An unparalleled and ambitious work by one of France’s greatest historians, revolutionizing the history of the Black Death.

The "Great Plague" was the largest demographic catastrophe in human history. Patrick Boucheron offers a comprehensive social history of this long-lasting event, which transcends chronological, geographical, and disciplinary boundaries. The book draws on advances in archeology and anthropology, as well as in microbiology and environmental sciences. It also reveals the political and social effects of the plague, and examines how it tested the ability of human societies to cope with mass death.