Along with a minority who had behaved in a cowardly or avaricious fashion, this was enough to cast doubt on the authority of the Holy Fathers.Īs for the shameful and disorderly mob, after the party came the hangover in the form of 'a neurotic and all-pervading gloom', as historian, Philip Ziegler puts it. Not only had the priests failed to warn of the coming catastrophe, they perished in proportionately greater numbers than laymen. What this suggests, apart from rueful reflections on human nature, is that the survivors' belief in the Church and its doctrines had taken a beating during the plague years.

But instead of becoming more 'humble, virtuous and Catholic,' in the words of eyewitness historian, Matteo Villani, '…they gave themselves up to a more shameful and disordered life than they had lived before.' The sins of gluttony, lechery and pride were on full display, as if daring God to do it all over again. One might presume the survivors would have raced to church in a suitably pentitent mood. It's commonplace to talk about all the things we don't know in this field, but we are vastly better informed than those Europeans who saw the Black Death of 1347-1351 as God's punishment for their sins.Īpproximately a third of Europe's population had perished when the illness finally subsided. Both are speculative fictions that draw on our knowledge of the causes and behaviour of an epidemic. It may be a symptom of morbid curiosity but the coronavirus lockdown has generated a new interest in novels such as Albert Camus's The Plague, and movies such as Steven Soderbergh's Contagion.

The black death by philip ziegler