Black Death mortality not as widespread as long thought | HeritageDaily

The Black Death, which plagued Europe, West Asia and North Africa from 1347-1352, is the most infamous pandemic in history.

Historians have estimated that up to 50% of Europe’s population died during the pandemic and credit the Black Death with transforming religious and political structures, even precipitating major cultural and economic transformations such as the Renaissance. Although ancient DNA research has identified Yersinia pestis as the Black Death’s causative agent and even traced its evolution across millennia, data on the plague’s demographic impacts is still…