1348 Europe suffered the most. By the end of 1348, Germany, France, England, Italy, and the low countries had all felt the plague. Norway was infected in 1349, and Eastern European countries began to fall victim during the early 1350s. Russia felt the effects later in 1351.
The Black Death was the largest demographic shock in European history, killing approximately 40% of the region's population between 1347 and 1352. Some regions and cities were spared, but others were severely hit: England, France, Italy and Spain lost between 50% and 60% of their populations in two years.
Where did the Black Death originate? The plague that caused the Black Death originated in China in the early to mid-1300s and spread along trade routes westward to the Mediterranean and northern Africa. It reached southern England in 1348 and northern Britain and Scandinavia by 1350.
There are slight differences between the two cemetery samples at older adult ages. At face value, these results might suggest that compared to normal medieval mortality, the Black Death disproportionately affected young adults and very old adults.
The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, resulting in the deaths of an estimated 75–200 million people and peaking in Europe in the years 1348–1350.
In the middle of the 14th century, the Black Death wiped out half of Europe's population. However, Poland and Milan managed to escape the worst of the pandemic and had death rates much lower than those of the other affected nations.
It's estimated that the Black Death killed 25 million people in Asia and North Africa between 1347 and 1350, in addition to the carnage in Europe.
At the same time, the plague brought benefits as well: modern labor movements, improvements in medicine and a new approach to life. Indeed, much of the Italian Renaissance—even Shakespeare's drama to some extent—is an aftershock of the Black Death.
Cause and outbreak
From Kaffa, Genoese ships carried the epidemic westward to Mediterranean ports, whence it spread inland, affecting Sicily (1347); North Africa, mainland Italy, Spain, and France (1348); and Austria, Hungary, Switzerland, Germany, and the Low Countries (1349).
1351. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. The Black Death takes a great toll on all of Europe, claiming the lives of an estimated 25 million people by 1351, including half of the population of 100,000 in Paris, France.
Black Death: 75-200M (1334-1353)
The Black Death was a devastating global epidemic of bubonic plague that struck Europe and Asia in the mid-1300s.
The eventual weakening of the pandemic was likely due to the practice of quarantining infected people that originated in Venice in the 15th century and is with us to this day. Improved sanitation, personal hygiene, and medical practices also played a role in ultimately slowing the plague's terror march.
The Black Death was so extreme that it's surprising even to scientists who are familiar with the general details. The epidemic killed 30 to 50 percent of the entire population of Europe. Between 75 and 200 million people died in a few years' time, starting in 1348 when the plague reached London.
No. Bubonic plague killed at least one-third of the population of Europe between 1346 and 1353. But that was before we knew it was caused by the bacterium Yersina pestis. Bubonic plague does still occasionally occur in small flare-ups of a few dozen cases, but we have antibiotics to treat it now.
People abandoned their friends and family, fled cities, and shut themselves off from the world. Funeral rites became perfunctory or stopped altogether, and work ceased being done.
The three most endemic countries are the Democratic Republic of Congo, Madagascar, and Peru. In Madagascar cases of bubonic plague are reported nearly every year, during the epidemic season (between September and April).
Bubonic plague may seem like a part of the past, but it still exists today in the world and in rural areas of the U.S. The best way to prevent getting plague is to avoid the fleas that live on rodents such as rats, mice and squirrels. The fleas can also live on chipmunks and rabbits.
It was believed to start in China in 1334, spreading along trade routes and reaching Europe via Sicilian ports in the late 1340s. The plague killed an estimated 25 million people, almost a third of the continent's population.
Today, modern antibiotics are effective in treating plague. Without prompt treatment, the disease can cause serious illness or death. Presently, human plague infections continue to occur in rural areas in the western United States, but significantly more cases occur in parts of Africa and Asia.
Although worker population decreased because of the plague, the amount of land and the tools did not change much.
Although specific numbers and anecdotes are hard to come by, different chronicles note that Central Asian cities like Talas, in modern-day Kyrgyzstan; Sarai, the capital of the Golden Horde in Russia; and Samarkand, now in Uzbekistan, all suffered outbreaks of the Black Death.
The Carpathian Mountains, at the time a part of the Polish borderland, could have lessened the impact of the plague. (Existing mountain ranges, such as the Himalayas, are believed instrumental in preventing the bubonic plague's spread into India.)
Alexandre Yersin, the man who discovered the bacterium responsible for the plague. Swiss-born Alexandre Yersin joined the Institut Pasteur in 1885 aged just 22 and worked under Émile Roux. He discovered the plague bacillus in Hong Kong. A brilliant scientist, he was also an explorer and pioneer in many fields.