Black Plague Dbq

The Black Death ravaged over 20 million people in China, India, Persia, Syria and Egypt during the early 1340’s. Most of these people were in Europe; this was over ⅓ of the population at the time (“BLACK PLAGUE”). This was the First Pandemic of the Bubonic Plague, killing far more than any Pandemic to follow it. Given the knowledge of medicine and science during this era, the Black Plague spread like wildfire, and caused many hideous symptoms which led to several ineffective treatments. Luckily, scientists and doctors worked together to create a cure, and while the Bubonic Plague does still infect people to this day, the wave that killed countless Europeans died out by 1400 (“IN THE WAKE OF THE PLAGUE: The Black Death and the World It Made”).

Aboard those 12 ships were many dead, or nearly dead sailors. The few that were alive were on the brink of death and covered in black boils filled with blood and pus (“BLACK DEATH”). The disease then spread through northern Italy, into Portugal, Spain, France, and England by June of 1348 (“IN THE WAKE OF THE PLAGUE: The Black Death and the World It Made”). The Black Plague is caused by a bacillus called Yersinia pestis. The bacillus infects people through the bite of infected fleas and rats (“BLACK DEATH”). This was especially prominent in urban and over populated areas (“Ecology and Transmission“). When Plagues strike people and animals alike die horrifically, in turn fleas need to find other sources of food. The people living in poor conditions often get forayed by flea bites, thus infecting them (“Ecology and Transmission“). It was seldom for the Black Death to be spread from person to person. 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