ABSTRACT
In the 14th century, Europe was ravaged by the Black Death. Many cities aected by the early appearance of this plague lost 60 to 80 percent of their populations.1 Groups that thought their piety had spared them soon learned that the disease would infect their towns, too. Families were devastated, and survivors were not sure how to go on. ey could not live as they had before. ey could not count on their inherited identities to mean anything.2 ose who faced the new social landscape became modern social selves, inventing themselves and taking control of their lives in ways they had never imagined before. ey helped to build a capitalist economy as they sought new opportunities and dreamt of new ways of being in the world. And merchants and artisans who made fortunes and ne reputations refused to accept their traditional subordination to nobles and the clergy, starting a revolution from below that never really stopped.
