The Black Death was one of the most devastating pandemics in human history, peaking in Europe between 1348 and 1350. The long-held theory that the Black Death was an outbreak of plague caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis had been challenged by a number of scholars from the 1970s, but has been supported by genetical studies published since 2010. Thought to have started in China, it travelled along the Silk Road and had reached the Crimea by 1346. From there, probably carried by Oriental rat fleas living on the black rats that were regular passengers on merchant ships, it spread throughout the Mediterranean and Europe.
The Black Death is estimated to have killed 30–60 percent of Europe's population,[1] reducing the world's population from an estimated 450 million to between 350 and 375 million in 1400. This has been seen as having created a series of religious, social and economic upheavals, which had profound effects on the course of European history. It took 150 years for Europe's population to recover. The plague returned at various times, killing more people, until it left Europe in the 19th century. (WIKIPEDIA)
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