Bubonic Plague
The Bubonic Plague, or Black Death, had many negative as well as positive effectson medieval Europe. While being one of the worst and deadliest diseases in the history ofthe world, it indirectly helped Europe break grounds for some of the basic necessities for The Black Death erupted in the Gobi Desert in the late 1320s, but one reallyknows why. The plague bacillus was alive and active long before that; as Europe itselfhad suffered an epidemic in the 6th century. But the disease had lain relatively dormant inthe succeeding centuries. It is believed that the climate of Earth began to cool in the 14thcentury, and perhaps this so-called little Ice Age had something to do with it becomingmore active than normal (Knox 2). Whatever the reason, we know that the outbreakbegan there and spread outward. While it did go west, it
It hit Alexandria in theautumn of that year, and by spring 1348, a thousand people a day were dying there. The flea's life is noteffected (Gregg 126). Already in 1347, the plague had hit Sicily. The mostnoticeable characteristic is a swelling of the lymph nodes. It is an organism mostusually carried by rodents. It seems likely thatsome form of pneumonic plague was at work alongside the bubonic plague in those awfulyears. The whole process, from firstsymptoms of fever and aches, to final expiration, lasts only three or four days. There are two othervarieties of plague: septicaemic plague, which attacks the blood, and pneumonic plague,which attacks the lungs. The swellings continue to expand until theyeventually burst, with death following soon after. By January of 1348, the plague was in Marseilles, and it reached Paris inthe spring of 1348. By September of 1348 the Bubonic Plague had worked its way intoEngland. Theswiftness of the disease, the terrible pain, the grotesque appearance of the victims, allserved to make the plague especially terrifying. The disease traveled by ship as readily as byland and it was no sooner in the eastern Mediterranean than it was in the western end aswell. Bubonic plague was caused by the bacteria Yersinia Pestis.
Common topics in this essay:
Black Death,
Yersinia Pestis,
Ice Age,
Gobi Desert,
Cairo Egypt,
Volga River,
Italy January,
bubonic plague,
England Bubonic,
black death,
pneumonic plague,
plague especially,
rodents fleas,
lymph nodes,
plague attacks,
spring 1348,
Bubonic Plague,
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