Black Death Essay -- History, Plague

The most immediate effect of the plague was that it led to higher wages for the poor. Prior to the Black Death, Europe was in a state of overpopulation, and famines were a frequent occurrence (Herlihy 39). After the arrival of the first outbreak of plague, however, Europe's population dropped somewhere between twenty-five and forty-five percent (Gottfried 77). Not only that, but, repeated occurrences of plague kept Europe's population lowered, and it did not regain its pre-plague levels until the mid-sixteenth century (Gottfried 134). That overwhelming loss of so many lives turned the situation around, and suddenly Europe was facing a labor shortage. That gave laborers an advantage over their employers. With the lack of workers able to fill positions, people were able to negotiate their employment, demanding more money. If their demands were not met, they were often able to find better opportunities elsewhere (Ziegler 233). This led Matteo Villani to complain in 1363 that, à ¢â‚¬Å"Serving girls and unskilled women with no experience in service and stable boys want at least 12 florins per year, and the most arrogant among them 18 or 24 florins per year, and also nurses and minor artisans working with their hands want three times or nearly the usual pay †¦ † (Herlihy 48-49). That shows, clearly, what was happening at the time. Not only did workers want more money, they expected it. What is more important, however, is that they actually received more pay. In fact, wages doubled overall in the period after the plague. Evidence has shown that during the period between the 1340's and 1390's, skilled construction worker's pay rose from 3d to 5d per day in Southern England, and those who were unskilled saw an increase from 1 ½d to 3d... ...cent (Gottfried 97). That led to a new trend in Europe, one where many landlords, unable to obtain a profit from their lands, leased their lands to the serfs for a cash rent, and many became absentee landlords (Gottfried 138). For instance, on one manor in the baliwick of Clare, most of the lands were being leased out by 1380 (Ziegler 239). In another example, in Witchurch England in 1383 the landlord, Richard Talbot, switched to leasing the lands after attempts to directly farm in failed (Platt 50). And those are just a couple of the many examples of that occurring. What that meant for the serfs who received leases was that they were no longer bound by the chains of serfdom. They could farm the lands as they saw fit, keep what they needed for their families, and sell what they didn't. In return for this they only needed to pay a cash rent to the landlord.