The Impact Of The Black Death On The Feudal System

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The Black Death and Its Impact on the Feudal System TWELVE is the astonishing number of ships it took to kill more than one third of the population in Europe. In October of 1347, the twelve ships docked at the Sicilian port of Messing. Every man aboard the ship was either dead or gravely ill. Later, people would learn that the cause of their deaths was the Bubonic Plague, also known as The Black Death. The plague infected fleas, and those fleas infested the rats that were aboard the ships that came to Europe from Asia. Symptoms of the Black Death included turgid lymph nodes in the groin and underarm areas, followed by hemorrhaging, a foul odor of all body fluids, and gangrene of the fingers, toes, and nose ( McCasland 1). The Black Death tragically…show more content…
No one thought to go against this order because punishment, usually death, would surely follow. Essentially, "The Order of rank and precedence in the Medieval Feudal System was as follows: The king, nobles, knights/vassals, freeman, yeomen, servants, peasants/serfs/villains" (Feudalism Pyramid 1). Since the serfs and peasants were at the bottom, they did all of the work for everyone above them. When the plague hit and the serfs were set free, they began to build the Middle Class, and eventually the Peasant's Revolt of 1381 began (Black Death of 1348 to 1350 1). The serfs no longer had to abide by the rules and regulations of the ones above them, so they began working toward steadying the economy after the plague and rebuilding a name for themselves in the new Middle Class. Since the Middle Class would eliminate Feudalism and its practices, the "Pyramid of Power" would also be destroyed. While the shocked and discouraged kings, knights, and nobles scurried away in hopes to avoid the plague, the serfs began to operate independently. With the Feudal System diminished, only one question about the plague remained:…show more content…
Since the people had no way of knowing why the plague was happening, they naturally turned to religion for help. In Europe, the Catholic Church was the most powerful place (Middle Ages 1). This being said, everyone believed strongly in God and in his power. Those who had survived the plague believed that God himself had protected them (Black Death of 1348 to 1350 1). On the contrary, people began to ask themselves the question that if God had protected them, who had cast the plague upon them? No one could understand why their family members were oozing blood and dying within a week. Grasping the concept of family after family falling ill and dying a horrific death was just not possible. The people who had witnessed the horrors of the plague and had survived it felt as though they had to blame someone. According to Christina Vunguyen, author of THE BLACK DEATH (part 2): History and How It Affected Feudalism, " A large group of people, desperate to point their fingers at someone, alleged and accused many different 'groups' which included 'witches,' lepers and Jews" (1). Since the people could not physically see the disease and could not figure out what was causing it, blaming others became an easy way to cope. Over 8,000 Jews were killed in Strasbourg alone on the suspicion of causing the plague (Vunguyen 1). People began blaming witches
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