A characteristic ofYersinia pestis infection isnecrosis of the hand. (photo from 1975 plague victim)A map of theByzantine Empire in 550 (a decade after the Plague of Justinian) with Justinian's conquests shown in green
Theplague of Justinian orJustinianic plague (AD 541–549) was anepidemic ofplague that afflicted the entireMediterranean Basin, Europe, and theNear East, especially theSasanian Empire and theByzantine Empire.[1][2][3] The plague is named for the Byzantine EmperorJustinian I (r. 527–565) who, according to hiscourt historianProcopius, contracted the disease and recovered in 542, at the height of the epidemic which killed about a fifth of the population in the imperial capitalConstantinople.[1][2] The contagion arrived inRoman Egypt in 541, spread around the Mediterranean Sea until 544, and persisted inNorthern Europe and theArabian Peninsula until 549. By 543, the plague had spread to every corner of Justinian's empire.[4][1]
The plague's severity and impact remain debated.[5] Some scholars assert that as the first episode of thefirst plague pandemic, it had profound economic, social, and political effects across Europe and the Near East and cultural and religious impact on Eastern Roman society.[6]However, scholars such as Mordechai and Eisenberg have argued that the Plague of Justinian was overstated byprimary sources and while would have been incredibly impactful on a personal level, did not have a severe or even a long lasting impact on the population of the Mediterranean in the Age of Justinian.[7]
In 2013, researchers confirmed earlier speculation[8] that the cause of the plague of Justinian wasYersinia pestis, the same bacterium responsible for theBlack Death (1346–1353).[9] Ancient and modernYersinia pestisstrains are closely related to the ancestor of the Justinian plague strain that has been found in theTian Shan, a system of mountain ranges on the borders ofKyrgyzstan,Kazakhstan, andChina, suggesting that the Justinian plague originated in or near that region.[10][11] However, there would appear to be no mention of bubonic plague in China until the year 610.[12]
Incompletebasilica inPhilippi; its construction is believed to have been halted by the plague of Justinian.
The Byzantine historianProcopius first reported the epidemic in 541 from the port ofPelusium, nearSuez in Egypt.[13] Two other first-hand reports of the plague's ravages were by theSyriac church historianJohn of Ephesus[14] and byEvagrius Scholasticus, who was a child inAntioch at the time and later became a church historian. Evagrius was afflicted with thebuboes associated with the disease, but survived. During the disease's four returns in his lifetime, he lost his wife, a daughter and her child, other children, most of his servants, and people from his country estate.[15]
According to contemporary sources, the outbreak inConstantinople was thought to have been carried to the city by infected rats on grain ships arriving from Egypt.[13][16] The Romans in Byzantium imported a significant amount of grain from Egypt, where rats and fleas potentially affected byy. pestis were a significant pest control issue.[17]
Procopius, in a passage closely modelled onThucydides, recorded that at its peak the plague was killing 10,000 people in Constantinople daily,[18] but the accuracy of the figure is in question, and the true number will probably never be known. He noted that because there was no room to bury the dead, bodies were left stacked in the open, funeral rites were often left unattended to, and the entire city smelled like the dead.[19] Given such circumstances, it is highly probable that a sudden increase in mortality rates may not have been as accurately recorded, hence why the overall death toll is based on an estimate.[20]
In Procopius'Secret History, he records the devastation in the countryside and reports the ruthless response by the hard-pressed Justinian:
When pestilence swept through the whole known world and notably the Roman Empire, wiping out most of the farming community and of necessity leaving a trail of desolation in its wake, Justinian showed no mercy towards the ruined freeholders. Even then, he did not refrain from demanding the annual tax, not only the amount at which he assessed each individual, but also the amount for which his deceased neighbors were liable.[21]
As a result of the plague in the countryside, farmers could not take care of crops and the price of grain rose in Constantinople. Justinian had expended huge amounts of money for wars against theVandals in the region ofCarthage and against theOstrogoths'kingdom in Italy. He had invested heavily in the construction of great churches, such asHagia Sophia. As the empire tried to fund the projects, the plague caused tax revenues to decline through the massive number of deaths and the disruption of agriculture and trade. Justinian swiftly enacted new legislation to deal more efficiently with the glut of inheritance suits being brought as a result of victims dyingintestate.[22]
The plague's long-term effects on European andChristian history were enormous. As the disease spread to port cities around the Mediterranean, the strugglingGoths were reinvigorated andtheir conflict with Constantinople entered a new phase. The plague weakened the Byzantine Empire at a critical point, when Justinian's armies had nearly retaken all of Italy and the western Mediterranean coast; the evolving conquest would have reunited the core of theWestern Roman Empire with theEastern Roman Empire. Although the conquest occurred in 554, the reunification did not last long. In 568, theLombards invadedNorthern Italy, defeated the small Byzantine army that had been left behind and established theKingdom of the Lombards.[13][23]
Gaul is known to have suffered severely from the plague,[24] and plague victims at an early Anglo-Saxon burial site at Edix Hill nearCambridge show that it also reached Britain.[25]
Procopius said that plague sufferers experienced delusions, nightmares, fevers, swellings in the groin, armpits and behind the ears, and coma or death.[26] Treatments included cold baths, powders "blessed" by saints, magicamulets or rings, and various drugs, especiallyalkaloids.[27] When these treatments failed, people went to hospitals or tried toquarantine themselves.[28]
