The Point : Towards the middle of the Fourteenth century, during what we now call the first globalization, an outbreak of bubonic plague imported from China by traders traveling on the silk road, struck first in Italy and France, before spreading then in all of Europe as far as England, killing all in its path half of the population of the continent. The unintended consequence of this pandemic drama was a social upheaval as significant, which allowed the beginnings of the Renaissance. In Western Europe, in particular, the shortage of labour p…
