The challenge: Imagine that the Black Death causes far fewer deaths in England. Follow one dispute over work, wages or land, and ask who gains leverage. Keep what your characters observe separate from what they believe—and from what you, as the writer, invent.
The historical starting point
The Black Death reached England in 1348. London Museum describes people recognising that plague spread between people without knowing about germs, alongside interpretations of plague as divine punishment. Observation and explanation were not the same thing. Read the museum’s account.
The resulting labour shortage increased workers’ potential to demand higher wages and more flexible working arrangements, challenging employers’ control. This is the historical pressure your counterfactual will change—not a reason to assume equal gains for every worker. Read Chris Given-Wilson’s chapter summary.
The government issued the Ordinance of Labourers in June 1349. A modified Statute of Labourers followed in February 1351. The legislation sought to restrain wages, restrict workers’ movement and enforce employment contracts favourable to employers. Source: Given-Wilson’s summary. You can also read a translated text of the 1351 statute at Fordham University.
Do not confuse legislation with uniform results. Mark Bailey reports routine enforcement in published studies of the small number of surviving royal sessions, but rare public prosecutions in the manorial courts sampled. These prosecutions should also be distinguished from private litigation over employment. Read Bailey’s open-access study, especially sections III–IV. For this exercise, treat a law as evidence of official policy; investigate its operation separately.
Your counterfactual premise
Fictional change: The outbreak reaches England, but substantially fewer people die. Treat this as an explicit assumption, not a historical claim or a medical explanation you have proved.
Begin with one community and one decision. Keep wars, harvests and institutions unchanged at first as a modelling choice. If you later alter them, explain the connection rather than assuming that one change transforms everything.
Choose a direction:
- A local bargain. Your imagined village loses fewer workers. A labourer asks for better terms anyway. What alternatives can they credibly offer—or threaten to take?
- A different legal response. Decide whether your fictional government still introduces labour controls. Explain why; do not simply transplant the real 1351 statute into changed circumstances.
- Competing employers. Two fictional employers want the same worker. Show how pay, obligations, distance and household needs affect the choice.
- An uncertain explanation. A character interprets the outbreak through religious belief, personal observation or conflicting reports. Show what evidence they possess without giving them modern medical knowledge.
These are prompts, not predictions. A persuasive scenario should make its chain of reasoning visible while leaving room for another plausible outcome.
What to write
Draft a scene or short scenario containing:
- An evidence note: identify the historical facts you are using and link to their sources.
- A clear divergence: state exactly what differs from documented history.
- A consequential choice: give someone a decision about work, payment or obligations.
- A limit on knowledge: distinguish what the character knows, suspects and misunderstands.
- An alternative outcome: explain briefly how the same premise might produce a different result.
Label invented dialogue, people and documents as fictional. If you include a supposed court entry or letter, do not present it as a surviving source.
Revision checklist
Ask whether your scenario distinguishes evidence from inference, gives employers as well as workers constraints, and avoids treating one English community as representative of all Europe. Replace claims that something *must* happen with an explanation of why it *might* happen.
Use this as a self-paced writing exercise. Write wherever suits you, or visit the Nexus Historia create page.
For related reading, see What If the Black Death Never Happened? Population, Wages and Power and What If the Black Death Never Happened? A Careful Counterfactual.
FAQ
What could people know about the outbreak?
London Museum describes awareness of spread between people without knowledge of germs, alongside religious explanations. Specify which observations and beliefs are available to your character; do not assume everyone understood the outbreak identically. Source: London Museum.
Do historians know exactly how many people died?
Treat totals as estimates. Bailey puts mortality in England during 1348–49 at around half the population and acknowledges the limits of exact population figures. Do not turn an estimate into a precise count—or into knowledge available to your characters. Source: Bailey, introduction and section I.
Would fewer deaths definitely have meant lower wages?
No particular fictional wage follows automatically. Given-Wilson identifies the historical shortage as strengthening workers’ bargaining position. Imagining weaker bargaining power after fewer deaths is a counterfactual inference, not an observed result. Explain your assumptions about employers, available workers and legal constraints, then test another possible outcome. Historical basis: Given-Wilson’s summary.
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