A totally illogical reason to us must have seemed logical at the time to be considered, this can be related to the theory that the airy spirit would leave the eyes of a sick man and transfer to the eyes of a healthy man looking at the sick man, the illness then goes into the healthy man infecting him.
Another common reason was god and the devil, the general opinion at the time was that god was unhappy with the people of the world and had sent a plague to destroy them all. A quote from the time stated," Terrible is god towards the sins of men… he often allows plagues, miserable famines, conflicts and other forms of terrible suffering to arise… thus indeed, the realm of England, because of their growing pride, corruption of it's subjects and innumerable sins."
At this time, hatred of Jews was still around. Jews were blamed for the Black Death, one person said," Some say it was brought about by the corruption of the air, others that the Jews planned to wipe out al the Christians with poison. In Germany many Jews were supposedly burned alive for their crimes.
Another seemingly illogical explanation was the movement of the sun and the planets. It was believed that the close position of the three great planets, Saturn, Jupiter and Mars was to blame. It was said that such a coming together of the great planets was always a sign of wonderful, terrible or violent things to come.
A more interesting opinion was that of the four humours being out of balance. The idea from the time of Galen and Hippocrates was evidently thought of in the time of the Black Death. One writer at the time said," Many people have been killed, especially those stuffed full of evil humours. As Galen says in his book of fevers…The pestilence of the air does no harm to cleansed bodies from which evil humours have been purged.
Many of these explanations have been used to explain disease in earlier times. For example in Aboriginal times there was a strong belief in the supernatural, they believed in spirits and magical powers whereas with the Black Death people believed in the movement of the planets and God and the devil. This is quite similar with no real logical explanations for either.
In Egyptian times a blockage of the body and bad digestion was thought to cause disease, this was exactly what was said with the Black Death.
In Roman times, the best thinkers in the world were coming up with reasons for illnesses, mainly Galen and Hippocrates. It is from this place that the theory of the four humours and the opposites arose. The theory of the four humours was applied to the Black Death and probably would have helped the people of the time if applied properly. People being clean and living in clean surroundings would have had a better chance of surviving the plague than those living in the opposite conditions.
There were no real explanations for the Black Death that were correct although many were actually very close to the truth. As I have just mentioned the idea of the four humours, having a healthy lifestyle and living in healthy conditions would have dramatically reduced the chance of becoming infected with the disease as the germs could not spread so easily in a clean environment as they could if they were surrounded by dirt and rubbish.
Another example would be that people thought that the disease came from dead rats or the corruption of water in ditches. This was partly correct as the rats did carry the disease but dead rats would not have been as infectious as an alive rat. If the people had just considered another alternative, i.e. the rats spreading disease by moving around the country, they could have stopped this and done something about it before it reached the epidemic that it did.
Water in ditches, as I have already mentioned would have been dangerous if drank and this was partly recognised by many. This was a logical explanation and probably the closest to the truth that thinkers of the time came to.
Finally the thinking that a privy next to a building would be unhealthy was correct but not for the right reasons. They thought that it caused fumes to be carried through the air, spreading the infection, although close we now know that the truth of the matter is that the toilets would be filthy and full of germs do with air or no air infection would still spread.
Many people believed in these explanations because they knew no better. They simply accepted what they were told, as they couldn't think of anything better themselves. Although what they were told must have seemed logical to them or I doubt it would have been accepted. Without knowledge of germs very little could be done to destroy and prevent the infection sweeping the world. People simply looked for any explanation they could find in their desperation as so many died around them. This would have played a major part in why they accepted the explanations put forward to them. When so many people die it is hard to think why such a thing would happen.
In conclusion I would say that with such limited technology it is a great surprise that so many explanations could be made. Although most were incorrect many explanations if expanded and thought about further would have provided a logical cause, explanation and treatment for the illness.
If greater care had been taken to prevent the epidemic in the first place such as a healthy lifestyle and cleaner living conditions maybe so many need not have died.
