The Black Plague

At the end of the Black Plague, there was a redefinition of social statuses and roles in society, as well as political upheaval, after the death of over 25 million people total. The workers created the Ordinance of Laborers in 1349, because they wanted pay and housing for their work in the land owners' fields. Since the Plague had wiped out most of the people, the laborers could get almost anything they wanted from the land owners, because they were so desperate to have workers tend to the fields and animals. The workers also made it be that everyone was paid fairly and equally, instead of those who were paid great wages, and those who were paid little to nothing. This created a new sense of fairness between the two groups of people in England.

In France, there began an awful killing of knights and their families. The French common villagers came together without any armor but swords and knives, and cruelly tortured the knights, their families and then killed them all because of their belief of " how the noblemen of the realm of France, knights and squires, shamed the realm, and that it should be a great wealth to destroy them all." The common villagers would tie up the knight, then violate his wife and daughter, and then kill them all. After that, they would burn down the house and move on to the next house.

The Plague was believed to have been started by the Jews placing poison in the wells of the people. The people decided to kill and burn the Jews because of this accusation of them poisoning wells. The burning of the Jews took place from the Mediterranean to Germany. The only place they were safe was in Avignon, because the pope protected them. At first, other religious leaders would do the same, but they gave up and agreed to burn the Jews as well. It was a tragedy throughout Europe.