Western Civilization - History Of European Society

216 Chapter 12

The data presented in this table show the dramatic

effects of the Black Death as well as the substantial in-

creases in the European population between 1150

and 1250 and between 1400 and 1450. The indices

are based on the figures for 100 (that is 1000
100).

These figures are estimates only and have proved

controversial.

Indices per period of fifty years

PeriodIndexPeriodIndex

1000–50109.51500–50113.0

1050–1100104.31550–1600114.1

1100–50104.21600–50112.4

1150–1200122.01650–1700115.0

1200–50113.11700–50121.7

1250–1300105.81750–1800134.3

1300–5069.91800–50141.5

1350–140088.21850–1900150.8

1400–50133.31900–50136.7

1450–1500115.0

Source: B. H. Slicher van Bath, The Agrarian History of Western Europe,

A.D. 500–1800,trans. Olive Ordish (London: Edward Arnold, 1963),

p. 79.

TABLE 12.1

Indices of Population Increase in Europe,

1000–1950

160

0

1000110012001300140015001600170018001900

140

120

100

80

60

40

20

DOCUMENT 12.2

The Symptoms of the Plague

A description of the Black Death survives from one of the

greatest of the late medieval writers. In 1348–53 Giovanni

Boccaccio, who would later become a founder of Renaissance

humanism (see chapter 13), wrote the Decameron,a series

of stories told in a villa outside Florence where a group of

fashionable young people take refuge from the plague. The

book begins with a description of the epidemic.

In the year of our Lord 1348, there happened at

Florence, the finest city in all Italy, a most terrible

plague; which, whether owing to the influence of

the planets, or that it was sent from God as a just

punishment for our sins, had broken out some

years before in the Levant, and after passing from

place to place, and making incredible havoc all the

way, had now reached the west. There, in spite of

all the means that art and human foresight could

suggest, such as keeping the city free from filth,

the exclusion of all suspected persons, and the

publication of copious instructions for the preser-

vation of health; and not withstanding manifold

humble supplications offered to God in proces-

sions and otherwise; it began to show itself in the

aforesaid year, and in a sad and wonderful manner.

Unlike what had been seen in the east, where

bleeding from the nose is the fatal prognostic, here

there appeared certain tumors in the groin or under

the armpits, some as big as a small apple, others as

an egg; and afterwards purple spots in most parts of

the body; in some cases large and but few in num-

ber, in others smaller and more numerous—both

sorts the usual messengers of death. To the cure of

this malady, neither medical knowledge nor the

power of drugs was of any effect; whether because

the disease was in its own nature mortal, or that the

physicians (the number of whom, taking quacks

and women pretenders into the account, was

grown very great) could form no just idea of the

cause, nor consequently devise a true method of

cure; whichever was the reason, few escaped; but

nearly all died the third day from the first appear-

ance of the symptoms, some sooner, some later,

without any fever or accessory symptoms.

Boccaccio, Giovanni. “The Decameron.” In Stories of Boccac-

cio,p. 1, trans. John Payne. London: The Bibliophilist Society,

1903.