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A Deadly Plague In Central America Summary

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“Plague in Central America,” by Arana Xajila, in the years of 1519-1560 talks about a deadly plague that derives from Europe to Mesoamerica (Central America) and spreads throughout Central America. This plague had spread to the people of Central America when their tribe, Cakchiquels, were fighting against the Spaniards. The Spaniards that were fighting in the tribe had passed on this deadly plague to the Cakchiquels tribe who then passed it on to others in Central America. This plague can be known as the influenza (flu). This deadly virus was spreading rapidly and soon everyone in Central America were affected. This deadly disease that spread from Europe to Central America had caused people much suffering and ultimately was the cause of their …show more content…

One being the Bubonic Plague, also known as the Black Death, was the deadliest disease in 1346-1353. However, there were a few outbreaks since then. This disease had spread across Europe. The symptoms of the bubonic plague were quite severe. People suffering from this disease, “died quickly-sometimes overnight-and in great agony, coughing up blood and oozing pus and blood from ugly black sores the size of eggs” (Tignor 407). The victims struggling with this disease had coughed up blood and had terrible sores all over their bodies. This led to them dying as quick as the same night they were infected. This disease spread throughout Europe killing millions of people. The deadly plague in Central America had come from Europe. Xajila describes the symptoms of this deadly plague as, “there was a cough, then the blood was corrupted, and the urine became yellow” (Pomeranz 74). The victims struggling from this plague had also coughed up blood and their urine became yellow. There were many deaths due to this plague and it had killed people immediately with this illness. I think that this plague in Central America had been a similar disease to the Bubonic Plague or it can be said that the illness in Central America was the Bubonic Plague considering the fact that the deadly plague did come from Europe where the Bubonic Plague was originated from and where there were millions of people affected. I find this source credible because during this time there were many plagues, the deadliest being the bubonic plague. Further, during this period, there were many plagues that resulted in mass

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People who were native to the Americas did not have strong enough immune systems to easily overcome the new European diseases, so there was mass death and suffering. For example, smallpox was spread to the Americas. In the Florentine Codex, smallpox was described to be an incredibly miserable and indomitable disease. “The disease brought great desolation: a great many died of it. They could no longer walk about, but lay in their dwellings and sleeping places, no longer able to move…

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The primary source I chose for my analysis is “A Most Terrible Plague: Giovanni Boccaccio”. This document focuses on the account of how individuals acted when a plague broke out and hundreds of people were dying every day. This source is written by Giovanni Boccaccio as it is a story told by him and friends as they passed the time. Boccaccio discusses how “the plague had broken out some years before in the Levant, and after passing from place to place, and making incredible havoc along the way, had now reached the west.” Readers of this source can assume there wasn’t much cures and medicinal technology weren’t used much during this time as even their physicians stayed away from the sick because once they got close they would also get sick.

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Using the native peoples, the Spaniards gained an advantage in knowledge and strength which helped them mostly conquer the Americas. Finally, the spread of disease can both be agreed upon in both Guns, Germs, and Steel and Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest. Restall says that the diseases began to be brought to Mexico in the year of 1518 and spread to South America by the end of the 1530’s . Disease in this time is almost inescapable and targeted both the conquistadors and the indigenous alike.

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This caused millions of people to fall ill from smallpox, a disease that the Spanish had brought from the Old World. The Spanish were

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The Columbian Exchange: Positive or Negative? Christopher Columbus is credited with ‘discovering’ the Americas. After he ‘discovered’ them, the Old World and the New World began trading plants, animals, and diseases; otherwise known as the Columbian Exchange. The plants and animals were greatly beneficial, but the diseases were quite the opposite, killing many of the Native Americans.

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The Black Death The Black Death was tragically devastating to the European Society, it affected many people. The Black Death is exactly what it sounds like. The Bubonic Plague (The Black Death) spread in Italy in the spring of 1348. The Black Death is a disease carried by bacteria, which is carried by fleas, on to rats, who pass it on to humans.

