{"id":2672,"date":"2016-09-27T03:20:55","date_gmt":"2016-09-27T03:20:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/?p=2672"},"modified":"2026-02-19T22:38:36","modified_gmt":"2026-02-19T22:38:36","slug":"impacts-of-the-black-death","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/impacts-of-the-black-death\/","title":{"rendered":"Impacts of the Black Death: A Detailed Summary"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The impacts of the Black Death<\/a> are related to the social, economic, political and artistic aspects of society at the time. It led to economic shifts, with surviving workers demanding higher wages and better living conditions. Socially and culturally, the plague caused widespread fear, challenged religious faith, and influenced art and literature with themes of death and mortality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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WHAT WAS THE BLACK DEATH?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The\u00a0Black Death<\/a>\u00a0is one of the most important events in Western history and is the most famous pandemic in all of human history.\u00a0 A pandemic is the term used to describe the spread of an infectious disease over a wide area including the entire planet.\u00a0 The Black Death occurred during the 14th century and ravaged human populations throughout Asia and Europe as it spread along trade routes and through trading ports.\u00a0 Throughout history it has also been referred to as the \u2018Great Mortality\u2019 and \u2018Great Pestilence\u2019.\u00a0 It had major impacts on both the\u00a0Middle Ages<\/a>\u00a0and the\u00a0Renaissance<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Causes
The people of Tournai bury victims of the Black Death. (1353)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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IMPACTS OF THE BLACK DEATH – SOCIAL<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The first main impact of the Black Death was the sheer number of people that died<\/a>.\u00a0 Historians agree that Europe\u2019s population dropped by half in the first several decades of the Black Death, and this had a huge impact on social and family life for communities throughout Europe.\u00a0 For example, because people did not have a clear understanding of the causes of the plague they often went to the aid of their family members that became ill.\u00a0 This, of course, led to the caretakers also becoming sick after being bitten by the infected fleas.\u00a0 As such, people soon learned to avoid those that were showing symptoms of the plague.\u00a0 This situation meant that families and whole communities were often ripped apart as they tried to avoid the disease.\u00a0 As well, communal activities such as gathering for church and trading in marketplaces became difficult and dangerous.\u00a0 For example, the following excerpt from Giovanni Boccaccio, an Italian writer who lived from 1313-1375, shows the desperate situation of the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTedious were it to recount, how citizen avoided citizen, how among neighbors was scarce found any that showed fellow-feeling for another, how kinsfolk held aloof, and never met, or but rarely; enough that this sore affliction entered so deep into the minds of men a women, that in the horror thereof brother was forsaken by brother nephew by uncle, brother by sister, and oftentimes husband by wife: nay, what is more, and scarcely to be believed, fathers and mothers were found to abandon their own children, untended, unvisited, to their fate, as if they had been strangers.\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u200bFurthermore, the massive death tolls and the growing fear of people to deal with those that are sick meant that the bodies of the dead literally collected in homes and on streets.  In particular, poor areas of towns and cities quickly became littered with the bodies of the dead and overwhelmed communities often resorted to mass burials or burning of the bodies.  This had a profound effect on European cities, as the disease ravaged hole areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Giovanni
Giovanni Boccaccio<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
<\/div>\n\n\n\n

IMPACTS OF THE BLACK DEATH – ECONOMIC<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The second major impact of the Black Death was the economic loss or effect that resulted from the spread of the plague.  As stated in the previous paragraph, the spread of the plague caused people to avoid crowded areas.  As such marketplaces and trade in general suffered.  For example, some of the hardest hit areas in Europe and Asia were trading ports along the coast of the Mediterranean.  These cities were often hotbeds for the plague since this was where the rats and mice that carried the fleas arrived after having stowed away on trading ships.  This reality meant that trade in these port cities slowed as merchants and traders suffered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Black
A plague doctor wore very characteristic clothes during outbreaks of the plague. (1656)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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IMPACTS OF THE BLACK DEATH – POLITICAL<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The third major impact of the Black Death was political.  The nature of the plague meant that it impacted everyone equally.  It did not matter if people were wealthy or poor, the plague spread to all people of all classes.  As well, the massive death tolls put massive amounts of pressure on the monarchs across Europe to deal with the crisis.  This strained the political structures of many countries and kingdoms and led to political crisis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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IMPACTS OF THE BLACK DEATH – ART<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The fourth major impact of the Black Death was the effect it had on art.\u00a0 For example, the image below is called \u2018The Dance of Death\u2019\u00a0and was created by\u00a0Michael Wolgemut in 1493.\u00a0 Artistic images such as this emerged out of the\u00a0time\u00a0period and displays the focus that art took on death, which was a common reality for the people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In all, the Black Death was an important event that fundamentally changed life for people across Europe and Asia.\u00a0 It was caused by the spread of the bubonic plague and caused massive death tolls wherever it occurred.\u00a0 It is remembered today as one of the most important pandemics in all of human history and for its role in other major events and time periods, such as: the Silk Road<\/a>, the Middle Ages and the Renaissance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Black
\u2018The Dance of Death\u2019 by Michael Wolgemut.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There were several main impacts of the Black Death. It was caused by the spread of the bubonic plague and caused massive death tolls wherever it occurred.\u00a0 It is remembered today as one of the most important pandemics in all of human history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5510,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":33,"footnotes":""},"categories":[46,42],"tags":[85,15],"class_list":["post-2672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle-ages","category-black-death","tag-black-death","tag-history"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2672"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2672\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5511,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2672\/revisions\/5511"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/crunchlearning.com\/website_ec2cbfb0\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}