The Black Death — Final
A Turning Point in European History
We’re here!
We’ve finally reached the conclusion of our exploration into the Black Death, a defining moment in history that radically transformed European life and sowed the seeds for a fundamentally different future.
In my first article, I described the Plague’s chilling arrival, the nature of the illness and how it began its grim trek across the continent of Europe.
Next, I examined how medieval medicine tried, and failed, to deal with the horrific onslaught of this unseen and unexpected enemy.
I also explored the kaleidoscope of human responses to the Plague. There were those who embraced self-indulgence and pleasure seeking. Some sought their solace in extreme religious practices such as the Flagellents.
Then there were those sections of the population like the Gravediggers and the Plague Spreaders who took advantage of a weakened population and turned to murder and intentionally spreading the Plague.
Tragically, some, desperate for answers and a needing a scapegoat, turned on their fellow human beings. Religious minorities and Jews faced unimaginable prejudice and violence resulting in pogroms and the annihilation of many Jewish communities across Europe.
There is no denying the profound impact of the Black Death on Europe.
It ripped through the very fabric of European society, leaving its mark on every aspect of life: physical health, emotional well-being, economic stability, social structures. Nothing remained untouched.
This concluding article will explore its legacy in more detail by examining the short and long-term changes brought about by the pandemic.
The Toll in Lives
Determining the exact number of deaths caused by the Black Death is a significant challenge for historians.
One reason is because of the lack of centralized record keeping. In short, it didn’t exist! Most villages and towns did not keep detailed records of their population, and those that did exist may not have survived the passage of time.
Also, you can probably guess the immense chaos and disruption that society endured when the Black Death began its onslaught. Public officials and churchmen responsible for maintaining records died alongside the general population. Understandably, record-keeping became a low-priority activity in the face of such overwhelming illness and death.
Bear in mind too, that many other illnesses abounded during the time of the Plague. Distinguishing deaths specifically from the bubonic plague would have been difficult, especially given the limitations of medieval medicine.
Lastly, to get an exact number of deaths, we would need to consult pre-Plague and post-Plague population census data. Sadly, this information does not exist!
Despite these caveats, it is possible to estimate the total number of deaths resulting from the Black Death pandemic. Overall, the pandemic is believed to have killed somewhere between 30% and 50% of Europe’s population.
Regional variations were significant, with higher mortality rates in densely populated areas like cities.
Areas like Tuscany, Italy, likely saw higher death rates compared to Bohemia, Germany which had a much lower death rate. French historian Jean-Noël Biraben estimates that France’s overall death rate ranged from 12% to 65% depending on the region.
Despite limited records, England’s death toll is estimated at around 28–30%, or roughly one-third of the population. This may be because it was an island and separate from the rest of Europe.
Economic Consequences
The Black Death wasn’t just a health crisis, it completely reshaped European society and its economy.
Imagine losing a third of your population in just a few years! This massive loss of life had major consequences.
Historians debate how big of a deal it was. Austrian cultural historian Egon Friedell, wrote: “The year of the conception of modern man was the year 1348, the year of the Black Death.” British historian, G. M. Trevelyan argued that the Black Death was as significant a phenomenon as the Industrial Revolution in its effects upon society.
One of the biggest changes? A land revolution.
Remember how I mentioned Europe’s rigid feudal system in the first article? Lords with absolute power and serfs stuck working the land? Well, after the Black Death, the tables turned. With so many people gone, those who survived now had the upper hand.
They could demand better wages, or more freedom if they weren’t already free. If a lord refused, there were plenty of other options. If a landlord was particularly intractable, his fields went unworked and value of his estate tanked.
The Black Death also led to a more mobile workforce, which chipped away at the foundations of feudalism. Parliament in England tried to pass laws to check the rise in wages and the freedom to move around. These punitive actions resulted in a great deal of resentment, ultimately leading to the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381.
Another consequence? Food prices plummeted because there were fewer people to buy it. This made life even harder for the landowning lords. On the other hand, wages and prices for manufactured goods rose sharply, also due to lack of demand.
Religious Consequences
The Grim Reaper of Plague cast a long shadow over humanity’s faith in God. People who had unquestioningly believed in a benevolent God were forced to grapple with a horrifying reality: a seemingly random plague that snatched away clergy and commoners alike.
