THE BLACK DEATH Essay -- essays research papers

The Bubonic Plague, more commonly referred to as the " minatory Death," ravaged Europe among the years 1347 and 1350. During this short period, 25 million people, one third of Europes population at the period, were killed. Thousands of people died each workweek and dead bodies littered the streets. Once a family member had contracted the disease, the spotless household was doomed to die. Parents abandoned their children, and parent-less children roamed the streets in search for food. Victims, delirious with pain, oft lost their sanity. Life was in total chaos. The Plague was a possibility with verboten a parallel, causing dramatic changes in medieval Europe. Coming out of the East, the Black Death reached the shores of Italy in the spring of 1348 unleashing a rampage of close across Europe unprecedented in recorded history. By the time the epidemic played itself out three years later, anywhere between 25% and 50% of Europes population had fallen victim to the pestile nce. Primarily fleas and rats transmittable the Black Death. The stomachs of the fleas were infected with bacteria known as Y. Pestis. The bacteria would discontinue the "throat" of an infected flea so that no blood could reach its stomach, and it grew raptorial since it was starving to death. It would attempt to suck up blood from its victim, only to hurl it back into its preys bloodstreams. The blood it injected back, however, was now mixed with Y. Pestis. Infected fleas infected rats in this fashion, and t...