Medicine in the medieval period - The Black Death

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Rachel Preston

MEDICINE IN THE MEDIEVAL PERIOD

The Black Death

        In the 14th Century, trade around Europe was increasing ships regularly and travelled from the Mediterranean to other parts of Europe. In 1348 one ship brought a devastating plague to England.

Source 1-Written by a monk from Malmesbury in Wiltshire, in the 1350’s:

“In 1348, at about the feast of the Translation of St Thomas the Martyr (7 July) the cruel pestilence, hateful to all future ages, arrived from the countries across the sea on the South coast of England at the Port called Melcombe in Dorset. Travelling all over the South country it wretchedly killed innumerable people in Dorset, Devon and Somerset…next it came to Bristol, where very few were left alive, and then travelled Northwards, leaving not a city, a town, a village, or even, except rarely, a house, without killing most or all of the people there so that over England as a whole a fifth of the men, women and children were carried to burial. As a result there was such a shortage of people that hardly enough living to look after the sick and bury the dead.”

According to modern historians Source 1 underestimates the effects of the BLACK DEATH. It is now estimated that over 40% of the people in England died. Towns and Ports were hardest hit. Villages and farms in the hills were the safest. Further outbreaks of the plague came in 1361, 1369, 1374 and 1390. It killed quickly and painfully.

The Black Death included two kinds of pestilence:

  • Bubonic plague made people suddenly feel cold and tired. Painful swellings (buboes) appeared in their armpits and groin and small blisters all over their bodies. This was followed by high fever and severe headaches. Many lingered, unconscious for several days before death. Fleas spread this form of Black Death.
  • Pneumonic plague attacked the victim’s lungs causing breathing problems. Victims began to cough up blood and died more rapidly than those who had bubonic plague. This form of Black Death was spread by people breathing or coughing germs onto one another.

The reaction of people was somewhat to be expected. Shock, horror, anger and panic were only a few of what these people must’ve been feeling. Most simply waited, hoping to God that themselves and their families would survive. However some people decided to take action.

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The King and his Bishops sent out orders for churchmen to lead processions, pleading with God to end the pestilence. Some people made candles their own height and lit them in church as an offering to God. IN Barcelona the citizens tried to protect themselves by making a candle seven kilometres long- enough to encircle the whole city.

There were many different ways in which the people caused the BLACK DEATH:

  • Common-sense reasons (smells in the air from toilets etc)
  • The body’s humours being out of balance.
  • The movement of the sun and the planets.
  • God and the Devil.
  • ...

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