What if the Black Death Never Happened?

welcome to the 21st century an age of medicine science and not burning witches where the Western world has gone almost a century without a catastrophic deadly plague good job us yeah as you know this wasn't always the case the Roman plagues smallpox that killed the Native Americans dankmemes germs have lent an invisible but obvious hand throughout the course of human history plagues killing so many people poor and rich alike that societies at their core crumbled demographics changed and even empires disintegrated nowhere else as this example more prominent than in one of the most infamous plagues ever recorded the black death a pandemic that ravaged Eurasia during the Middle Ages the black death was so terrifying in its scale many truly believed the apocalypse was upon them can you blame him and less than a decade hundreds of millions died across the medieval world from China to the Middle East and finally Europe especially in Europe a continent where the population was cluttered the cities were growing and sanitation was atrocious you're basically lighting a match in an explosion factory so many died so many demographics shifted it truly reinvented Europe and from the ashes brought it down a path we see today without it who knows where Europe would have been so what if the black death had never occurred saves just never happens no plague kills millions across Eurasia before I discussed this alternate scenario let's put this into context there have always been waves of plagues ever since civilization began the most notable before the medieval era was the Justinian plague which killed over 25 million people in the 6th century the plague of course now Justinian what exactly was the Black Death well we know it was a form of bubonic plague bubonic meaning that buboes basically horrifying welts pop up across the victim's body if you got the plague in the 1300s you would have less than a week to survive boils would cover your body you would vomit blood dizziness a slow painful and horrifying death the disease originated from rats who transferred it to fleas hitching a ride when the rancid died the fleas would hop off to find the nearest hosts who happened to be Jimmy the peasant it's believed the disease came from the steppes of Central Asia good thing nobody ever comes in contact with Central Asia Oh in the 13th century the Mongols carved their empire across Asia they don't purposely spread the plague well Lisa first after the pillaging and conquests the Khan set up a trade network connecting China to Russia and everywhere in between reinventing the Silk Road and connecting East with West the plague originated in Central Asia but had already been in China for millennia however was this trade was reinvigorated more merchants traveled across the continent and with them rats and with them fleas all on caravans wagons and ships in the following years the Black Death would kill and break down anyone across Asia from the Middle East to China cities filled with the dead and dying unable to understand or stop such a horrifying scenario soon enough the fund reached Europe's doorstep at the time the Mongols had established a Khanate called the Golden Horde the Golden Horde was seizing the Crimean city of kapha when their forces began to suffer from the Black Death with their army quickly dropping like flies the Mongols had a pleasant idea taking the disease-ridden bodies of their fallen comrades the Mongols catapulted the carcasses into the streets of the city in a short amount of time this medieval act of biological warfare took its toll the plague brought down kapha to its knees as its citizens died by the masses some ships were able to escape Italian merchants being one of them sailing the safety across the Mediterranean back home to Italy bringing with them not only news of the Mongol attack but unwelcome guests as well medieval Europe was a perfect breeding ground for the disease to do its work hygiene and sanitation were non-existent germ theory was not even theorized yet combine this with a disease that kills within the first week and you're basically playing pandemic 2 on super easy mode within a decade the disease spread to nearly every part of the continent Europe would lose over 1/3 to 60% of its population in just four years more than half of the population of London and Hamburg died half of Paris thousands in Rome and Venice and 75% in some cities so many died across Eurasia it was faster to bury the bodies in a massive hole by the hundreds huge graves to dump the endless stream of new victims indiscriminately tossed in to the ground and covered for the next batch remember when I said the part about vomiting blood and boils multiply this by a hundred million across the world that's the black death so when your friends neighbors and family begin to die from mysterious pus boils how would you react blame the Jews and that's what Europe gone and did scapegoats were needed to explain the unexplainable and since less Jews were affected by the plague for hygienic reasons one plus one equaled anti-semitism rioters massacred entire Jewish communities burning down their homes taking their possessions lynching them and forcing their kids to convert to Catholicism except the Pope said hey maybe you should not kill the Jews who had nothing to do with us to which the population said shut up hope and continued as they were some Europeans theorized it was God punishing them for their sins or bad air that was causing people to die the King of France even believed it was the alignment of the planets Oh France after this three-year period over half of Europe lay dead mostly adults the kiddies would be killed in a plague just ten years after Europe was devastated please continue to come back in waves for the next few centuries not completely ending until industrialization so what if in an alternate timeline the black death simply never happened here is one scenario now if I wanted to be extremely