Amber Davis
Professor Brian Feltman
HIST 1112 N
5 September 2014
The Florentine Chronicle Reading Response
Marchione di Coppo Stefani wrote The Florentine Chronicle. He was born in Florence and wrote of his encounters during the Black Plague, or commonly referred to as the “Black Death.” The Florentine Chronicle is considered a primary source, because Stefani was alive when the Plague struck Europe, specifically Florence, and he wrote this source a few years after. The significance of this reading is that it gives us an inside view of what it was like living during this time and the social implications that came with the Plague.
When trade routes from Asia to Europe were established after Marco Polo’s travels, diseases were easily spread by merchants and travelers. The Plague killed more than a third of Europe’s population within 5 years. The common symptoms were…show more content… When someone in a household came down with the Plague, everyone in that household died usually. Many people abandoned the sick in their homes and fled to other homes or villages. Physicians died with everyone else. If a physician or servant were to be found, he or she wanted a huge sum of money before they would look at the sick. The people who were willing to take the dead to the mass grave, called the beccamorti, were paid in large amounts of money. This caused an overall increase in prices and a shortage of necessities, such as sugar and wax. Trade and goods from the outside came to a halt. According to Stefani, “The rich dressed in modest woolens, those not rich sewed clothes in linen.” The priests and friars became extremely wealthy under these circumstances, also. Flagellants believed the Plague was a punishment from God. They went through town hitting themselves over the shoulder with strings that had barbed hooks. People were not looking for a scientific explanation to this outbreak, only