Consequences of the Black Death

Consequences of the Black Death included a series of religious, social and economic upheavals, which had profound effects on the course of European history. The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, peaking in Europe between 1347 and 1350 with 30% to 60% of the population killed. It reduced world population from an estimated 450 million to between 350 and 375 million. It took 150 and in some areas more than 250 years for Europe's population to recover.

From the perspective of many of the survivors, however, the impact was much more benign, for their labor was in higher demand. Hilton has argued that those English peasants who survived found their situation to be much improved. For English peasants the 15th century was a golden age of prosperity and new opportunities. Land was plentiful, wages high, and serfdom had all but disappeared. A century later, as population growth resumed, the peasants again faced deprivation and famine.

Figures for the death toll vary widely by area and from source to source as new research and discoveries come to light. It killed an estimated 75–200 million people in the 14th century. According to medieval historian Philip Daileader in 2007:

The trend of recent research is pointing to a figure more like 45% to 50% of the European population dying during a four-year period. There is a fair amount of geographic variation. In Mediterranean Europe and Italy, the South of France and Spain, where plague ran for about four years consecutively, it was probably closer to 75% to 80% of the population. In Germany and England, it was probably closer to 20%.

Estimates of the demographic impact of the plague in Asia, are based on both population figures during this time and estimates of the disease's toll on population centers. The initial outbreak of plague in the Chinese province of Hubei in 1334 claimed up to eighty percent of the population. China had several epidemics and famines from 1200 to the 1350s and its population decreased from an estimated 125 million to 65 million in the late 14th century.

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