What was the Black Death?
What was the Black Death?
Answer: The Black Death was a large outbreak of the plague in Europe between 1348 and 1349 that killed around a third to half of the population.
What animals were believed to have helped spread the Black Death on trade ships?
Answer: Rats
How did fleas contribute to spreading the plague?
Answer: Fleas would bite infected rats and then bite people, transmitting the disease.
How many people are thought to have died in Europe during the Black Death?
Answer: Around 25 million people.
What are antibiotics, and how do they relate to the Black Death?
Answer: Antibiotics are medicines that can treat infections, including the types of plague that caused the Black Death, but they were not available until the 20th century.
What were some of the symptoms of the bubonic plague?
Answer: Fever, vomiting, and large, red swells on the body called ‘buboes’.
Name one false belief people had about what caused the plague.
Answer: People believed it was caused by bad air (miasma), punishment from God, or the movement of planets.
Why did some people think that ‘bad air’ caused the Black Death?
Answer: People noticed a connection between dirty environments and sickness, so they believed that bad air from waste (miasma) spread the disease.
How did the high death rate affect jobs in Europe?
Answer: There weren’t enough people to do necessary jobs, like farming, which led to higher wages and better conditions for workers.
Why couldn’t people during the Black Death use antibiotics to treat the disease?
Answer: Antibiotics had not been discovered yet.
How were the symptoms of pneumonic plague different from the symptoms of bubonic plague?
Answer: Pneumonic plague caused symptoms like coughing, fever, and breathlessness, and it was more deadly than the bubonic plague.
What was the actual cause of the Black Death's spread?
Answer: The plague was spread by fleas that bit infected rats and then humans, and it could also be passed through coughing and sneezing.
What strange method did people use to try and cure the disease, involving a chicken?
Answer: The Vicary Method, where a live, plucked chicken was strapped against the sores of the body, was believed to draw out the disease.
What was the Great Plague, and when did it happen?
Answer: The Great Plague was another large outbreak of the plague in England, which occurred in 1665.
Name one method people used to clean areas and try to stop the plague.
Answer: Fines were given to people who threw waste in the streets, and people were hired to clean towns and cities.
Name the two main types of plague thought to have caused the Black Death.
Answer: Bubonic plague and pneumonic plague.
Why were trade ships important to the spread of the Black Death?
Answer: Trade ships carried rats that were infested with plague-carrying fleas, which spread the disease to people across Europe.
What was one way people tried to prevent the spread of the disease?
Answer: They tried cleaning towns and cities and fined people who threw waste onto the streets.
Why did people ask for better pay after the Black Death?
Answer: Because there were fewer workers available, those who survived could demand higher wages.
How did isolating sailors help control the spread of the disease?
Answer: By keeping sailors isolated for 30-40 days, it helped prevent infected individuals from bringing the plague ashore.
Why was the Black Death so deadly in Europe during 1348-1349?
Answer: It was deadly because it spread quickly, people didn’t know how it was transmitted, and it killed a large portion of the population.
When was the first case of the bubonic plague in England?
Answer: June 1348.
What does the word "quarantine" mean, and how did it help slow the spread of the Black Death?
Answer: "Quarantine" comes from the practice of isolating sailors for 30/40 days to prevent the spread of disease, which helped to reduce the spread.
How did the Black Death contribute to changes in living conditions for poorer people?
Answer: With fewer people to work, surviving workers could negotiate better pay and living conditions, improving their quality of life.
What was the "Vicary Method," and why do you think it didn’t work?
Answer: The Vicary Method involved strapping a live chicken to a patient’s sores to draw out the disease, but it didn’t work because it was based on a misunderstanding of how the plague was transmitted.