Black Death

The Black Death was a pandemic that caused Europe to lose up to 200 million people in the span of roughly two decades. The disease, called the plague, is caused by a bacteria that is spread through fleas. It is believed that the disease originated from China and traveled to Europe through trade between nations. There are several reasons as to why Europe is the place in which the effects of the plague had been prominent. The first reason were the living conditions of the people in Europe. The people lived in close proximity with each other; therefore causing the spread of the fleas to be faster. Furthermore, the living spaces are not hygienic causing the rats, which carry the fleas, to be able to live and thrive. The people were able to learn that the disease could spread between each other. This led to isolation, be it between nation to nation, community to community, or even people to people. Furthermore, in order alleviate their worries, they turned to the Church for the answers but were unable to get any. This in turn, caused the Church to lose a lot of power


However, the Black Death had certain benefits as well. On small scale benefit. workers have become scarce, and therefore their value increased, people began to study the cause of the pandemic rather than rely on the Church for answers. These small scale benefits can then be enlarged to show the positive side the Black Death to humanity as a whole which can be summarized as people beginning to think. They started to study, medicine would of course be the first thing they tried to advance, but they did not limit the thing they were learning to the plague. They also started to think about many other things such the economy. The combination of these large scale benefits can be said to lead to the Renaissance, which is an intellectual movement that gave birth to new inventions and ways of thinking.