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The Black Death


            The Great Mortality and its Socio-Economic Repercussions .
             The Great Mortality, better known to us as the Black Death, or the plague, wiped out 1/3 of the population of Europe and many other nations. Its impact was not only of the slain innocent, but it also impacted society in a socio-economic fashion. The Great Mortality changed the very core of how government was run, power was shifted, traditions were lost, and the economy completely changed. This was a new era; burying old traditions along with the dead and the rise of the "nouveaux riches.".
             In beginning to examine the Great Mortality itself, and the impacts of its aftermath, one must look at the state that medieval society was in before this epidemic devastated it. Society was becoming unrest. There was an over flow in the labor force, which lowered the wages for workers. There was a shortage of food because of the teeming numbers in the population; this caused prices to go up. So to recap; too many workers + low wages + high prices + low food supply = disaster. Riots were beginning to become a daily ritual as the poor become poorer. Just as a fire in nature burns the ground of excess debris, the plague will eliminate society of its excess in population.
             The Great Mortality originated in China, particularly in the Gobi Desert. It was caused by the Y. Pestis Bacilli bacteria, which was carried over on brown and black rats with the infected fleas through trade routes from Northern China to the Black Sea regions of what is now Russia. The disease then spread to traders in India and Asia to the Italian ports, and also the traders that came to England and Northern Europe, Constantinople, Cano, and Alexandria. By 1349, it hit the Islamic world. 40%-50% of the population died in the urban centers. In Florence, 100,000 alone perished. It then moved into Spain, where as of now, 35% of the mediaeval world are dead by 1350. The Mongolians actually used the corpses of the infected dead to catapult over the walls of a town they were invading to infect and kill their opposition.


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