THE DEADLIEST PANDEMIC OF ALL TIME- THE BLACK DEATH- A Bacteria Caused Plague

 Nadene Goldfoot                                                 

The Black Death was the deadliest pandemic recorded in human history. The Black Death resulted in the deaths of up to 75,000,000 to 200,000,000 (75–200 million) people in Eurasia and North Africa, peaking in Europe from 1347 to 1351. Plague, the disease, was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis.  The Y. pestis infection most commonly results in bubonic plague, but can also cause septicaemic or pneumonic plagues.

From the map, one can see a black broken line that was a border line between the principality of Kiev, (Ukraine) and the Golden Horde (a Khanate in Turkey) of 13th century; part of Mongol Empire).  It was a passage prohibited for Christians.  We can see by the color chart that the plague started in 1346 in the East and moved Westward across all of Europe.  It killed a great part of the population of Europe and led to murderous attacks on many Jewish communities, particularly in Germany by 1348-9.                      

 A bubos on the thigh that developed in the Bubonic Plague-connected to the Black Death, one of three types of plague caused by bacterium Yersinia pestis...but for now we're only concerned with the Black Death plague. 

It had travelled along the Silk Road, reaching Crimea by 1347. From there, it was most likely carried by fleas living on the black rats that travelled on Genoese merchant ships, spreading throughout the Mediterranean Basin and reaching Africa, Western Asia, and the rest of Europe via Constantinople, Sicily, and the Italian Peninsula. 

Current evidence indicates that once it came onshore, the Black Death was in large part spread by human fleas – which cause pneumonic plague – and the person-to-person contact via aerosols which pneumonic plague enables, thus explaining the very fast inland spread of the epidemic, which was faster than would be expected if the primary vector was rat fleas causing bubonic plague.                                                 

The superstitious masses readily listened to charges coming from Savoy, a country in Western Europe,  that Jews had caused the disease by poisoning their wells.  The fact was that Jews were less exposed to the plague because of their enforced segregation and that they kept kosher (their dietary and hygienic practices) that lent weight to the charges.  A practice in keeping kosher is the washing of the hands, and bathing (going to the mikva).    

Pope Clement VI issued a bull condemning the libel and ordering the Jews to be protected.  Even so, hardly a single Jewish community from Alsace eastward was spared from attacks.  Emperor Charles IV condemned the attacks in return for a share in the booty.  The hatred of the guilds for the lower nobility nd the lower patriin classes was diverted against their Jewish supporters.  Also, those that owed money to jews welcomed the opportunity to kill their creditors.  

In Germany alone, attacks took place on the Jews in about 350 places, while 60 large and 150 small communities were exterminated.  Many towns thereafter banished the Jews for all time, although some soon changed their minds.                    

This was the greatest disaster which happened to German Jewry in the Middle Ages.  Attacks on a smaller scale took place in Poland, Catalonia and Northern Italy.  

With such a large population decline from the pandemic, wages soared in response to a labour shortage. On the other hand, in the quarter century after the Black Death in England, it is clear many labourers, artisans, and craftsmen, those living from money-wages alone, did suffer a reduction in real incomes owing to rampant inflation. Landowners were also pushed to substitute monetary rents for labour services in an effort to keep tenants.

Recent research has suggested plague first infected humans in Europe and Asia in the Late Neolithic-Early Bronze Age.  Research in 2018 found evidence of Yersinia pestis in an ancient Swedish tomb, which may have been associated with the "Neolithic decline" around 3000 BCE, in which European populations fell significantly. This Y. pestis may have been different to more modern types, with bubonic plague transmissible by fleas first known from Bronze Age remains near Samara.

The symptoms of bubonic plague are first attested in a fragment of Rufus of Ephesus preserved by Oribasius; these ancient medical authorities suggest bubonic plague had appeared in the Roman Empire before the reign of Trajan, six centuries before arriving at Pelusium in the reign of Justinian I.  

In 2013, researchers confirmed earlier speculation that the cause of the Plague of Justinian (541–542 CE, with recurrences until 750) was Y. pestis. This is known as the First plague pandemic.

The importance of hygiene was recognised only in the nineteenth century with the development of the germ theory of disease; until then streets were commonly filthy, with live animals of all sorts around and human parasites abounding, facilitating the spread of transmissible disease.

One early medical advance as a result of the Black Death was the establishment of the idea of quarantine in the city-state of Ragusa (modern Dubrovnik, Croatia) in 1377 after continuing outbreaks.:  not cleanliness, garbage disposal, etc.  Do you remember reading FOREVER AMBER?  That was a good example of filth in her day.  Forever Amber is a historical romance novel by Kathleen Winsor set in 17th-century England. It was made into a film in 1947 by 20th Century Fox.  The book came out in 1944.  I remember vividly that Amber threw her garbage out her window.  

Explanation: From 1416 to 1847, the Duchy of Savoy was a country in Western Europe. It was created when Sigismund, King of the Romans, raised the County of Savoy into a duchy for Amadeus VIII. The duchy was an Imperial fief, subject of the Holy Roman Empire with a vote in the Imperial Diet

Resource: 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Death

The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia