The short answer is no. There wasn't a cure. Not back then, anyway. If you caught the "Great Mortality" in 1347, you were basically looking at a death sentence, usually within three to five days. It’s hard for us to wrap our heads around that today. We live in an era of Z-Paks and hand sanitizer, but back then, people were literally watching their neighbors turn black and blue before dropping dead in the street.
Honestly, the medical community at the time was flying blind. They didn't even know what a germ was. They thought bad smells—miasma—were the culprit. So, they carried around bouquets of flowers or sat in smoky rooms. It didn't work. The question of was there a cure for the Black Plague isn't just a medical one; it's a story of human desperation and some of the weirdest "treatments" ever recorded in history.
The "Cures" That Definitely Weren't Cures
People were terrified. When the plague hit a city, the social fabric just ripped apart. Doctors, or at least the ones who didn't flee, tried everything. One of the most common "cures" involved lancing the buboes. These were the painful, swollen lymph nodes in the groin, armpits, or neck. They’d cut them open to "drain" the poison.
It was agonizing. And usually, it just helped the infection spread faster.
Then you had the more... creative approaches. Some doctors recommended rubbing a live chicken’s backside on the sores. The idea was that the chicken would "draw out" the pestilence. It sounds like a joke, but in 1348, people were willing to try anything. Others suggested drinking crushed emeralds. If you were rich enough, you’d literally grind up gemstones and swallow them. Spoiler: It didn’t help, and it probably shredded your insides.
There was also the religious angle. Since many believed the plague was a punishment from God, flagellants roamed from town to town. They’d whip themselves with iron-tipped lashes, hoping their public penance would satisfy divine wrath and stop the dying. In reality, they just spread the bacteria further as they moved from one village to the next, often carrying the fleas in their clothes.
Why Medieval Medicine Failed
The core problem was a total lack of understanding regarding Yersinia pestis. That’s the bacteria responsible. It’s a hardy little monster carried by fleas that live on black rats. When the rats died, the fleas jumped to the nearest warm body. Usually, that was a human.
Medieval doctors followed the theory of the Four Humors. This was an ancient Greek idea that health depended on a balance of blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile. If you were sick, your humors were "out of whack." So, they’d bleed you. They’d use leeches or just cut a vein to let the "bad blood" out. When you're already dying of a massive bacterial infection and dehydration, losing a pint of blood is the last thing you need. It actually killed people faster.
📖 Related: Does Ginger Ale Help With Upset Stomach? Why Your Soda Habit Might Be Making Things Worse
The One Thing That Actually Worked: Quarantine
Even though there was no medicinal cure, people eventually figured out that distance helped. This is where we get the word "quarantine." It comes from the Italian quaranta giorni, meaning forty days. In 1377, the city-state of Ragusa (modern-day Dubrovnik) established a trentino, a thirty-day isolation period for arriving ships. This was later bumped to forty days.
It was brilliant in its simplicity. If you stayed on your ship for forty days and didn't die, you were probably safe to enter the city. This didn't "cure" the individual, but it saved the community. It was the first real step toward public health policy as we know it today.
Milan is a fascinating case. They took a "scorched earth" approach to quarantine. When a house was found to have a plague victim, they didn't just isolate the sick person. They walled up the entire house with everyone—sick and healthy—inside. It was brutal. It was heartless. But Milan had a significantly lower death rate than other Italian cities like Florence or Venice.
The Role of the Plague Doctor
We’ve all seen the costumes. The long leather coats, the gloves, and that haunting bird-like mask. You might think those masks were just for show, but they had a functional purpose—at least in the minds of the doctors. The "beak" was stuffed with aromatic herbs like camphor, dried flowers, and spices.
The theory? If you couldn't smell the "bad air," you wouldn't get sick.
Of course, the leather suit actually provided a bit of unintended protection. It acted as a barrier that made it harder for fleas to bite the doctor. However, most plague doctors weren't actually highly trained physicians. They were often second-rate doctors or young guys looking to make a name for themselves. They couldn't cure anyone, but they were paid by the city to keep records of who died.
