The Black Death In 1347 twelve Genoese trading ships docked at the Sicilian port of Messina. They just arrived after a long journey through the Black Sea. When the ships arrived The Black Death was unknowingly released to the people who have gathered to greet the ships and sailors. However when the ships arrived most of the sailors were dead and the few that were alive were deathly ill. They had fevers and were unable to keep down what they ate or drank. They were in so much pain that they were delirious. But the weirdest symptom they had was that they were covered in mysterious black boils that oozed pus and blood, therefore giving the illness it name the “Black Death.” The fleet of “death ships” were ordered out of the harbor by the Sicilian authorities, but it was too late. The mysterious Black Death would kill over 20 million people in Europe, all in the course of the next five years, which is almost …show more content…
It then found its way to Florence and Rome, two cities at the center of an elaborate web of trade routes. The Black Death has struck Paris, Bordeaux, Lyon, and London, all this happened by the middle of 1348.Today this horrific sequence of events is both scary and comprehensible. Back then, the middle of the 14th century, there seemed to be no explanation for it. The people didn’t know how it spread from one patient to another. One doctor said “ instantaneous death occurs when the aerial spirit escaping from the eyes of the sick man strikes the healthy person standing near and looking at the sick” no one knew how to treat or prevent it. Physicians back then would try techniques that were extremely unconventional such as boil lancing and bloodletting. Both of which were not only dangerous but also unsanitary. Superstitious practices such as bathing in rosewater or vinegar or the burning of aromatic