Description
Book SynopsisThe best introduction to the terrible international impact of the Black Death. Unique, sensational and shocking, this revelatory book provides the best overview of the Europe-wide history of the Black Death. The author's painstakingly comprehensive research throws fresh light on the nature of the disease, its origin, its spread, on an almost day-to-day basis, across Europe, Asia Minor, the Middle East and North Africa, its mortality rate and its impact on history. These latter two aspects are of central importance here, for it is demonstrated that the plague's death rates have consistently been under-estimated and that they were in fact much higher, making the disease's long-term effects on history even more profound. First paperback edition published 2006. OLE J. BENEDICTOW is Professor of History at the University of Oslo.
Trade ReviewBenedictow's book is highly recommended. It is well written and accompanied by many helpful maps and tables of data. * STUDIES IN MEDIEVAL AND RENAISSANCE TEACHING *
The thoroughness and precision of [Benedictow's] research are admirable. [...] Opens a treasure trove of correct information. There is no doubt that [the book] should be acquired by all university libraries. * FIFTEENTH-CENTURY STUDIES *
Every library that covers population studies, epistemology, or medieval history should have a copy of Benedictow's book. * POPULATION STUDIES & DEVELOPMENT *
A book which should be on every Late-Medievalist's bookshelf. It is packed with valuable and well-considered accounts. ... A wonderful compilation of data which will be widely used for many years to come. * MEDIEVAL ARCHAEOLOGY *
[This] remarkable, engrossing and controversial study is the first to assemble and synthesize historical data from every region in which the Black Death wrought havoc. [...] An immense and entirely breathtaking feat of scholarship...and a moving quest to account for a cruel phenomenon. * TLS *
[This] magisterial account mixes demographic research, meticulous reading of the chronicles and modern bacteriology. * THE GUARDIAN *
The author...has achieved a Herculean task in reviewing a very large part of the literature on the pestilential disease or set of diseases that afflicted Europe from 1346 to 1353. * THE MEDIEVAL REVIEW *
A valuable addition to the historiography of the Black Death. Highly recommended. * CHOICE *
Ambitious and contentious. * ENGLISH HISTORICAL REVIEW *
Those looking for a vast compendium of local data will not be disappointed. * SPECULUM *
