the black death. it is known, however, that the sultan of delhi recruited many mercenaries from central asia in to his army, and since the black death is known to have been present in central asia, it is considered theoretically possible that the plague could have been carried to india by them. whether the black death occurred in india is not known, but it is regarded as a possibility and a possible contributor to the sudden decrease in power and expansion of the delhi sultanate in this time period. european outbreak the black death rapidly spread along the major european sea and land trade routes in 1345 the mongols under khan jani berg of the golden horde besieged caffa. suffering from an outbreak of black plague, the mongols placed plague-infected corpses in catapults and threw them into the city. in october 1347, a fleet of genoese trading ships fleeing caffa reached the port of messina in sicily. by the time the fleet reached messina, all the crew members were either infected or dead. it is presumed that the ships also carried infected rats and/or fleas. some ships were found grounded on shorelines, with no one aboard remaining alive. looting of these lost ships also helped spread the disease. from there, the plague spread to genoa and venice by the turn of 1347–1348, spreading across italy. from italy the disease spread northwest across europe, striking france, the crown of aragon, the crown of castile, portugal and england by june 1348, then turned and spread east through germany and scandinavia from 1348 to 1350. it was introduced in norway in 1349 when a ship landed at askøy, then proceeded to spread to bjørgvin (modern bergen). from norway it continued to sweden, by which point it had already spread around denmark. finally it spread to north-eastern russia in 1351; however, the plague largely spared some parts of europe, including the kingdom of poland, isolated parts of belgium and the netherlands, milan and the modern-day france-spain border. at siena, agnolo di tura wrote: "they died by the hundreds, both day and night, and all were thrown in ... ditches and covered with earth. and as soon as those ditches were filled, more were dug. and i, agnolo di tura … buried my five children with my own hands … and so many died that all believed it was the end of the world." middle eastern outbreak