The worst pandemic which changed the course of history of law

pandemic coronavirus COVID-19 may not be the worst pandemic ever disseminated. Europe in general and England in particular witnessed another pandemic from the mid-twelfth century until the beginning of the thirteenth century, which formed a spectacular turning point in many well-established legal relations , and changed the then-economic equation prevalent in Europe and England at that time. This pandemic was embodied by the "plague", and also called as the "black death", the wide-spread dissemination of which changed the course of history of law. It is common knowledge that the balance of power, both from the legal and economic viewpoint, was in favor of the feudalism, or the feudal class represented by lords, barons and landlords. At the expense of the majority of the population, which were living in a very bad economic and health conditions, caused by their subjection to the terrible "3Ds" motto, that is to say "destitution, disease, death". even the civil liberties included in the "Magna Carta" issued in 1215 came in favor of the feudalism. But suddenly, a pandemic called the "black death" infested almost all the European continent, as well as England in 1348, causing a high percentage of mortality, and rising the death toll in Europe roughly to the third of the total population. This "black death" represented by the plague decimated the majority of the destitute labor force, especially the peasantry labor force. Previously suffering from bad living conditions. This formed a spectacular turning point in the history of law, and broke the monopoly of the feudalism on control of land and ownership. Therefore the equilibrium of the power turned upside down in the favor of the peasantry labor force, owing to the decimation of the majority of workers and farmers. From the legal viewpoint this drastic change in the equilibrium of the power led to the appearance of two important legal tools, The first is the negotiations made between landlords and peasants. the second are the contracts concluded between them. When the negotiations set out between these two different social classes, that is to say, the feudal class and the peasantry, the equality in the bargaining power had been realized. As far as the contracts concluded between the feudal class and the peasantry are concerned, two types of indispensable contracts had been concluded: the contract of the lease of land and the contract of employment. The supply and demand rule had changed in favor of the peasantry class as a result of decimation of the majority of workers by the plague, the demand increased suddenly and surprisingly at the expense of the supply of the labor force. This forced the feudal class to conclude negotiations with the peasantry, and recognized for the first time the equality in the bargaining power with them. This drastic change in the supply and demand rule made it also necessary to conclude two important contracts: the contract of the lease of land and the contract of employment. One of the most significant changes taking place, was the abolishment of the serfdom. Therefore, the legal character of the serf has been changed into tenants of the land. This enabled them to conclude contracts of the lease of land with landlords, to hire farm lands, rather than serving as forced labor. This type of contracts included two important contractual terms as to subject-matter of the contract: the first was the money rent payment delivered by new tenants instead of being subordinated to forced labor. The second was that the landlords agreed to receive payments in rem from the peasantry, if the payments in kind were not available. It should also be noted that royal courts decided, more frequently than not, in favor of the tenants at any time disputes arose between them and landlords. This had been interpreted as a clear-cut bias towards the peasantry, thanks to their ever-increasing social and economic powers. As a result of manumission from serfdom, there were dire needs for the conclusion of the contract of employment between owners of the production means and workers emancipated from serfdom, to work in return for wages, rather than being forced to serve forced labor. At the end of this brief article, we can make a comparison between that pandemic befalling Europe in the mid-twelfth century and the current pandemic coronavirus COVID-19. From a legal viewpoint. While "black death" pandemic has had an important legal consequence, represented by the both the contract of the lease of land and the contract of employment, as a result of the abolishment of serfdom. The pandemic coronavirus COVID-19 has created other legal effect s in the field of bankruptcy and the merger of commercial companies. This means that the ratio of unemployment will increase as a consequence of turn towards the highly-automated production, and the robotization of the production systems.