The Black Plague Analysis

It’s common knowledge that the Black Plague terrorized and then transformed Western Europe. By the time it was over in 1351, the epidemic had killed between 25% and 50% of the population (Napp). People neither understood where this atrocity came from, nor how to protect themselves. Many people often only associate negative effects with the Black Death; however, although awful effects did spawn from this epidemic, it also opened the way for many important positive effects to happen too. The Black Death led to the oppression of Jews, allowed for money to take the place of land with peasants having higher wages, and enabled the people of Western Europe to question the power of the Church.
While positive progression happened as a result of the
Before the Plague, there was an endless supply of serfs controlled by lords with absolute power. During the Early Middle Ages, the serfs were legally bound to the land and if they attempted to leave they were hunted and killed. However, as the Plague spread, lords were too scared to chase after serfs when they left because they feared contracting the Plague. As many serfs left, the few who stayed were in high demand, and“[The laborers] would not listen to the king’s command, but if anyone wished to have [money] he had to give them what they wanted,”(Knighton). Because the lords were so fearful of losing all of their workers, the serfs became very powerful. Before, in the Early Middle Ages, the lords had all of the power, and now that the roles reversed, the manor system itself began to decline. As more people died from the Plague, there was more land available for use. Because land was the equivalent of money in the Middle Ages, the declining demand for land led people to pay using coined money. As the number of deaths increased, the once scarce gold and silver was now more widely available (Routt). The Black Plague destroyed the old feudal system and make way for the use of money rather than
Because of the Plague, anti-semitism increased, the manor system collapsed, and the Church was weakened. It’s difficult to know whether the Plague contributed to atrocities like the Holocaust but it is clear that it ended the Middle Ages and helped to set the stage for the modern world. Without the Plague, Jews might have been less persecuted, but the most sophisticated societies might still be reliant on farming and not progressing because of their fear of God. The Plague opened the door to help humans progress into the modern