Ancient plauges

cross posted from my main blog


right now I'm listening to The-Fate-of-Rome-Climate-Disease-and-the-End-of-an-Empire on Scribd.

Scary.

The theory is that various plagues resulted in depopulation in the Roman empire, and the climate variations (volcanic?) caused famines.

Plagues that weakened Rome includes the Antonine plague (? Measles? Smallpox?) and the plague of Cyprian.(measles? Smallpox? a viral Hemorrhagic fever?)

Measles can be very serious in malnourished people and in adults, and can kill even today. But it may have mutated to be less severe with time. Measles was first described by a Persian physician in the 9th century, but some historians wonder if it mutated (from Rinderpest of cattle or distemper in dogs) long before then.

Ancient mummies howeveer do show evidence of smallpox scars, so we know that disease has been around for quite awhile.

Cyprian's plague was blamed on that diabolic sect the Christians (/s) but one wonders if the custom of Christians for careing for the poor and sick might have resulted in converts too. No data on this: Just wondering.

Wikipedia on the Diseases of Rome. Don't forget Malaria, which was more widespread in "temperate" climates than most moderns realize.

from the article: Mapping smallpox, malaria and Leprosy:

Malaria deaths in the United States, 1870 census.

But the really big plague that probably stopped the swift recovery of the western Roman empire was the plauge of Justinian.

Justinian's plague was probably Bubonic plague, and began in Egypt/Ethiopia, although the black death probably started in China.
The germ does hide in various little critters: Gerbils, rats, etc.
So IHS docs would see a couple cases a year in the Navajo reservation, and there are spotted reports about cases in Islamic terrorists catching it probably from living in dirty caves.

DNA studies suggest that it was around in the silk road area long before then,

from Nature

and SciAm wonders if this might have encouraged locals to migrate to safer pastures (i.e. to Europe and India). But DNA suggests that this strain was a lot less infectious.

But the analysis revealed that plague might have been less transmissible in the early Bronze Age. The six oldest Bronze Age strains lacked a gene called ymt that helps Y. pestis to colonize the guts of fleas, which serve as an important intermediary. In outbreaks of bubonic plague, infected fleas (often travelling on rodents) transmit the bacteria to humans living nearby. Without fleas as a go-between, Y. pestis spreads much less efficiently through blood (where it is known as septicaemic plague) or saliva droplets (pneumonic plague).

yet one does wonder what was behind a lot of bronze age plagues in the Middle East.


and one wonders if this is what hit the Philistines after they stole the Arc of the Covenant ("Hemorrhoids" is the usual translation.) and if this might have been the plague that devestated the Hittites after they went against Egypt in the Battle of Kadesh and took home some POWs as slave (and the plague followed them).

but this article claims it was the Hittites who spread Tularemia via infected sheep and they caught it too. UKTelegraph article:

The method of attack was simple. The Hittites would leave the sheep outside the targeted city. Locals would bring them in and either breed them or eat them, spreading the disease.

and this article suggests it was Tularemia that hit the Philistines too.

Global Security has a history of the use of Tularemia as biowarfare, and mentions the debate if the Tularemia in German troops at Stalingrad was biowarfare or just from normal infections. Discussion here.

Tularemia makes one sick for a couple of weeks, and has a low (under 20percent) mortality, and luckily for modern man, responds to antibiotics.

whereas Y.Pestic (black plague) works quite quickly to kill you.

more on Justinian plague here.