Where does evidence point to as the beginning or source of the plague? Why is there disagreement over the location of the source and the mortality rate of the plague?

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

A. Source of the plague
1. age of plague seems to have started in China
2. repeated occurrences or continuous visitation of massively lethal
maladies were recorded in southwest China in early 1320's
3. in 1353–1354, chroniclers reported that around two-thirds of the
population perished from pestilence in eight distinct Chinese districts
B. Disagreement of source
1. doubt persists, however, over whether the diseases rampant in China
were the cause of or even the same as those found farther west
2. plague was an invader of the steppelands
a. observers at the time noted that the Mongols transmitted plague
b. siege of Kaffa
3. multiple sources of entry
C. Disagreement over mortality rates
1. chroniclers' estimates of mortality are notoriously unreliable
2. historians have been reluctant to believe claims that the plague wiped
out half or more of the population where it struck
a. In China, too little work has been done on the demographic
impact of plagues to make firm assertions, but there seems
little doubt that the population of the empire fell
3. verifiable evidence bears out some of the most shocking assessments
a. records from northern England suggest the first visitation of
plague killed 40 percent of clergy of the archdiocese of York
b. plague spread along the coast of North Africa, causing, so
people claimed, 1,000 deaths a day at its height in Tunis, and
reaching Morocco
c. Arab sources reported that many steppeland dynasties and
Mongol warriors succumbed