Middle ages plague skin#

As such, the plague is a zoonosis, an illness that passes from animals to humans. But under the right conditions the bacteria spreads at such a rate as to kill off its rodent hosts, forcing the fleas to find alternatives-humans. Normally this takes place in a closed cycle between fleas and rodents. When it bites, it regurgitates the bacilli into the body, infecting it. The bacilli multiply in the gut of the flea. Later named Yersinia pestis, the bacteria was carried by fleas living as parasites on rats and other small rodents. ( Here's why plague doctors wore strange beaked masks.) But even these explanations were widely believed to have an underlying cause: divine wrath at the sinfulness of humankind. Others blamed natural phenomena: volcanic eruptions and seismic tremors releasing deadly gases. Some accounts suggested astrological causes, blaming the plague on the conjunction of certain planets, eclipses, or the sighting of a comet.

Middle ages plague skin#

Those closest to scientific reality were based on classical Greek medicine, attributing the sickness to miasmas: The invisible corruption in the air emanating from decomposing matter and supposedly absorbed by the body either by breathing or through skin contact. Many explanations of the plague were proposed, most wrapped up in religious or superstitious assumptions. It is little wonder that its medieval chroniclers often assume an extravagant and even apocalyptic tone. None were safe as the plague cut down peasants and princes alike, its levelling of social distinctions resonating in the written accounts of the time. It seized victims with alarming speed and its horrific ravages were incurable. Its impact fundamentally altered the social, economic, and religious lives of those who survived, scarring the collective consciousness of the entire continent. During its peak years, the plague spread faster, farther, and with deadlier effect than ever before or since. But it was the plague that struck the highest note of terror into people’s hearts. Medieval Europe was at the mercy of many infectious diseases, including dysentery, influenza, measles, and the much-feared leprosy. The Third Plague Pandemic, the world's last major outbreak, began in the mid-19th century and lasted well into the 20th.

After the Black Death, it continued to strike large numbers of Europeans, most notably in London in 1665. The so-called Plague of Justinian devastated the Byzantine Empire in the sixth century, killing an estimated 25 million people. Most historians agree that it was bubonic plague, a bacterial disease that periodically flared up in Asia and Europe.