...Through following the life of a male member of the 2nd Estate, Enguerrand de Coucy VII (1340-1397), Tuchman first seeks to find the effects on society due to the Black Death, but expands her understanding to other plagues and perils post-Black Death (xiii). The 600-plus page text does so much more than just merely show the effects of the Black Death on European society, it demonstrates the effects of the Crusades, and provides insight into the lifestyle of a typical noble of the 14th century. Tuchman realizes the shortcomings about writing an intimate piece from the Middle Ages and owns up to them early on by addressing how the narrative can be “hard to read,” and there are always “conflicting facts (xvi-xvii).” With a text this size, there are a going to be multiple themes. One of the most apparent themes is loyalty. Enguerrand becomes a man of two nations: England and France. Born in France, Enguerrand becomes an English Hostage in 1389, and through this imprisonment (if it can really be referred to as such), Enguerrand becomes the son-in-law to the King of England (185, 192). In order to keep his loyalty to both nations, Enguerrand, decides to fight for the Pope in Italy, rather than sacrifice his neutrality (248). His loyalty is rewarded by both nations. When he finally chooses to side with France, his loyalty is rewarded...
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...Canterbury Tales Webquest Today you are going to research background information about Geoffrey Chaucer and The Canterbury Tales. Anything not completed in class should be finished for HW. - Use the links to answer the questions listed below. - Please PARAPHRASE your answers rather than copying and pasting information. You may type your answers directly into the document and print when finished. 1. Geoffrey Chaucer 1. What kind of writer was he? He is a realistic writer. 2. What were the years of his birth and death? Born 1340/44, died 1400. 3. Where was he from? London, England 4. What was his “masterpiece”? The Canterbury Tales http://www.bartleby.com/65/ch/Chaucer.html 2. What is a pilgrimage? (You should already know this from our vocab. quiz.) A pilgrimage is a journey or search of moral or spiritual significance. Typically, it is a journey to a shrine or other location of importance to a person's beliefs and faith, although sometimes it can be a metaphorical journey in to someone's own beliefs. 3. Define prologue. The preface or introduction to a literary work. http://www.webster.com (or other dictionary site) 4. Where is Canterbury? Canterbury is located in Kent county, south-east of London. It is home to the Caterbury cathedral, the burial site of King Henry IV. What famous...
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...The Bubonic Plague: A turning point in history The Bubonic Plague, which also goes by other names such as: the Black Death, the Black Plague, the Great Pestilence, is a disease that devastated the medieval world with a 9 out of 10 mortality rate (Vyas). It is so resilient that cases of infection are still being recorded in America today –although in a much milder manner. The plague then killed of almost one-third of Europe’s population, leaving lasting effects wherever it had touched (Bussema and Witowski). This fatal epidemic disease has since changed how we take on such diseases, and modified our tactics on handling epidemics and other contagious diseases. The Black Plague is an infection caused by the bacterium, Yersinia pestis (originally known as Pasteurella pestis) (Kohn). The name of the bacterium comes from the scientist that discovered it; French bacteriologist, Alexandre Yersin (Tyson). The pestilence has a typical incubation period of two to seven days before the symptoms begin to show. The plague has many symptoms, some of which include: chills, fever, nausea, and painful swelling of the lymph nodes (called buboes –from which the disease is named) that occur in the armpits and neck and groin. Other symptoms of the illness are: red spots on the skin that turned black, the rotting of flesh whilst still living, severe headache, weakness, and vomiting. Yet, most cases were fatal by the third day (Vyas). This disease was transferred from infected animals -most often...
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...The Black Death Labor Supply and Demand Missie Thomas XECO/212 August 2, 2013 Anna Gonzalez PhD. The Black Death devastated Europe during 1347-1351 and is believed to have claimed the lives of 75 million people that is about 1/3rd to 2/3rds of Europe’s population. The Black Death is a result of the Bubonic Plague and spread from Europe, India, Middle Eastern lands, and China. The Government had no idea how to cure the disease since they did not know the origin of the disease. This caused the monarchs to prohibit export of food even this did not stop the disease from spreading. England was one of the hardest hit places and could not buy grain from France as a result of the prohibition and crops were dying because there was not enough laborers to maintain crops. The Churches power was weakened because people were losing faith blaming God for the sickness that was spreading. The Black Death caused economical downfall everywhere. The epidemic led to widespread rebellion in numerous portions of Europe including France, Italy, and England. Various people see the Black Death as a cause in the Revitalization and maybe even the Renovation in Western Europe. With an inhabitants decrease this got inexpensive property costs, extra sustenance for the common farmer, and a big surge in per capita revenue amongst the poor. “Economic historians such as Fernand Braudel have concluded that the Black Death exacerbated a recession in the European economy that had been under way since the...
