Black Death Archive
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Plague of Justinian was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis, scientists confirm
Posted on May 14, 2013 | No CommentsThe Black Death, which caused the deaths of tens of millions of people in the fourteenth century, was caused bacterium Yersinia pestis. New evidence now shows that the same microscopic bacterium also caused the Plague of Justinian in the sixth century. -
New Towns in Medieval France and Nature of Institutions
Posted on April 1, 2013 | No CommentsIn its early stages, a new town was a village community created by a central authority (king or overlord) on his wildland to meet the needs of growing populations and to further both its own benefits and the common interests of the inhabitants. -
The Virgin Mary in High Medieval England, A Divinely Malleable Woman: Virgin, Intercessor, Protector, Mother, Role Model
Posted on March 31, 2013 | No CommentsThis thesis examines the significance of the Virgin Mary in England between the late fifteenth century and early sixteenth century. The primary sources selected indicate the variety of ideas circulating about her during this period. Strictly religious texts such as the Bible and early Christian writings ground Late Medieval beliefs about Mary in their historical context. -
Burial ground discovered in London may be victims of Black Death
Posted on March 14, 2013 | No CommentsThirteen skeletons have been uncovered lying in two carefully laid out rows on the edge of Charterhouse Square at Farringdon, and are believed to be up to 660 years old. -
The Mind’s Eye: Reconstructing the Historian’s Semantic Matrix Through Henry Knighton’s Account of the Peasants’ Revolt, 1381
Posted on February 11, 2013 | No CommentsThe Mind’s Eye: Reconstructing the Historian’s Semantic Matrix Through Henry Knighton’s Account of the Peasants’ Revolt, 1381 Sarah Marilyn Steeves Keeshan Master of Arts, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia December (2011)... -
Bawdy badges and the Black Death : late medieval apotropaic devices against the spread of the plague
Posted on January 27, 2013 | No CommentsOwing to the fact that historians generally view the late medieval period as an "age of faith," the existence ofthese remarkable objects raises some fundamental questions about the exact socio-religious nature ofmedieval culture. The primary questions, however, that need answering are: when, where, and for whom were the badges produced, and perhaps most importantly, why. -
Scottish saints cults and pilgrimage from the Black Death to the Reformation, c.1349-1560
Posted on January 15, 2013 | No CommentsThis thesis will question this premise and provide the first indepth study of the cults of St Andrew, Columba of Iona/Dunkeld, Kentigern of Glasgow and Ninian of Whithorn in a late medieval Scottish context, as well as the lesser known northern saint, Duthac of Tain. -
The Trebuchet
Posted on January 13, 2013 | No CommentsRecent reconstructions and computer simulations reveal the operating principles of the most powerful weapon of its time -
Researchers find more links between the Black Death and Justinian’s plague
Posted on December 10, 2012 | No CommentsResearchers from the University of Tuebingen in Germany are uncovering more evidence that is linking the Black Death with earlier plagues. -
The Black Death And The Future Of Medicine
Posted on December 9, 2012 | No CommentsThis paper will specifically focus on the effects of the Black Death on medicine and medical practice in Europe. Its purpose is to investigate the Black Death’s influence on medicine, especially with regard to learned medicine and surgery. -
Hot Holiday Reads!
Posted on November 23, 2012 | No CommentsPut down those turkey left-overs and check out some of these hot holiday reads! -
Modelling Population and Resource Scarcity in Fourteenth-century England
Posted on October 26, 2012 | No CommentsHallam argues that the steady population rise of the 12th and 13th centuries may not have been the main cause of the crisis of the 14th century. First, unprecedented harvest failures and animal diseases between 1315 and 1322 had significant adverse effects on peasant welfare. -
Technological Change in Medieval England: A Critique of the Neo-Malthusian Argument
Posted on October 13, 2012 | No CommentsThe last two sections will address this issue by dividing the material into two periods preceding and following the great epidemic. The interpretation that will be provided is heavily indebted to Brenner. -
The Black Death in Medieval India: a Historical Mystery
Posted on October 9, 2012 | No CommentsWhy did a pestilence that had such an impact on one part of the world go unmentioned in another part of the world? -
The Black Death – lecture by Sir Richard J. Evans
Posted on October 8, 2012 | No CommentsIn this series of six lectures I want to look at some of the great diseases and their relationship to human history. -
Epidemic Trade
Posted on September 18, 2012 | No CommentsThis paper studies the spread of the Black Death as a proxy for the intensity of medieval trade flows between 1346 and 1351 -
Anthropologist compares medieval lives, pre- and post-Black Death
Posted on September 6, 2012 | No Comments'The survivors were either tremendously lucky or there was something about them that made them better able to resist the Black Death or mount a really strong immune response to disease' -
The Lived Experience of the Black Death
Posted on August 29, 2012 | No CommentsTo appreciate the importance of the biological effects of disease on a society’s lived experience, it can be useful to look at modern examples. Polio provides an excellent example. Children who survive an infection of polio – and escape the neurological incapacitation that can result in disability up to paraplegia – have a fifty percent chance of suffering the similar effects of post-polio syndrome later in life. -
Living on the Edge: A Study on Cultural Memory in Narratives from Medieval English Literature Before and After the Black Death
Posted on August 26, 2012 | No CommentsOne of the interesting questions that springs from all this chaos is in what way did the outbreak affect the mentality of fourteenth-century society and, if affected, how does this show? -
Agricultural wage labour in fifteenth-century England
Posted on August 22, 2012 | No CommentsIn the period when agriculture dominated almost every aspect of daily life, the lords and wealthy peasants relied on paid labourers for farming business, yardlanders hired labourers to work with them, whilst moderate and landless villagers worked for hire. Agrarian wage labour is a window on the economy as well as on agricultural society. -
Labor Markets After the Black Death: Landlord Collusion and the Imposition of Serfdom in Eastern Europe and the Middle East
Posted on August 19, 2012 | No CommentsThe differences in the imposition of serfdom led to different economic and political effects for the peasantry in Europe. In Western Europe, wages rose, grain prices fell, and the consumption of meat, dairy products, and beer increased. More and more peasants moved into a widening “middle class” that could afford to buy manufactured goods. -
The Dance of the Black Death
Posted on August 17, 2012 | No Comments'One by one, we become the mistress of Death. Extending his bony grip, he pulls us into his fleshless, decayed frame and begins whirling us around in a morbid dance of fatal seduction. We are Death’s partner in the danse macabre.' -
Biological Warfare at the 1346 Siege of Caffa
Posted on August 15, 2012 | No CommentsOn the basis of a 14th-century account by the Genoese Gabriele de’ Mussi, the Black Death is widely believed to have reached Europe from the Crimea as the result of a biological warfare attack. -
Epidemics, Pandemics, and the Doomsday Scenario
Posted on August 12, 2012 | No CommentsFor centuries in Christian society people have made direct connections between the outbreak of epidemic disease and Doomsday. -
The effect of sex on risk of mortality during the Black Death in London, A.D. 1349-1350
Posted on August 12, 2012 | No CommentsThe purpose of this study is to determine whether the Black Death was similarly selective with respect to biological sex-that is, did either sex face an elevated risk during the epidemic or were men and women at equal risk of dying?
