Map of the Black Death's Spread

What it is

This is a decorative world map of the Black Death, painted in watercolour by Munro Scott Orr. The Wellcome Collection holds it, and its record describes it as a map showing the history and distribution of the Black Death around the world. Because it is a modern work, it is a later summary of the pandemic rather than a document from the 1340s. The image is built around a globe-shaped world map, with allegorical figures, banners and small scenes of medical and historical life around its border. A central panel shows many bodies and a skeletal figure.

Why it matters

The Black Death was the 1346 to 1353 pandemic that spread across Eurasia and North Africa. Maps like this one let students see the disease's reach at a glance, but they are shaped by the choices of the person who drew them. Orr's map was made long after the events, so it shows how the pandemic was understood and presented later, more than what people living through it knew.

Look closer

• What do the central panel of bodies and the skeletal figure suggest about how the artist wanted viewers to feel?
• Which places does the map show clearly, and which regions does it leave out or make hard to see?
• How would the picture change if it were built from the eyewitness writing of the 1340s instead of from later research?