September 1, 1347

Black Death in France

Black Death outbreak recognized at Marseille

One calendar label hides three different moments: a ship docking, weeks of silent transmission, and the day a city finally realized what was happening to it.

Not 1 September

No consulted scholarly source supports 1 September 1347 as the date plague arrived at Marseille. A Marseille chronicle — the annals of Saint-Victor — places the outbreak's beginning around All Saints' Day, 1 November 1347.

Modern reconstructions accordingly put the recognized outbreak around 1 November, or more conservatively by November of that year. Other scholarship has placed the arrival as late as January 1348.

Working backwards from the dead

Ole Benedictow reads recognition on 1 November as evidence that an infected ship from the Genoese network had contaminated the city roughly seven weeks earlier, before mid-September.

On that reading, 1 November is probably not a literal ship-arrival date. On Benedictow's reconstruction it marks recognition of the outbreak or the beginning of visible mortality, not secure documentation of a plague ship docking that morning.

An Angevin port, not yet French

Marseille was geographically in what is now France but politically belonged to the Angevin County of Provence; it joined the French crown only in the late fifteenth century.

Once established the city became a major Mediterranean epidemic focus, spreading plague through Provence and along coastal, river and overland connections. Before the end of 1347 plague was present elsewhere in Provence and on Corsica, and it reached further southern French regions during 1348.

Sources

Researched 23 Aug 2026 7 sources 2 audit passes Date disputed

How this was checked

Researched from the web into a fact sheet, rewritten from that sheet, then audited against it by a different model. How the pipeline works →

Date disputed. Sources disagree; the research places it at ~1347-11-01.

What the sources leave uncertain

Sources distinguish among a ship’s arrival, initial hidden transmission and public recognition of an epidemic. These were not necessarily the same date.
One scholarly tradition dates the outbreak to All Saints’ Day, 1 November 1347; other scholarship has placed Marseille’s arrival as late as January 1348.
No consulted scholarly source supports 1 September 1347 as the exact arrival date.
Marseille was geographically in present-day France but politically belonged to the Angevin County of Provence; it did not join the French crown until the late fifteenth century.