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...The Impact of the Black Death From the point of view of developing a pest and control methods, the manifestation of the plague in Europe historically known as "Black Death", “ fever " or "Bubonic plague" among other epithets, is a particular example of why a pest or plague can be developed and how can it be controlled. In this specific case, the plague is used to expand from the general conditions of a concrete reality, and disappears spontaneously when these conditions vary, these circumstances promoted behavioral changes to encourage changes in behavior and domestic actions of man, which in turn caused such a change of environment that disfavored the transcendence of the plague, which has its ultimate manifestation in the Old Continent nearly four hundred years after his arrival in Europe. Some people consider this event as the worst of the epidemics that affected man in its history. Although historically it has been established that the disease was bubonic plague acting with pneumonic and septicemic variants, some researchers attribute the high mortality registered to more than one disease, they base their statements and even in our times, by studying bones from graves that in which tradition is known to have been buried victims of the plague , in some cases there was no evidence of bubonic plague and its variants in one hand and in the other hand traces of other diseases such as Anthrax were found. What is certain and beyond doubt is that this epidemic ends with...
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...receive this letter so just to let you know it is the year 1347. I am living in the great city of Sienna, Italy with my dear husband and my two young children. My life isn’t going so well right now it’s falling apart, all due to the outbreak of the black plague. I bet you have already come across it because it’s spreading without stop from city to city, but if you haven’t yet let me inform you that it’s the most horrifying thing I have ever experienced in all my life. This disease has killed millions of people including my neighbors, relatives, and my loved ones, no one is safe. The black plague starts off with painful swelling and almost tumor like lumps on your body called buboes usually located in your groin and underarms and can be as large as the size of an egg. Next you will start vomiting and have an extremely high fever and you will start seeing dark blotches all over your body caused by bleeding under your skin. If you haven’t passed away yet the disease will attack your nervous system and create you to have excruciating painful spasms. Lastly the buboes will pop and there will be black liquid discharge from it. All in all most victims suffer a painful death; it is just so depressing to see your whole city perish this way. The black plague had such a major impact on the world, it affected it socially, religiously, and it even affected the economy. It affected the world socially for many reasons the most obvious being the population shortage. About 50-70% of people died in...
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...The Black Death in Europe Europe had prospered for about 300 years prior to the beginning of the 1300’s but a series of natural disasters occurred. Economies were in recession at the onset of Black Death, Europe as a whole would take a step backward because of an epidemic that almost wipeout sixty percent of the entire population. Black Death was one of the worst disasters on record (Lerner 533). This plague began in 1946 on grassland where a reservoir stretches far from the northwestern shores of Caspian Sea into Southern Russia. At the time, Southern Russia was believed to be under the rule Mongolian Empire travelling in Silk Road using caravan between China and Europe. As a result, Russia which might have become the Black Death’s European conquest, but in fact was its last, and was invaded by the disease not from the east but from the west which is China (Benedictow 4). During the rampage of the bubonic plague, the Chinese population was decimated by up to 90 percent. The Mongols who were infected with the disease surrounded a Genovese trading centre in the Crimean coast and fled the site by a ship carrying the disease with them back to Europe via ports of Sicily. The plague spread further North by major trade routes and reached Europe through its ports. Once it had reached England, it proceeded rapidly with devastating consequences throughout Eastern Europe all the way to Russia (Duiker 322). There were many theories that existed at the time about the reason behind the Black...
