1347–1353 CE · Global · Medicine
Plague moved through Eurasian and North African networks, killing an immense share of local populations.
Atlas dossier · Medieval WorldFree device narration · synchronized English captions · transcript available
Why it matters
The 1347–1353 range follows the major Mediterranean and European outbreak. Ancient DNA from burials dated 1338–1339 in present-day Kyrgyzstan links an earlier Central Asian outbreak to the bacterial lineage associated with the Black Death. This supports a regional origin for that lineage; it does not reconstruct every transmission route. Later plague outbreaks continued for centuries.
Max Planck Society: ancient plague genomes ↗English labour legislation after the mortality sought to compel service and restrict wages. The text preserved by Yale’s Avalon Project records the authorities’ response to labour scarcity, rather than a neutral account of workers’ choices. Its provisions do not prove uniform enforcement or identical economic consequences elsewhere.
Yale Avalon Project: medieval labour legislation ↗Silent pan-and-zoom motion derivative of the Black Death reconstruction; not archival footage.
Primary Atlas editorial reconstruction for Black Death.
World History in Pictures · Public site artwork. This record does not grant third-party republication rights.
How Atlas classifies this artwork →
Detail crop from the same Black Death reconstruction; not an independent historical record.
World History in Pictures · Same editorial artwork package
How Atlas classifies this artwork →
Context crop from the same Black Death reconstruction; not an independent historical record.
World History in Pictures · Same editorial artwork package
How Atlas classifies this artwork →Interpretation note
This dossier distinguishes the event’s basic chronology from later arguments about meaning, responsibility and legacy. When comparing religious, national, Indigenous or scholarly interpretations, consult the primary and institutional sources above alongside peer-reviewed historical work.
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