Overview
People have long used the term "plague" to mean any great calamity. But the deadly disease that swept through Asia, North Africa, and Europe in the mid-1300's was so devastating that it became forever identified with that name. Today, we call this plague epidemic the Black Death, but that label dates from the 1600's. During the 1300's, people called the event by such names as the Pestilence, the Great Mortality, or just "the Death." Many wondered if the world was ending. The epidemic, which killed about one-third of all Europeans, led to massive changes in the structure of society, economics, trade, religion, culture, and nearly every other area of life.
The descriptions of the fictional French physician Rogier d'Orleans in this feature represent the real views of European doctors of the 1300's. It would be centuries before researchers would discover that the plague was spread by fleas that live on rodents, including a species of household rat. These small black rats are rare today, but in the 1300's, they lived in close company with people, both in homes and on ships.