The Inner Temple Yearbook 2021–2022
History Society: Law in the Time of Plague
HISTORY SOCIETY:
LAW IN A TIME OF PLAGUE:
WAS THE LAW A GOOD DOCTOR? Master John Baker and Master John Wass in conversation with Master Donald Cryan via webinar on Monday 22 March 2021.
A Donald Cryan: This evening, we are concerned with the law’s response to plague in the Tudor and Stuart periods. What is of interest here is how the executive used the law. Were their actions legitimate in constitutional terms? How effective was the law that they administered? And in medical terms, did the law do more harm than good? Professor Wass, I understand that the Black Death in the mid-14th century was part of the second great wave of bubonic plague and it was enormously devastating. How far would the echo of that have impacted down the years? JW: The Black Death was a slight misnomer because they went blue, they became cyanosed, because it often affected the lungs. A third of the population of Europe died. I think it is fair to say it reshaped the course of history. There was huge psychological impact because this high mortality destroyed the confidence of the population of the world in the future. And it affected social architecture: indeed, the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381 was possibly related to the social discord caused by the Black Death of some years earlier. The plague of 1665 is well documented. This was an awful illness. And there was death in considerable agony. It was originally thought to be spread by rat-borne fleas. More recent data shows that there is human-to-human transmission, usually by human fleas and body lice. It is interesting also that plague still exists in parts of the USA and possibly in North Korea, so it is something which has never ever been seriously got rid of. DC: We know that the distribution of the plague amongst the different levels of society was by no means the same. Why was this? How different was it for the poor and the rich? Is it much the same as now?
102
JW: The answer to all that is, yes. The price of labour rose because there was a predominant infection of people who were in the lower socio-economic groups, probably largely related to their degree of overcrowding. That resulted in this shift in the distribution of wealth. It is very interesting that in Cambridge there were 972 people who got the plague, but not a single academic got the plague. Because actually they had moved out of Cambridge, and that’s something which actually is a reflection of how it affected people: people who were affected in perhaps the higher socio-economic groups moved away from where all the infections were.
In Cambridge there were 972 people who got the plague, but not a single academic got the plague. Because actually they had moved out of Cambridge, and that’s something which actually is a reflection of how it affected people: people who were affected in perhaps the higher socio-economic groups moved away from where all the infections were. DC: Sir John, Professor Wass has set out the public health emergency which the Tudor and Stuart administrations were facing. How did the great institutions deal with that? What was the practical response?