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It was such a vitriolic Plague that the carrier was normally dead before they had a chance to pass it on (“BLACK DEATH”). Another common way the Plague is transmitted is through contact with infected tissue or pneumatically. When

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The Bubonic Plague (Black Death) came to the eastern Mediterranean along the shipping routs. It reached Italy in spring of 1348. By the time the disease spread between 25% and 50% of Europes population had died (document 1, (Source: EyeWitnesstoHistory.com) the Bubonic Plague was spread because in this time there was not any place to put garbage and wast products like we have today, so they would just leave the trash/wast anywhere and everywhere and the result of this would bring rats and many other animals, and with these animals they had fleas and eventually the fleas would get to the people and the humans would get sick and spread it to everyone. Some symptoms of the Bubonic Plague were large swelling lumps which they called "buboes" sizing

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People grew more and more concerned with contracting the disease that they would try to isolate themselves, “… and human aid was as vail as it was destructive to those who approached the infected.” ( Hecker, J. C., & Babington, B. G., pg 6) This quote shows the tremendous devastation that the plague caused since once the person was infected there was very little that could be done to save that person and in turn the risk that people faced when attempting to help someone would only kill them. The concern with contacting the disease was so terrifying since they would die a painful death that even mothers and fathers would abandon their children as soon as they discovered that they were infected. (DeWitte, S., & Slavin,

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The Justinian Plague was the first recorded pandemic. It began in 541 AD. The pandemic was named after a 6th century Byzantine emperor Justinian I. It affected the Mediterranean basin, and killed over twenty five million people over the next few hundred years. The Great Plague, also known as the "Black Death," orginiated in china in 1334.

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Europeans brought many deadly viruses over to the Americas. Such as: smallpox, measles, typhus, bubonic plague, malaria and cholera. Native Americans had no immunities to these diseases and bacteria because they had not been exposed to it before this time of exchange. This killed off many of the Native population about eighty to ninety percent in the first one-hundred to one-hundred and fifty years. The Native Indians also had a disease they passed on called syphilis.

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Often as a result of overpopulation, pandemics—like swine flu and ebola, for instance—have affected life on Earth for centuries; one of the most well-known, and possibly the most unforgiving epidemics was the Bubonic Plague, also known as the Black Death . Although the first symptoms of the Plague trace back to the Mongol Empire in 1331, the disease first struck Europe in Venice and Genoa during the winter of 1348. In the following years, the Bubonic Plague spread rapidly throughout Europe, killing roughly a third of its population. It is suggested that the rapid spread and extreme severity of the Black Death was partially due to the weakened immune system of the Europeans, which had been caused by the Great Famine, a period of food scarcity that affected Europe from 1315 to 1322. Additionally, the lack of knowledge about the spread of

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Infected rats and fleas would bite people and they would fall ill. Infected people could also cough, sneeze or vomit and the partials of the black plague would go through the air. Another common way it spread was bacteria on certain surfaces. In the past years the black plague has been in the U.S in about 14-15 cases. All though the black plague started in Europe, it has spread throughout the world.

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Among the many things spread and shared in the Columbian Exchange, the trading of diseases is perhaps the most significant. The natives of the Americas had never experienced the serious diseases that European explorers carried over to the New World. From smallpox to influenza and malaria to cholera, Native American populations were drastically decreased due to their poor immunity. Between the numerous amounts of European diseases, though, measles was the most remarkable in that its effects were both widespread and enduring. Measles, also known as rubeola, is a respiratory infection caused by the measles virus.

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The Colonisation of Latin America had a major negative impact on these indigenous people as the arrival in Latin America collided with 12,000 years of isolation from Eurasia which imposed many diseases on the natives. The natives were unable to fight of these diseases as they did not have the immune system for these types of sickness nor the appropriate medicine so many of them died as a result. These diseases included small pox, measles and influenza, bubonic plagues, cholera and tropical

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