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What Caused The Plague Dbq Essay

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This Primary Source is an excerpt from "The Cremation of Strasbourg Jewry, St. Valentine's Day, February 14, 1349—About the Great Plague and the Burning of the Jews" This document talks about how the Jews were blamed for the spread of the plague by putting poisons into water and wells. Because of this it was decided that all Jews would be burned to death and none would be allowed to enter specific cities for 200 years.
Our primary source gives us an idea of what people thought started the plague. Many people blamed the Jews saying that they had killed christ and that they poisoned the water and the wells with the plague. The Black Plague allowed a new wave of Anti-Semitism to spread through Europe. “In the matter of this plague the Jews throughout the …show more content…

This tells us the reasoning that people believed proved that the Jews were guilty. As it says for this reason they were burned in these places as well as any other place that the word they should be burnt spread to. “However in Basel the citizens marched to the city-hall and compelled the council to take an oath that they would burn the Jews, and that they would allow no Jew to enter the city for the next two hundred years. Thereupon the Jews were arrested in all these places.” In some places the Jews had admitted to poisoning the water so they were burned. In some places however the Government believed the Jews should be left alone. This caused an uproar among the people of Strasbourg, because of the public demand the Jews of Strasbourg were arrested and a meeting was held. “The money was indeed the thing that killed the Jews. If they had been poor and if the feudal lords had not been in debt to them, they would not have been burnt.” This shows that since the Jews were wealthy at the time many Europeans

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During the thirteenth century, a disease known as the Black Death spread from Asia to Europe at an alarming speed. It travelled through the trade routes, in the form of infected fleas carried from town to town on rats causing catastrophic loses of population . The Black Death consisted of two forms of the disease; the pneumonic plague, and the bubonic plague . Since it was unknown as to what caused the disease at the time, their responses to the plague’s outbreak were almost entirely futile. Since religion was a big factor in nearly everybody’s lives, the records of the Black Death that we do have are heavily influenced by religion, and as such, their views strongly swayed things like treatments and medicine that were used against the plague.

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People began attacking the Jews with pogroms, burning them at stake or exiling them from the country. On August twenty fourth, 1349, the largest Jewish community in Europe found in Mainz was killed with six thousand Jews being executed (Wein, The Black Death). Some Jews were taken in, tortured and forced to falsely accuse others. By 1351 there were no Jews left in Germany or Southern Europe. Those that survived the Black Death were either murdered or forced to escape to Poland or Russia.

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Someone had made up a story that the jews had gotten together and put poison into the wells of people's water and caused the black plague which was a huge lie, but after this story had got out Europe started treating jews like garbage and sorta like how Hitler treated them in the 1930’s. Also a European priest Yeah Yosef Ben Naftali Hirts Segal Mansbach, was one of the main people that had started this story and he said that the jews were responsible for all the millions that were killed. In conclusion, the black death was a sickness that nearly wiped out all of Europe.

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The Black Death was caused by various reasons, non-religious and religious. The disease in Europe, was said to be caused by, miasma (impure air) carried by warm southern winds, the March 20, 1345, conjunction of Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars, excessive clothing or outrageous fashion, and in the near east, caused by, miasma due to wind carrying the stench of Mongol bodies from Crimea,

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Germany was convinced that the books and Jews were evil and unsuitable for the world so they wanted them to cease to exist. “Of course, everyone knew about the Jews, as they were the main offender in regard to violating the German ideal.” (111). During the war, the Jews were hated so much because they were not the same as everyone who fit

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The Black Death was a disease that had a catastrophic impact on Europe. Reaching Europe in 1347, the plague killed an estimation of one-third of the population in the first wave. Each document varies with its reasons for the cause of the plague and how to deal with it. The first document Ordinances against the Spread of Plague seemed to blame Pisa and Lucca for the plague and thus, began to forbid contact with those places. It was forbidden for citizens of Pistoia to go to, or have contact with anyone or anything from Pisa or Lucca.

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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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During the mid-fourteenth century, a plague hit Europe. Initially spreading through rats and subsequently fleas, it killed at least one-third of the population of Europe and continued intermittently until the 18th century. There was no known cure at the time, and the bacteria spread very quickly and would kill an infected person within two days, which led to structural public policies, religious, and medical changes in Europe. The plague had an enormous social effect, killing much of the population and encouraging new health reforms, it also had religious effects by attracting the attention of the Catholic Church, and lastly, it affected the trade around Europe, limiting the transportation of goods. As a response to the plague that took place

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In 1350, there were 19,000 Jews residing in Frankfurt, Germany; in 1400, there were less than 10. The reason for this massive drop: a deadly disease spread by rats, caused by fleas, was ravaging the majority of Europe’s population. However, this plague, known as the black death, was not directly responsible for the decline in the Jewish population, despite the fact that, at this time, 40% of Europe was dead or dying. The Jews were not killed by rats. They were killed by humans.

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Government ordinances still commonly defined and restricted the Jewish quarter. Jewish people spoke Yiddish, and had a common language which they used among themselves and did not expect Christians to understand. Laws since 1215 had required Jews to wear distinctive clothes.(Deborah Dwork, pg10-20) The riots, or another name would be pogroms, against Jews in the middle ages were given a theological justification.

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Although these records were beneficial somewhat to researches, it can also be unreliable since Church figures of this time were believers that God brought the plague upon them and it is possible that it only provides one side to the cause and not was actually being looked for. It is also very limited in that the cause of the death isn’t recorded and can’t be separated from those who died of natural causes before the plague. Another problem with only using bishops’ and priests as evidence is that they are not an accurate representation of the entire population which included both male and female. One Historian argued that “priests were on average better fed, better housed and better educated” than most of the people other than those of higher

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Anti-Semitic acts took place every day in the streets as well as on trains. The Fascists attacked places ranging from stores to synagogues. “The situation is becoming very serious.. ”(Page 9). Jews were the target of discrimination because they were known for being wealthy while others were in debt.

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Lastly, citizens burned houses of the Jews. The start with the common were viewed with a scornful eye in the sight of all people. People viewed others with bad judgement. The commons seemed like a very despaired group.

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In Merchant of Venice, a romantic comedy written by Shakespeare, Shylock, a man of Jewish faith, is portrayed as the villain and obstacle of the tale. Many have argued that the play was written as an anti-Semitic piece of work because of the portrayal of Shylock. Anti-Semitism is the hatred, prejudice or discrimination of Jews in all aspects of their lives, and this treatment is clearly seen being thrown onto Shylock by one of the main protagonists, Antonio. One must ask the question now, if the role of Shylock is simply to be the villain. I say this because there is a reason as to why Shylock is a villain in the first place; the treatment of Shylock by our good hearted Christian, Antonio.

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During the fourteenth century, life in Europe was structured around Christianity because it was the most common religion but also the foundation for governing the people. This caused the Jews to become a minority because Christianity had immersed into the culture. The Jewish customs separated the Jews from the Christians, and the intolerance and suspicion of these unfamiliar customs, and the unwillingness of Jews to convert to Christianity often led to fear and hatred from Christians. When the Great Plagues of the fourteenth century started in Europe, it only made the situation for Jews worse. During a hard time in society, humanity is fragile and answers are sought to how such a destructive force could so quickly destroy a whole population.

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