Black Death Strikes Europe, 1347-1353

What it is

This is a modern map uploaded in 2007 by a Wikipedia contributor, showing the spread of the Black Death across Europe from 1347 to 1353. It marks major cities including Stockholm, Copenhagen, Moscow, Kiev, London, Cologne, Cracow, Paris, Vienna, Milan, Marseilles, Barcelona, Rome, and Constantinople, with the year 1346 labeled in the upper corner.

Why it matters

By marking well-known cities across Europe, the map helps show how widely and quickly the pandemic reached across the continent, affecting communities from Scandinavia to the Mediterranean within just a few years.

Look closer

• What does the spread across so many distant cities suggest about how the disease traveled?
• Why might the mapmaker have chosen these particular cities to label?
• What information about the spread, such as dates for each city, is missing from this map?