Plague pamphlet. Title page to the 17th-century pamphlet 'The Countrie Ague' (1626), showing the seven gates to the City of London (Ludgate, Newgate, Aldrichgate, Cripplegate, Moorgate, Bishopsgate, and Aldgate). The sub-title of this work, by Henry Petowe, is 'London her Welcome home to her retired children'. Petowe wrote several works on the plague (the Black Death) and its effects on London. This pandemic, thought to be bubonic plague, affected Europe throughout the 14th to 17th centuries, killing tens of thousands even in the smaller outbreaks.