The Plague Facts
In Japan, during a major war, the government released the plague on their enemies.
The formal name for Yersinia pestis is Pasteurella pestis.
The plague today mostly exists in Central Asia, Western USA, South America, and Africa.
In America, mostly prairie dogs, meadow voles, squirrels, rabbits, and rats carry the disease.
The people of Europe believed that the disease was carried in the air.
Because they believed that it was a miasma, they ordered huge amounts of heavy tapestries to cover windows. This did wonders for the tapestry industry in Belgium and northern France. Royalty had their tapestries embroidered to look like scenes from favorite plays and books.
The earliest form of biological warfare was when Mongolia was at war with the trade-prosperous city of Caffa, in 1346. At first, it seemed as though Caffa would win the battle, but then the Mongols started dropping like flies, writhing with the plague. They then took the dead bodies, and catapulted them over the walls into the city of Caffa, contaminating the population.
Peasants would come around with wagons, and you would have to throw your dead there, for mass burials. The peasants carrying the wagons would know if a loved one died, because you would draw a red cross on the door of your house.
The plague's earliest out-break was in the early 1330's, in China.
The formal name for Yersinia pestis is Pasteurella pestis.
The plague today mostly exists in Central Asia, Western USA, South America, and Africa.
In America, mostly prairie dogs, meadow voles, squirrels, rabbits, and rats carry the disease.
The people of Europe believed that the disease was carried in the air.
Because they believed that it was a miasma, they ordered huge amounts of heavy tapestries to cover windows. This did wonders for the tapestry industry in Belgium and northern France. Royalty had their tapestries embroidered to look like scenes from favorite plays and books.
The earliest form of biological warfare was when Mongolia was at war with the trade-prosperous city of Caffa, in 1346. At first, it seemed as though Caffa would win the battle, but then the Mongols started dropping like flies, writhing with the plague. They then took the dead bodies, and catapulted them over the walls into the city of Caffa, contaminating the population.
Peasants would come around with wagons, and you would have to throw your dead there, for mass burials. The peasants carrying the wagons would know if a loved one died, because you would draw a red cross on the door of your house.
The plague's earliest out-break was in the early 1330's, in China.