The Black Death: A Chronicle of the Plague

by Johannes Nohl, C.H. Clarke (Translator)

A History of the Most Catastrophic Plague Through Contemporary Accounts and How Humans Reacted
Hailed by the New York Times as "unusually interesting both as history and sociological study,"  The Black A Chronicle of the Plague traces the ebb and flow of European pandemics over the course of centuries through translations of contemporary accounts. Originally published in 1926 and now in paperback for the first time, Nohl's volume is unique for its geographical and historical scope as well as its combination of detailed accounts and overarching contemporary views of the history of the plague in Europe, a disease that claimed nearly 40 million people during the fourteenth century alone. With current concerns about pandemics, The Black Death provides lessons on how humans reacted to and survived catastrophic loss of life to disease.

Contents
Preface
1. The Aspect of the Plague
2. The Precursors of the Plague
3. The Medical Profession and the Plague
4. Plague Remedies
5. Administrative Precautions
6. Attitude of the Church
7. The Diabolical Element of the Plague
8. Persecutions of the Jews
9. The Erotic Element of the Plague
10. The Flagellants
11. Choreomania and Children's Pilgrimages
12. Life Victorious
Bibliography
Geographical Index
Index of Persons

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Medieval History, Medieval, Historical

296 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1926

Reviews

[Rhuff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Though it’s a good book on the Black Death, it’s far from the newest – or the best – interpretation of Europe’s Great Plague. Then why give it the five stars? For its unintended prescience. Written by a German scholar in 1926, it’s a sadly ironic forecast of a new Black Plague that was soon to engulf his country and radiate its bacilli throughout the Continent.

This was brought home in Nohl’s chapter on the Jews as a primary scapegoat for the Plague. Writing in the early 20th century, no doubt believing he lived in a saner, more evolved era, Nohl lamented the treatment of Jews as symptomatic of a simple-minded, superstition-ridden, irrational era. Little could he know that within fifteen years the mass burnings and executions sanctified by greedy opportunists, leading a gullible population overcome by magical thinking, would destroy his higher civilization with ease and gusto. The rot of medieval Germany returned post-WWI; its spiritual plague – and its mass biological destruction – would reach nearly the same level of genetic devastation. This bitter irony makes Nohl’s rendition of the Plague era the fullest exponent of a past that always breeds in the dark corners of human mortality.

[Ra · Rating 2 out of 5]

While it was interesting to read first-hand accounts, the author often presents myth as fact. I had not realized when I first picked up this book that it was originally published in 1924 but it definitely shows.

[Everet · Rating 2 out of 5]

For a subject as interesting as the black plague, this book is as dry as a riverbed during a drought

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

So great. Autopsy reports, letters from the scenes of multiple outbreaks, lists of dozens and dozens of remedies, religious meaning and response, all kinds of first-hand accounts. For three centuries (I think, or four), the world didn't go 20 years without an outbreak of this. Unbelievable. At one point, it was believed that the entire population of Iceland had been totally wiped out. Staggering staggering numbers in huge places (like London, for instance) too.

Hard to read at times. Incredibly chaotic and overwhelming.

Titian and Holbein the Younger both died of the plague.

"The experience incorporated in these graphic representations is the equality of all men in the face of death, an experience of greater import as, not only did it shake the foundations of the rigid system of medieval castes, but produced the consciousness of the equality of all men before the face of God—that consciousness which led up to the Reformation.

If prior to this estimation of the great had been successfully sustained by the ostentatious show of their obsequies and the innumerable masses said for their souls, this deception now failed...and more essential elements than external power and position began to assume the first place in the estimation of men."

[Elliot Schott · Rating 5 out of 5]

The most informative and entertaining book of compiled contemporary accounts of the many attacks of Bubonic Plague from the 14th through the 18th century in Europe. Rather than take the position of "objective" Historian in this piece, Nohl assumes an approach more in keeping with his profession as a Psychoanalyst and Sociologist. Rather than building a timeline narrative of Plague history from compiled sources, he instead combines accounts throughout the centuries by a particular theme ("The Medical Profession," "Plague Remedies," "The Diabolic Element During the Plague,") to show in essence the various coping mechanisms of a world less understanding of such a devastating, seemingly worldwide affliction. In doing so, Nohl effectively reveals the narrative of humanity using the constant challenge of the Plague to climb out of the Dark Ages of understanding and into Reason and Enlightenment, replacing superstition and quack remedies with better sanitation measures and the eventual isolation of the Plague bacilli. Part history, part folklore, part sociological study, this is a book with several applications in an academic setting.

[Joseph Washkevich · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book written by a German psychoanalyst about the Black Death in Medieval Europe. Each chapter describes how different aspects of this society dealt with the plague, including responses made by different religious demographics. It also describes movements that would arise in response to the plague, such as flagellants and those seeking folk cure remedies. There was a widespread belief that the Black Death was punishment for sin, and the book at the end discusses a rebirth of life in Europe following the end of the plague after years of being surrounded by death and suffering.

[Valerie]

I think this is the version I read, though this is not the edition.

One thing that is seldom mentioned is that the described mortality is low for a virgin-soil epidemic. This implies that either Europeans had been infected before, or that the transmission method was not very effective.

Comparison with pneumonic plague makes the vector theory more likey, perhaps, since pneumonic plague had a much higher mortality rate.

[Cy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A chronologizing of the Black Plague over its 300-400-yr reign in Europe. It can be dry and has some antiquated perspectives on "moral" behavior, but it is also a fascinating door to the human condition when a society is in total spiritual upheaval, bringing out the best, the weirdest, but mostly the worst in people and cultures.

[Jules · Rating 5 out of 5]

Who would associate the plague with comets, flagellants and the erotic? You must read it to see the correlations.