A plague pit is the informal term used to refer to

mass grave A mass grave is a grave containing multiple human corpses, which may or may Unidentified decedent, not be identified prior to burial. The United Nations has defined a criminal mass grave as a burial site containing three or more victims of executi ...

s in which victims of the Black Death were buried. The term is most often used to describe pits located in

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...

, but can be applied to any place where

bubonic plague Bubonic plague is one of three types of plague caused by the plague bacterium ('' Yersinia pestis''). One to seven days after exposure to the bacteria, flu-like symptoms develop. These symptoms include fever, headaches, and vomiting, as ...

victims were buried.

Origin

The plague which swept across China,

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europ ...

, and

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located enti ...

in the 14th century is estimated to have killed between one-third and two-thirds of Europe's population.Stéphane Barry and Norbert Gualde, "The Greatest Epidemic of History" ("La plus grande épidémie de l'histoire", in '' L'Histoire'' n° 310, June 2006, pp.45-46, say "between one-third and two-thirds"; Robert Gottfried (1983). "Black Death" in ''

Dictionary of the Middle Ages The ''Dictionary of the Middle Ages'' is a 13-volume encyclopedia of the Middle Ages published by the American Council of Learned Societies between 1982 and 1989. It was first conceived and started in 1975 with American medieval historian Jos ...

'', volume 2, pp.257-67, says "between 25 and 45 percent". Disposal of the bodies of those who died presented huge problems for the authorities, and eventually the normal patterns of burial and funerary observance broke down.

Major plague outbreaks

Plague pits were used especially often during major plague outbreaks, such as the London epidemic of 1665. Graveyards rapidly filled and parishes became strained; for example the number of deaths in the parish of St Bride's Church, Fleet Street, in 1665 was almost six times normal.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Plague Pit Epidemiology Cemeteries Death in the United Kingdom Plague monuments and memorials