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...increase health, more people survived and lived longer; thus creating many cities and towns that were over populated. Europe also had a very bustling trade route that began getting out of control and becoming very dangerous. Also, with the Pope relocating to France the church had lost it’s tax revenue, The church began charging there members fees for services which led the mebers to lose respect for the clergy and began seeing them as materialistic and greedy. Death and decay were all around with Europe on slot of the Bubonic Plague All these issues created an Economic and emotional state that at that time contributed to Europe’s downturn. As the 14th century progressed the state of Europe ripe for crisis was affected even more by the plague. As people began dying it also began to show how ineffective churches role in handling the people grief in the time of such devastation. These turned out to be 3 major factors that contributed to the Disastrous state of the 14th century. The Black Death or the Bubonic plague started in China during the 14th Century. China being one of the busiest trading Ports in the world at that time, it was inevitable that this deadly disease would spread to some of its trading partners. It spread to Asia and Europe. This disease is highly contagious, deadly and painful .The Bubonic Plague hit Sicily in 1937 and had calamitous consequences. It is estimated between one quarter and one half of the European...
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...“The Masque of the Red Death” by Edgar Allen Poe is an eerie short story about the “Red Death”, Poe’s twist on the Black Plague. This plague swept across an unknown kingdom killing many people as it went. There were sharp pain, and sudden dizziness, and then profuse bleeding at the pores, with dissolution. Poe had two main themes for readers to think about. These themes were proven through five main symbols: The ebony clock in the black room, Prince Prospero in the abbey with his friends, the colors of the seven rooms in the abbey, the format of the hallway and rooms and, Prince Prospero running after death through all the rooms. One theme that Poe intended to portray is the fact that death can’t be cheated or escaped, no matter how powerful or prosperous a person is. In the short story, Prince Prospero tries to hide from the “Red Death”. After some time the “Red Death” slips into the abbey taking Prince Prospero’s Life. This proves that even the most prosperous die. Another theme that Poe tries to portray is that people can’t go through life feeling that they are invincible and death will never get them. When the ebony clock in the black room tolled out every hour, the guest ignored their nervous sensations and continued with their masquerade. After the ebony clock tolled the last hour of the night, every guest in the abbey died. The ebony clocked symbolizes the time that goes by leading up a person’s death. This ties to into both themes because many of the guests were prosperous...
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...The Hundred Years’ War lasted from 1337 to 1453. It was between the English and the French. King Edward III of England launched the war to try and claim the throne. The war lasted so long that new innovations were needed to help turn the tide. The Hundred Years’ War morphed the medieval ways of life into a whole new culture. Many factors during the Hundred Years’ War led to fall of the medieval ways of life. The first major factor was the long bow. A bow that was lightweight and cheep allowed peasants to be as powerful as a knight. The arrows were fatal from 100 yards away. This destroyed the ranks of the knights. During battle the arrows would kill the horses making knights immobile. Now peasants were as strong as knights, which destroyed the feudal structure and the idea of chivalry. The Hundred Years’ War left a sense of Nationalism through out England and France. This made the population fight for the country more then lords destroying the feudal system even more. The Bubonic plague was one of the more major factors pushing the feudal system and medieval ways off the cliff. It cut the population in most cities in half, which struck the hearts of many peoples faith. They watched thousands die and though of it as a punishment of god. Since it never stopped they noticed their prayers useless and there was now a sense of hopelessness. This was a huge plow to the church ending the ways of the feudal system and medieval...
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...threatening excommunication to the lowly servants of God. The end of feudalism was a gradual happening caused by the Black Death, the commercial revolution, and humanism in European Society resulting in the enlightened, free thinking peoples of the Renaissance. The Black Death was one of the leading causes for the disintegration of the feudal system. Also known as the Bubonic Plague, the Black Death originated in China in the early 1000’s A.D.[1] The epidemic spread to Europe around 1347 A.D. killing two-thirds of the population. Denser populated areas of Europe, like London, were affected the most however; because of it’s crowded towns, and poorer families housing at least twelve people, the black plague swept through these places easily. [2] Because of the drastic drop off in population, new opportunities began to present themselves to the once hapless citizens who survived the bubonic plague. An increase in available land was one of these many benefits resulting in more crop yield per family. With healthier and more abundant nourishment, the peoples of Europe naturally received the expected benefits from such a gain. Also with this new development the infant mortality rate drastically dropped by thirty-three percent. [3] After the wrath of the black death had completed it’s trek through Europe the end of feudalism could clearly be seen. The Black Death...
