by Maria C Collins

Created on: August 31, 2008   Last Updated: March 22, 2010

The Black Death first hit Europe in 1348 and affected most European countries. Historians previously thought that it was bubonic plague, but now think that it was probably three diseases that hit the population together, bubonic plague, a bacterial disease and a viral pneumonic respiratory disease. Certainly, when The Plague hit London in late summer 1348, from contemporary accounts, it was bubonic and pneumonic plague combined. The epidemic came in waves beginning 1348 and returning periodically for over two centuries. It came from Asia on the trade routes.

The Black Death spread rapidly amongst the populations and across Europe, depopulating whole towns and villages. The poor, especially, were weak from famines caused by bad weather, there had been a mini ice age in the early years of the century, and the consequently bad harvests. England and France had gone to war in 1337, the beginning of The Hundred Years War, thus depleting the treasuries of both countries and requiring the lives of soldiers. Populations, therefore, were depleted and weak.

In the Middle Ages, standards of Hygiene, sanitation and housing were deplorable. The streets were used as open sewers, people did not wash themselves, and they thought of disease as a judgment from God and did not understand about infection. The poor lived in over-crowded and unsanitary conditions and, often, the only water supply was polluted. Food was often poor quality and badly kept and people did not understand about the necessity for a balanced diet, for example people thought fruit was bad for them. These conditions and the weakness of the population probably contributed greatly to the death toll of the plague. The death toll was huge, one illustration of this fact is London England; the first wave of the plague hit in late summer 1348 and raged until January 1351 it killed between a third and a half of London's population.

There was no cure for the plague. Some brave communities quarantined themselves when plague struck to avoid contaminating neighbouring communities. At the tiny and remote village of Zennor in Cornwall, England is a plague stone; it marked the boundary of the village. There is a hollow in the top of the stone, which during the plague, held vinegar. Villagers left coins in the vinegar to buy their supplies from outside tradesmen who delivered them to the stone. People believed that vinegar would remove any plague contamination. Plague stones have been found in other villages across

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