The Plague Didn't Start When and How You Probably Think It Did - The Daily Beast

Infectious diseases, on the other hand, rarely leave evidence in our bones so it’s difficult to determine cause of death from looking at a skeleton (the exceptions to this rule include tuberculosis and leprosy).

She discovered a text by a Persian physician al-Shirazi that included the seemingly trivial detail that Hulagu was importing millet grown in the foothills of the Tian Shan mountains.

In describing the significance of this kind of this research Professor Peter Sarris, a historian at the University of Cambridge and author of the forthcoming book Justinian—Emperor, Soldier, Saint, told me that paleogenetics “has put to rest a long-drawn out debate over the nature of the [Black Death] and whether it was bubonic plague.”

Well, according to the narrative supplied by Byzantine court historian Procopius, and that forms the basis for many modern histories, the plague of Justinian emerged in the middle of the sixth century and spread from Egypt up through the Mediterranean to the capital of the Empire—Constantinople.

“The probable dating of the Edix Hill burial site,” writes Sarris “suggested that the plague may have arrived in England a good century before it was attested in any written source for Britain.

If climate change, volcanic eruptions, and dust veils can hasten the spread of disease, we probably have to pay attention to how we treat our planet—or at least the rodents scurrying beneath our feet.