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...Black Death The Black Death was a devastation full of effects that led to a new revolution all around Europe. The major impact of Black Death was on the economy of the continent. Due to the shortages of labor, the wages increased to a high level. The population loss in Black Death also led to the prices of common commodities like wheat to decrease as well. With the shortage of labor and limited resources, the industry owners had to enhance their working methods. Therefore, an impact of the Black Death was the emergence of inventions that improved the way of life. Some would argue that this pandemic also lead to unequal distribution of wealth as to those who could grab opportunities went to be richer. Thus another impression of the plague was an increased gap between the rich and the poor. The way of life was enhanced for people around Europe and the women in Europe also went on join the working force. It is no surprise that Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in history. The plague burst out and started off the in winter of 1347-1348. The source of Black Death was traced back to the wild rodents of the steppes of central Asia even as far as Asia or China. Apart from China, some trace its origin back to Kurdistan and Iraq.1 The main concern wasn’t where it started but how it actually spread through the Black Sea and the Mediterranean. The plague first appeared in China and reached Crimea in 1346; from there it travelled to Constantinople and Sicily in...
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...LONDON IN 1665: THE GREAT PLAGUE Ellery Kamp HIST 4300: Junior Seminar December 7, 2015 In 1665, Londoners experienced their last, and most detrimental, wave of the Bubonic Plague; this specific outbreak is known today as The Great Plague. Population analyses provided by the Office of National Statistics along with the Bills of Mortality that were published on a weekly basis during the plague have concluded that around one hundred thousand people living in England died due to the plague, which was extremely significant because the estimated population of England at the time was under four hundred thousand people. The devastation that Londoners experienced during this outbreak was unexpected and far worse than any previous outbreak, leading many people to search for both an explanation for the plague’s occurrence and a successful way to stop it. Although modern research has attributed the origin of the bubonic plague to fleas and rats, medical and scientific technology was not advanced enough in 1665 to come to that conclusion; the invention of the microscope was necessary in order to study the specific mode of infection. At the time of the Great Plague, there was no revelation of the real cause of the transmission and infection of the plague; there were only general ideas of “pestilential miasmas” and “corrupted air” that were largely attributed to religious causes, such as being a punishment sent from God. Just as during other outbreaks of the so-called pestilence...
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...horticulture to family structure to military adventuring. Overpopulation delivers it cure through scourge, starvation, and different means. A few zones of Europe may have been viewed as ready for mass demise on the grounds that agrarian generation had not stayed aware of populace development. The overpopulation hypothesis has been condemned as lacking to clarify the disastrous impacts of the Black Death. But worries about overpopulation in later times were foreshadowed by examines of the disease years. Third, feudalism—the political and social structure then common in Europe—may have been the underlying reason for the mass mortality. A couple of individuals had everything; most individuals had practically nothing. Those naturally introduced to the lower classes had little open door for headway. This circumstance propagated a substantial underclass of generally uneducated individuals with restricted abilities, subsequently additionally restricting mechanical and social advancement. Moreover, the primitive framework was hinting at caving in from inside in the years going before the Black Death. The fundamental unit of creation was the little laborer ranch, worked with a basically stagnant strategy. The main development the framework permitted was the duplication of ranch units . . . subject to the theory of consistent losses. As development expanded onto poorer soils, so the comes back to the normal family cultivate essentially decreased. As laborer wage lessened, they paid lower...
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...The Black Death Imagine that within the next few months one third of your community, family and closest friends would be dead. That is what life was like when the bubonic plague took hold of Europe. Within three years nearly half of the European population was killed off. Like most sad stories, the tragedy of the bubonic plague has a silver lining. The drastic change in population destroyed the feudal system, allowed freedom of thought and gave birth to a new middle class. There was nothing pretty about the bubonic plague. It likely came from China and was carried to Europe by a few merchants and the rats/fleas that came with them on the ships. Once an individual caught the disease they had approximately 4 days to live. On the first day you would feel sick and start to develop patches of swelling. On the second day you might begin to vomit, developed a fever and the swellings would grow. On the third day bleeding under the skin would begin appearing and an unpleasant odor would arise. On the fourth day the illness attacked the nervous system, convulsions begin. Most people died on the fourth day. The disease was so contagious that nearly everyone who came into contact with a victim would also be dead in a matter of days. Before the days of the plague Europe operated on the Feudal system which basically involved three parties; the church, nobility and serfs. The lords owned all of the land while the vassals and serfs farmed it, in turn paying very...
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