As the Chinggis Khan created the hunger of conquering, his offspring continued his ambition, and carried the plague which originated from China and spread to Europe. The plague made life a living hell in Europe. Since the plague caused so much chaos and anarchy, people expected the Catholic Church to help. When the Roman Catholic Church failed to meet the expectation, it allowed space for the Protestant Reformation.
I think nobody would deny that Mongolians has built the largest empire in the world. But as we refer to the history, there is a name you have to know about, Temujin, the Chinggis Khan of Mongol Empire. He created the times belonged to Mongol and did all the great to build an empire. He became a symbol and a spirit of the empire. As all his sons and grandsons wanted to be like him, there came the two times of the Mongol conquests after Chinggis Khan’s death.
During the conquering process, the outbreak of the plague which originally came from Yunnan China, has spread with the Mongol army all the way to Europe, and became a catastrophe all over the world.
At first, the plague broke out in Yuan dynasty, when Mongolians wiped Song dynasty out of the map and ruled China. Later, during the Mongol’s conquests to the West, it connected Asia and Europe by conquering and expanding the Mongol empire. The empire also created prosperous business environment within its boundaries. In the 14th century, the plague went from Asia to Europe.
It is assumed that the plague was transported from Central Asia to Sicily Island then to the continent of Europe in 1347. Let’s just think about that, a huge boat from Asia just landed in the port of Sicily, another day of business just began. People were looking forward to buying the amazing animal fur produced in Asia, but the fleas carrying plague bacteria were hidden in the fur, they jumped and bit the black rats on board, they also bit human bodies, and spread all the way where the ship has gone to. The reaper named Black Death just came, rapidly and silently.
The plague passed through the port cities to the inner land. In 1348, even the Alps couldn’t block the plague. By the end of the 14th century, Europe lost one-third to two-thirds of its population, nearly twenty to thirty million people. In England and France, more than half of their populations died in the plague.
Several months after the plague landed in Europe, the Pope of Rome, Clement VI fled away from Avignon, the headquarter of Catholic. Besides, the plague was not only torturing human beings, but also did it bring pain to cats, dogs, camels, and birds.
The plague did actually made a living hell in Europe back then, in the journal Three Days in October of 1630 by Stephen R. Ell, we can know that over one-fourth of the deaths were not caused by the plague, but killed by the violence and starvation. The government lost control of the panicked and desperate society, the anarchy opened the gate for chaos. Let’s draw a picture of it really quick.
When people saw such terrible infectious disease swallowing others’ lives around them, some of these men just tried to live as longer as they can, they gathered all the uninfected people they knew and stayed in a house, enjoyed the best food and wine as they can. Some thought they could survive, thus they broke into houses and stores, robbed everything they can see. Also some of who thought they needed to catch every minute to do whatever they want before the reaper knocked on the door , they fought with others for any reason, they raped women and did something only the devil would do.
Because the disease was so scary, there were a number of funerals with nobody attended, the father abandoned the infected son, the husband left the wife, and the daughter locked her parents in the house with doors and windows sealed by nailing woods. Every evil you could imagine, the fact could only beyond your imagination.
However, believe it or not, like every coin has two sides, it also had its positive effects as outcomes. In some way, the Black Death disease liberated European society and improved the social status for farmers, due to the serious loss of population and the demand for the labor. England began to set wage standard, some other landlords reduced the rent, and started to improve farmers’ welfare.
The plague at the time stimulated a lot of masterpieces base on the theme “Dance to the Death”, which was a huge step forward for the literature and the art. For those masterpieces, we all can name one or two. Like Decameron by Boccaccio. Later, the Renaissance in Europe shocked the world.
At the time when plague was so serious, the loss of population also influenced the church and the war-fields. The cathedrals and churches without priests were in messes. On the other hand, the raising labor cost and lacking in soldiers made the fire of war among Europeans gradually died out.
As long as the pace of the plague reaper slowed down, people needed spiritual faith and mental support, their religious passion were stronger than ever before. On the one hand, they want themselves to be blessed and saved, they hoped the plague would never return. On the other hand, a lot of people did something unethical during the outbreak of the plague, they wanted to admit their sins and guilt and be saved.
But at that time the Roman Catholic Church didn’t do their job properly. On the contrary, the church gathered the believers’ money with every ridiculous effort. For example, unrestricted sales of indulgences that held by the church was very common then. The pope and bishops drowned themselves in women and money and power, the church corrupted.
The corruption of the church stimulated the Protestant reformation. The founder, Martin Luther, found that human could be saved just by faith as he climbed up the ladder. Then he founded a protest against the Roman Catholic Church by nailing his 95 theses against the church on the gate of a main German cathedral, which was known as the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. Justification by faith is the core rule for the Protestant, believers who have the faith in mind, they have already be saved.
From the Mongol conquests to the Protestant Reformation was a long way for human being especially for Europeans, they survived all those catastrophe and began to rebuild not only their physical homeland, but also a better world for spirit, for religion and for democratic progress in people’s mind.