detailed there could be multiple things that could prevent the black death from happening mainly the Mongol Empire never rising but if I remove the Mongols or any other big event in this alternate scenario it would butterfly effect this video so much it wouldn't be a video focusing on the Black Death specifically anymore so for the sake of time I'm simply removing the bubonic plague outbreak from this alternate timeline that doesn't mean the disease doesn't exist it just means it doesn't spread across Eurasia in the 14th century like it did in our timeline so it's entirely possible another disease could ravage the continent but it's doubtful because no pandemic quite compared to the killing power of the bubonic plague so in this alternate timeline is the 14th century the Mongol Empire carved up most of Asia collapsed and as khanates dot the continent Europe has continued to live its feudal medieval lifestyle China still suffers through famine in our timeline the stability of the high middle ages had slowly begun to end an overpopulation was becoming a significant problem by the 14th century just two decades before the black dust struck Europe a Great Famine called cleverly the Great Famine of 1315 217 created mass starvation across the continent royalty even had difficulty finding food children were abandoned old people forced to starve for the younger cannibalism was widespread the specifics are not quite known but millions eventually died simply put the population of Europe had gotten too large to support itself by the time the plague would strike Europe was already collapsing even though it sounds terrible and it was at the time the Black Death actually helped Europe at least one third to half the population died in just three years taking along with it the problems of overpopulation and lack of resources this meant Europe could actually sustain itself and bought enough time to figure out how to manage its resources in this alternate timeline the black death never occurs and so this overpopulation problem would never be dramatically solved population would continue to grow and then stagnate in the thirteenth century yet it remains at the limit famines are much more common in devastating as people compete and die for food sorry grandma with more people that means less food for the average peasant in this alternate world a terrible harvest results in much more famine than in our timeline killing off so many people brought many dramatic effects in the century following the plague wages increased land became cheaper individuals were needed in this alternate timeline this dramatic change doesn't happen feudalism needs cheap workers less workers means more valuable workers people the nobles depended on to remain in power died off demands were made for higher wages peasant revolts became more common land left unattended was now up for the taking political and social independence was becoming a reality laws were made by nobility to keep the lower classes down however eventually the system of feudalism couldn't afford to not hire wages at least in Western Europe there were just too few peasants to exploit serfdom continued in Eastern Europe all the way until the 19th century in this alternate timeline feudalism still would have ended of course you want to be a peasant living on a farm today don't worry but everything in history built off of each other if feudalism wasn't dramatically killed off like in our timeline that means innovations like less restrictive capitalist early Enlightenment ideas Renaissance beliefs would be pushed off as well Europe isn't going to remain medieval for all of eternity but it does remain stagnated for much longer than in our timeline religion itself was transformed by the plague the Catholic Church as an entity would remain much stronger in this alternate timeline the black death destroyed many people at the times faith and not just God but the papacy itself to them they had been developed good Christians yet were still punished unfairly in their eyes the church couldn't offer any answer or solution to the plague even seeing half of their own clergy die any new clergy they brought on was inexperienced or quickly trained to compensate for the lack of priests and monks this planted a seed of doubt among some of the population Catholicism was put into question and to set the stage which would play out in the Protestant Reformation just two centuries later in this alternate timeline since half of the clergy don't die the inexperienced never become prominent members Europe never experiences this rift and would prolong the eventual split for Europe it could be more of the same until the old ways gradually died a slow painful death Europe could be unrecognizable to how it is today overpopulation means Europe continues to struggle with famine food shortages and underpaid lower class for many centuries with cheap labor there isn't a need to innovate machines to make up for the lost labor as what happened in our time line so farming technology remains behind feudalism stays until it's slow death but by then entirely alternate dynastic marriages and political unions occur this is simply one scenario out of the countless possibilities what do you think would have happened had the black death never occurred say in the comments this scenario was suggested by patreon contributor Alex turbine thanks Alex for your suggestion this is Kody on the alternate history hub if you like learning about continents flags countries or anything geography and why that's important I have an entire channel dedicated to that whoa that's right geography hub so go check that out you

Channel: AlternateHistoryHub

Views: 2,297,257

Rating: 4.9286094 out of 5

Keywords: Black Death, Black Plague, AlternateHistoryHub, alternate history, Europe, Plague, Middle Ages, European history, Medieval Europe, Medieval Europe history

Id: q1aULu6BqNs

Length: 11min 25sec (685 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 12 2016