Their prayers for divine intervention seemingly unanswered, many questioned the very nature of God and their place in the universe. This crisis of faith eroded the Church’s absolute authority, once an unshakeable foundation of medieval life.
Medieval society felt profoundly betrayed by the Church, the institution that had promised divine protection. The sight of priests succumbing to the plague alongside everyone else, their prayers seemingly powerless, shattered the illusion of their superhuman status.
The ever-present threat of death reshaped not just religious beliefs but also daily life.
Anxieties about the afterlife soared, leading some to seek solace in increased religious rituals and practices believed to secure salvation. Others, confronting their own mortality head-on, embraced an ‘eat, drink and be merry’ mentality, indulging in pleasures and questioning the point of piety in the face of such impermanence.
These attitudes, coupled with resentment towards the Church’s vast wealth and perceived complacency in the face of suffering, sowed the seeds of discontent that would eventually blossom into the Reformation, a future movement that challenged the Church’s absolute authority.
Social Consequences
The Black Death was like a tidal wave that swept away the very foundations of European society.
Education, once the guarded domain of a small, scholarly elite, was hit hard.
Four of Europe’s thirty universities closed, including Oxford University. University students at Avignon, one of Europe’s most famous universities, wrote to the Pope and described the conditions: “… at a time when the University body of your studium… is deprived of all lectures, since the whole number has been left desolate by the death from pestilence of doctors, licentiates, bachelors and students…”
Yet, from this loss emerged something positive: a democratization of knowledge. With fewer Latin teachers available, the need for education in everyday language became obvious. This shift, driven by necessity, saw a blossoming of knowledge translated into the common tongue, making it accessible to a wider audience for the first time.
Chroniclers of the time lamented a moral decline after the Plague, citing rising crime rates likely caused by the social and economic upheaval caused by the drastic decline in population.
Others complained about the new fashions in dress adopted by the younger generations following the Plague. “Who could doubt that humanity was slipping towards perdition when women appeared in public wearing artificial hair and low-necked blouses with their breasts laced so high that a candlestick could actually be put on them?” they questioned.
American historian, JW Thompson compares the complaints of contemporary commentators on the Black Death with those of the Great War 1914–18: “…Economic chaos, social unrest, high prices, profiteering, depravation of morals, lack of production, industrial indolence, frenetic gaiety, wild expenditure, luxury, debauchery, social and religious hysteria, greed, avarice, maladministration and decay of manners.”
I find it immensely interesting that these concerns were expressed nearly six centuries later, and yet they share a common thread. It seems that, while times may change, human emotions remain the same in times of radical global upheaval.
Final Thoughts
The Black Death’s impact was undeniable. It exposed societal weaknesses, challenged faith, and paved the way for future social and religious change. Yet, it also revealed humanity’s remarkable resilience which endured in subsequent outbreaks of the Plague.
The period from 1347 to 1770 witnessed numerous bubonic plague outbreaks across Europe, with major recurrences in the fourteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries.
The Great Plague of London (1665) is a particularly well-documented example. (If you are interested, Daniel Defoe, wrote an excellent book about this called Journal of the Plague Year.)
Further, less serious, global outbreaks occurred from 1855–1950 with the Plague reaching Asia, Africa, and the Americas. The Hong Kong Plague (1894) saw the deaths of between 24,000 and 30,000 people. There was even an outbreak of Plague in my home country, Australia, in 1900. Over the course of eight months, there were over 300 reported cases of the plague in Sydney, resulting in more than 100 deaths.
Bubonic plague remains in certain parts of the world, especially in rodent populations. Thanks to antibiotics, it is no longer the devastating pandemic it once was.
However, The World Health Organization (WHO) reports that between 2010 and 2015, there were over 3,200 reported cases of bubonic plague globally, thus demonstrating that Plague is still with us!
If you are interested in reading more about the Black Death, I can recommend the book, The Black Death by Phillip Ziegler, an excellent historical treatise and analysis of the pandemic. Also, The Black Death by Johannes Nohl, comprises a collection of outstanding primary sources on the Plague. The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio is a medley of bawdy stories supposedly told by an isolated enclave of Italian nobility in order to keep each other amused whilst in isolation during the Black Death. Happy reading!
