The Great Plague 1665
A plague is a serious, infectious disease that spreads quickly and causes death. In Britain, plagues, killing tens of thousands of people, have struck many times. One of the worst plagues that happened in British history was the Great Plague in 1665 - almost 100,000 people were killed just in London alone and thousands more around the country. Source: History Today What caused the plague? What the people believed: 1. Back then, people thought that the plague was caused by the positions of the planets or sent as a punishment from God. 2. It was spread by touching a cat or dog. 3. Caused by poisonous air (miasma). The real cause of the plague: However, one of the theories behind the real cause of the plague was that it was caused by germs that lived in the blood of black rats and the fleas on their bodies. These fleas would hop onto humans, bite them and pass on the disease. These plague-infected rats and fleas were believed to have aboard boats bringing goods from Netherlands to E