects made of of of ivory.
00:05:29Uh, they then
00:05:36exported and sold throughout throughout Europe.
00:05:38They also sold throughout Europe uh, the great manufacturer of their own cities,
00:05:43very most luxurious arms weapons,
00:05:48but also the most luxurious brocades
00:05:52and expensively decorated and embroidered silks.
00:05:55So, uh, the Italians were everywhere in Europe,
00:05:59selling the products of their own manufacturing cities and selling the
00:06:04products that they imported from those very long journeys into Asia.
00:06:09That is why they were the most efficient vectors their boats were
00:06:13in spreading any sort of disease that came onto their boats.
00:06:18And so it was in 13 47 already
00:06:24in Italy itself, the mortality was felt very,
00:06:29uh, you know, very substantially. And, uh, in England, it is mostly 13, 48 13, 49.
00:06:32In Scandinavia, it's mostly 13, 49 50 51.
00:06:40Eastern Europe was on the whole Central and Eastern Europe, much,
00:06:45much less affected, as we're on the whole, the further reaches of the British Isles.
00:06:48So we see here,
00:06:55that sort of temporal itty to the development of
00:06:56this wave of what we call the black death.
00:06:59We also see this as a variation of effect.
00:07:03Although in the first wave,
00:07:06this wave of 13 47 to 51 really both rural and urban communities were affected very,
00:07:08very badly in some parts.
00:07:17And of course,
00:07:19this all depends on the our ability to assess is
00:07:19really dependent on the survival of sources in England,
00:07:22where we have very, very good survival of sources from records from manners,
00:07:26rural sources, we have tax returns.
00:07:31We have lots of different sources that allow
00:07:33us to make certain types of assessments.
00:07:35We think it was between 40
00:07:37and 60% mortality,
00:07:40uh, in in depending on the community,
00:07:43urban communities somewhat more than rural ones, although in the first wave,
00:07:47definitely both were affected.
00:07:52And what's really important to remember is also
00:07:53will be familiar with this from our own,
00:07:57um, already experience of waves of mortality.
00:08:00Um that there was, um, the this mid mid 14th century one and then practically every,
00:08:04uh, decade for the next century, there was a visitation of the plague again,
00:08:12and there it did tend to be that the return was much
00:08:19more was affecting much more urban populations for reasons of proximity,
00:08:24for reasons of patterns of travel
00:08:29and, um so so that is also something to bear in mind.
00:08:32It wasn't something that went away. It's something.
00:08:36And that's why the population of England did really recover.
00:08:39Start recovering until the 16th century, and some claim that the numbers really.
00:08:43We're not sort of the population did not reach
00:08:48the pre plague levels until about the 19th century
00:08:51And the just level of dislocation.
00:08:56You know, this starts in the summer who will go into the fields and harvest the food.
00:08:59So that means that food prices in in the aftermath went absolutely, uh, well,
00:09:03just heights that could not have been imagined.
00:09:10Uh, before the question of who takes care of people who are suffering,
00:09:12there is certain evidence that there was more mortality amongst the clergy.
00:09:20Maybe the clergy, because they visit the poor because they gave last rites,
00:09:23were more were more prone.
00:09:26There is a really interesting, um uh,
00:09:29reaction to to the plague that is evident in the literature of the period.
00:09:32One of the most
00:09:38extraordinary works is Boccaccio and Italian Tuscan, uh, writers.
00:09:40The camera on an account of as it were,
00:09:4710 days of storytelling whereby young people who escaped Florence
00:09:50from the plague tell stories to amuse each other,
00:09:56and these are sort of meant to be stories both to abuse and to edify.
00:10:00So this is a vast phenomenon in European history,
00:10:05particularly in Western Europe and the Mediterranean.
00:10:10But as I said at the start,
00:10:14it is part of a really Eurasian story and Eurasian African story,
00:10:17possibly of great importance.
00:10:23
Cite this Lecture
APA style
Rubin, M. (2021, September 09). Medicine Through Time – The Black Death, c. 1325-1450 - The Spread of the Black Death [Video]. MASSOLIT. https://massolit.io/courses/medicine-through-time-the-black-death/the-black-death-and-public-health
MLA style
Rubin, M. "Medicine Through Time – The Black Death, c. 1325-1450 – The Spread of the Black Death." MASSOLIT, uploaded by MASSOLIT, 09 Sep 2021, https://massolit.io/courses/medicine-through-time-the-black-death/the-black-death-and-public-health