The Black Death
“The Black Death” was a devastating global epidemic that struck Europe and Asia in the mid-1300s. The plague arrived Europe in the month of October, 1347, when 12 ships from the Black sea, docked in Italy. People that gathered at the docks met a shocking surprise that brought doom to their city.
Most sailors aboard the ships were already dead, the ones that were still breathing, were very ill and covered with black boils that was oozing blood and pus.
Sicilian authorities quickly ordered the fleet of “death ships” out of their harbour, but it was already too late. Over the next five years, “The Black death” brought fear and trembling to the hearts of many, as it killed almost one-third of the entire continent of Europe, which numbered up to 20 million people. Europe was in fear, they were confused and didn’t know what to do and how to manage the epidemic that troubled them and took the lives of most of their loved ones.
In the early years of the 1340s, the disease had already travelled as far as China, it didn’t stop at China. It also went to India, Persia, Syria and even Egypt.
Rumours spread fast that the disease actually originated from Asia over 2000 years earlier, and that it started spreading through trading ships.
The disease usually started with a small boil under the armpit of its victims, then it continues to grow and grow, until it grows to the size of an apple, and it also has a very terrible smell that comes from the boil. The sickness comes with fever, chills, vomiting, diarrhoea, terrible aches and pains, after which death comes around. It suffers its victims and still takes their lives in the end.
“The Black Death” was very contagious. It was so contagious that it could be transfered just by touching the cloth of an infected person. During that time, people usually went to bed looking very healthy, but die before it’s dawn.
Their doctors back then, tried all that they could to cure and eradicate this deadly disease, but nothing they did actually cured this disease, it only slowed it down.
After much efforts with no positive results in getting the cure to this deadly disease, people had no choice but to result to social distancing and a lockdown. The disease gradually reduced, but that was not the last of it. It came back some years later with full force. After then, it started to subside gradually, until it was totally eradicated.