Black Plague example essay topic

586 words
"It is hard to understand how anyone could not view the death penalty as morally problematic, . The Black Death was a disease that spread all over Europe. It was highly unpleasant and took only three or four days to kill you. Most importantly, it was the most contagious or wide spread disease of the time. The Black Death killed one third of Europe's population between 1347 and 1351.

Historians believe that there were two different plagues at this time. One of these plagues was called the Bubonic plague, this is when the fleas on the backs of rats which were infected with this disease. The Black Death was one of the most feared plagues in the world. "In 1347, a group of Italian merchant ships returned from a trip to the Black Sea, which was one of the key links in trade with China. When the ships docked in Sicily, many of its passengers were already dying of the plague. Within days, the disease had spread to the city and the surrounding countryside.

According to historians, the plague struck and killed people more quickly than any other disease in history". The Black Plague was a deadly pandemic continuously reappearing all throughout Europe until the Seventeenth century, leaving behind death, devastation, and economic disaster. The Black Death, also known as the Black Plague or the Bubonic Plague, originated in the Thirteenth century. It got its name from the black bumps it would leave on people before they died. They grew to the size of a small apple or an egg, more or less, and were vulgarly called tumours. The plague presented itself in three interrelated forms.

Having no defense and no understanding of the cause of the pestilence, the men, women, and children caught in its onslaught were bewildered, panicked, and finally mad. No doctor's advice, no medicine could overcome or alleviate this disease, An enormous number of ignorant men and women set up as doctors in addition to those who were trained. The disease was either such that no treatment was possible or the doctors were so ignorant that, they did not know what caused it, and consequently could not administer the proper treatment. Imagine yourself alone on a street corner, coughing up bloody mucous each time you exhale. You are gasping for a full breath of air, but realizing that is not possible, you give up your fight to stay alive. According to historians this is what would happen, write before they died.

Black Death also changed European history, affecting religion, economy, and politics. To truly understand the devastation caused by the Black Death in the mid-fourteenth century, one need only look at the writing of Agnolo di Tura, a Tuscan chronicler of the time. The victims died almost immediately. They would swell beneath the armpits and in their groins and fall over while talking.

Father abandoned child, wife husband, one brother another; for this illness seemed to strike through breath and sight. They died by the hundreds, both day and night, and all were thrown in those ditches and covered with earth. In addition, as soon as those ditches were filled, more were dug. In addition, I, Agnolo di Tura... buried my five children with my own hands...

And so many died that all believed it was the end of the world.