Europe in the Middle Ages

by Ierne L. Plunket

The Black Death

Death at the battle of Creci, decked in all the panoply of mediaeval warfare, had taken its toll of the chivalry of France and England. Now, in an open and ghastly form, indifferent alike to race or creed, it stalked across Europe, visiting palace and castle but sweeping with a still more ruthless scythe the slum and the hovel. Somewhere in the far East the ‘Black Death’, as it was later called, had its origin, and wherever it passed, moving westward, villages, nay, even towns, disappeared.

More than thirteen million people are said to have perished in China, India was almost depopulated, and at last in 1347 Europe also was smitten. Very swift was the blow, for many victims of the plague died in a few hours, the majority within five days; and contemporary writers tell us of ships, that left an eastern harbour with their full complement of crew, found drifting in the Mediterranean a few weeks later without a living soul on board to take the helm; of towns where the dead were so many that there was none to bury them; of villages where the peasants fell like cattle in the fields and by the wayside unnoticed.

In Italy, in France, in England, there is the same record of misery and terror. Boccaccio, the Italian writer, describes in his book, the Decameron, how the wealthy nobles and maidens of Florence fled from the plague-stricken town to a villa without the walls, there to pass their days in telling one another tales. These tales have made Boccaccio famous as the first great European novelist; but in reality not many even of the wealthy could keep beyond the range of infection, and Boccaccio himself says elsewhere ‘these who first set the example of forsaking others languished where there was no one to take pity on them’.

Neither courage, nor devotion, nor selfishness could avail against the dread scourge; though like all diseases its ravages were most virulent where small dwellings were crowded together or where dirt and insanitary conditions prevailed. ‘They fell sick by thousands,’ says Boccaccio of the poorer classes, ‘and having no one whatever to attend them, most of them died.’ According to a doctor in the south of France, ‘the number of those swept away was greater than those left alive.’ In the once thriving port of Marseilles ‘so many died that it remained like an uninhabited place’. Another French writer, speaking of Paris, says, ‘there was so great a mortality of people of both sexes ... that they could hardly be buried.’ ‘There was no city, nor town, nor hamlet,’ writes an Englishman of his own country, ‘nor even, save in rare instances, any house, in which this plague did not carry off the whole or the greater portion of the inhabitants.’

One immediate result of the Black Death was to put a temporary stop to the war between England and France; for armies were reduced to a fraction of their former strength and rival kings forgot words like ‘glory’ or ‘conquest’ in terrified contemplation of an enemy against whom all their weapons were powerless.

Other and more lasting effects were experienced everywhere, for town and village life was completely disorganized: magistrates, city officials, priests, and doctors had perished in such numbers that it was difficult to replace them: criminals plundered deserted houses unchecked: the usually law-abiding, deprived of the guidance to which they had been accustomed, gave themselves up to a dissolute life, trying to drown all thoughts of the past and future in any enjoyment they could find in the present. Work almost ceased: the looms stood idle, the ships remained without cargoes, the fields were neither reaped of the one harvest nor sown for the next. The peasants, when reproached, declared that the plague had been a sign of the end of the world and that therefore to labour was a waste of time. ‘All things were dearer,’ says a Frenchman: ‘furniture, food, and merchandise of all sorts doubled in price: servants would only work for higher wages.’

In the years following the Black Death the labouring classes of Europe discovered for the first time their value. They were the necessary foundation to the scheme of mediaeval life, the base of the feudal pyramid; and, since they were now few in number, masters began to compete for their services. Thus they were able to demand a better wage for their work and improved conditions; but here the governments of the day, that ruled in the interests of the nobles and middle classes, stepped in, forbade wages to be raised, or villeins and serfs to leave their homes and seek better terms in another neighbourhood. The discontent of those held down with an iron hand, yet half awake to the possibilities of greater freedom, seethed towards revolution; but few mediaeval kings chose to look below the surface of national life, and in the case of England Edward III was certainly not enough of a statesman to do so.

In 1355 he renewed the war with France, hoping that by victories he would be able to fill his own purse from French ransoms and pillage as well as to drug the disordered popular mind at home with showy triumphs. His eldest son, Edward, the Black Prince, who had gained his spurs at Creci, landed at Bordeaux and marched through Guienne, the English armies like the French being mainly composed of ‘companies’, that is, of hired troops under military captains, the terror of friends and foes alike; for with impartial ruthlessness they trampled down corn and vineyards as they passed, pillaged towns, and burned farms and villages.

Battle of Poitiers