Did the Plague Just... Disappear?
Not really. It didn't just vanish. It ebbed and flowed for centuries. The "Black Death" refers specifically to the massive outbreak between 1347 and 1351, but the plague kept coming back in waves. The Great Plague of London in 1665 was another massive spike.
👉 See also: Horizon Treadmill 7.0 AT: What Most People Get Wrong
So, was there a cure for the Black Plague during any of these later outbreaks? Still no.
The pandemic eventually slowed down because of a few factors. First, survivors developed some level of immunity. Natural selection is a cold-blooded teacher. Second, hygiene slowly improved. People started using soap more. The black rat (Rattus rattus), which loved living close to humans in thatched roofs, was eventually pushed out by the brown rat (Rattus norvegicus), which preferred sewers and kept its distance from people.
Modern Medicine and the Real Cure
If you're wondering if we have a cure now, the answer is a resounding yes. Today, the Black Plague is treated with basic antibiotics. Streptomycin, gentamicin, and tetracyclines work wonders. If you catch it early, you're fine.
But here’s the kicker: the plague is still around.
It’s not some relic of the Middle Ages. You can still find it in rodents in the American Southwest, parts of Africa, and Central Asia. Every year, a few people in places like New Mexico or Arizona catch it from handling squirrels or being bitten by fleas while hiking. The difference is that we now have the tools to stop it. We don't need live chickens or crushed emeralds anymore.
Why the History Matters Today
Studying the lack of a cure in the 1300s tells us a lot about how societies handle fear. When people don't have a scientific explanation for a disaster, they turn to scapegoating. During the Black Death, thousands of Jewish people were massacred because they were falsely accused of poisoning wells. Conspiracy theories aren't a modern invention; they're a symptom of a society that feels helpless.
It also highlights the importance of institutional trust. In the 14th century, the Church was the primary source of truth, and when the Church couldn't stop the plague, it led to a massive shift in how people viewed authority. This paved the way for the Renaissance and the Scientific Revolution. We started looking for answers in biology rather than just theology.
✨ Don't miss: How to Treat Uneven Skin Tone Without Wasting a Fortune on TikTok Trends
What to Remember About the "Cure"
Looking back, the "cure" for the Black Plague wasn't a pill or a potion. It was time, evolutionary adaptation, and the eventual discovery of the microscope. We spent centuries guessing. We guessed wrong most of the time.
If you're interested in the history of medicine or just want to be prepared for your next trivia night, here are the cold, hard facts to keep in your back pocket:
- Antibiotics are the only real cure. Without them, the bubonic plague has a 30-60% mortality rate. The pneumonic version (the one that gets in your lungs) is almost 100% fatal without treatment.
- Quarantine was the best defense. Social distancing isn't new; it's a 700-year-old tactic that actually saved lives when medicine failed.
- The plague didn't end. It's still endemic in certain animal populations. We just got better at managing it.
- Hygiene was the game-changer. Moving away from thatched roofs and improving waste management did more to stop the plague than any medieval doctor ever did.
To understand the Black Death is to understand the birth of modern public health. We learned the hard way that you can't pray away a bacteria, and you certainly can't cure it with a bird mask full of lavender. It took five hundred years of trial and error to get to a place where a flea bite isn't a death sentence.
Moving Forward with This Knowledge
If you want to dive deeper into how pathogens shape history, look into the "Justinian Plague" of the 6th century. It was the same bacteria, but it hit a completely different world. Also, keep an eye on modern CDC reports if you live in areas with prairie dogs or ground squirrels. Awareness is the best tool we have. Knowledge of how Yersinia pestis spreads is what keeps the "Great Mortality" in the history books and out of our hospitals.
Stay curious about the science, but stay thankful for modern pharmacy. We are living in the first era of human history where the answer to "is there a cure?" is actually yes.
Check your local travel advisories if you're hiking in the high desert, and always keep your pets treated for fleas. It’s a simple step that medieval peasants would have given anything to know.