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Crop Failures were believed to have been part of the reason of the widespread damage of the Bubonic Plague. Famine is occuring around Europe and Asia and the plague is beginning (Kagan, 258).
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In 1346, the Bubonic Plague hit Constantinople and Western Europe. Rats and fleas are believed to be onboard the ships that spread the plague to Western Euope (Kagan, 258).
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The Black Death hit full force in 1348 going from port to port and finding its way from Asia into Europe because of crop failures (Kagan, 258).
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The Black Death spreads to the Italian ports of Venice, Pisa, and Genoa. Then the plague travels throughout Spain and hits southern France. More people are affected (Kagan, 258).
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In 1351, the English Parliament passed a law that constricted the wages to pre-plague levels and prohibited servants from leaving the land of their masters (Kagan, 260).
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"Also, after 1350, the results of the plague put two traditional "containers" of monarchy--the landed nobility and the church--on the defensive. Kings now exploited growing national sentiment in an effort to centralize their governments and economies" (Kagan, 262).
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"According to the contemporary observations for Giovanni Boccaccio, an Italian who recorded the reactions in his Decameron (1353), some sought a remedy in moderation and a temperate life, other gave themselves over entirely to their passions (sexual promiscuity ran high within the stricken areas), and still others, "the most sounds, prehaps, in judgment,"chose flight and seclusion as the best medicine" (Kagan, 258).
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In 1381, the peasants of England make a protest towards the English Parliament for passing the Statute of Laborers. France peasants also cause an uprising because of a tax increase on them (Kagan, 260).