The Plague of Justinian is the first and the best known outbreak of the first plague pandemic, which continued to recur until the middle of the 8th century.[1][29] Some historians believe the first plague pandemic was one of thedeadliest pandemics in history, resulting in the deaths of an estimated 15 to 100 million people during two centuries of recurrence, a death toll equivalent to 25 to 60% of Europe's population at the time of the first outbreak.[30][31][32] Research published in 2019 argued that the 200-year-long pandemic's death toll and social effects have been exaggerated, comparing it to the modernthird plague pandemic (1855–1960s).[30][33] Furthermore, some historians argue that the eyewitness accounts of the disease are hysterical in tone and therefore misleading.[34]
The plague of Justinian is generally regarded as the first historically recorded epidemic ofYersinia pestis.[35][36] This conclusion is based on historical descriptions of the clinical manifestations of the disease[37] and the detection ofY. pestisDNA from human remains at ancient grave sites dated to that period.[38][39]
Genetic studies of modern and ancientYersinia pestis DNA suggest that the origin of the Justinian plague was inCentral Asia. The mostbasal, or root level, existing strains of theYersinia pestis as a whole species are found inQinghai, China.[40] Other scholars contest that, rather than Central Asia, the specific strain that composed the Justinian plague began in sub-Saharan Africa, and that the plague was spread to the Mediterranean by merchants from theKingdom of Aksum inEast Africa. This point of origin aligns more with the general south–north spread of the disease from Egypt into the rest of the Mediterranean world. It also explains whySassanid Persia saw a later development of the outbreak despite stronger trade links with Central Asia.[41][42][43][44] After samples of DNA fromYersinia pestis were isolated from skeletons of Justinian plague victims in Germany,[45] it was found that modern strains currently found in theTian Shan mountain range system are most basal known in comparison with the Justinian plague strain.[10] Additionally, a skeleton found in Tian Shan dating to around 180 AD and identified as an "early Hun" was found to contain DNA fromYersinia pestis closely related to the Tian Shan strain basal ancestor of the Justinian plague strain German samples.[11] This finding suggests that the expansion of nomadic peoples who moved across theEurasian steppe, such as theXiongnu and the laterHuns, had a role in spreading plague to West Eurasia from an origin in Central Asia.[11]
Earlier samples ofYersinia pestis DNA have been found in skeletons dating from 3000 to 800 BC, across West and East Eurasia.[46] The strain ofYersinia pestis responsible for theBlack Death, the devastating pandemic ofbubonic plague, does not appear to be a direct descendant of the Justinian plague strain. However, the spread of Justinian plague may have caused theevolutionary radiation that gave rise to the currently extant 0ANT.1clade of strains.[47][48]
The mortality rate is uncertain and remains heavily debated. Some modern scholars believe that the plague killed up to 5,000 people per day in Constantinople at the peak of the pandemic.[33] According to one view, the initial plague ultimately killed perhaps 40% of the city's inhabitants and caused the deaths of up to a quarter of the human population of theEastern Mediterranean.[49] Frequent subsequent waves of the plague continued to strike throughout the 6th, 7th and 8th centuries, with the disease becoming more localized and less virulent.[citation needed]
Revisionist views suggest that the mortality of the Justinian Plague was far lower than previously believed. Lee Mordechai and Merle Eisenberg argue that the plague might have caused high mortality in specific places, but it did not cause widespread demographic decline or decimate Mediterranean populations. Therefore, any direct mid-to-long term effects of plague were minor.[33] However,Peter Sarris criticizes their methodology and source handling, and provides a discussion of the genetic evidence, including the suggestion that the plague may have entered Western Eurasia via more than one route, and perhaps struck England before Constantinople.[25] On the other hand, Haggai Olshanetsky and Lev Cosijns reassert the view that the plague had a limited impact, as various archaeological evidence indicates there was no demographic or economic decline in the 6th century Eastern Mediterranean.[50]
According to 2024 research, major plagues that significantly impacted theRoman Empire, such as theAntonine Plague, thePlague of Cyprian, and the Plague of Justinian, are strongly linked to periods of cooler and drier climate conditions, indicating that colder weather may have contributed to the spread of these diseases during that time. It is thought that climate stress interacted with social and biological variables, such as food availability, rodent populations, and human migration, making populations more susceptible to disease.[51][52]
^Floor, Willem (2018).Studies in the History of Medicine in Iran. Costa Mesa, California: Mazda Publishers. p. 3.ISBN978-1-933823-94-2.The Justinian plague (bubonic plague) also attacked the Sasanian lands.
^Meier, Mischa (August 2016). "The Justianic Plague: The economic consequences of the pandemic in the Eastern Roman empire and its cultural and religious effects".Early Medieval Europe.24 (3):267–292.doi:10.1111/emed.12152.S2CID163966072.
^Mordechai, Lee; Eisenberg, Merle (2019). "Rejecting Catastrophe: The Case of the Justinianic Plague".Past & Present.244 (1):3–50.doi:10.1093/pastj/gtz009.
^Retief, F. P.; Cilliers (2005). "The epidemic of Justinian (AD 542: a prelude to the Middle Ages".Acta Theologica.7:115–127.doi:10.38140/at.v0i7.2084.
^Eisenberg, Merle; Mordechai, Lee (December 2020). "The Justinianic Plague and Global Pandemics: The Making of the Plague Concept".The American Historical Review.125 (5):1632–1667.doi:10.1093/ahr/rhaa510.
^Procopius, History of the Wars, 7 Vols., trans. H. B. Dewing, Loeb Library of the Greek and Roman Classics, (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1914), Vol. I, pp. 451–473.
^Wiechmann I, Grupe G. Detection of Yersinia pestis DNA in two early medieval skeletal finds from Aschheim (Upper Bavaria, 6th century A.D.)"Am J Phys Anthropol 2005 Jan;126(1) 48–55
^Peter Sarris (2007), "Bubonic Plague in Byzantium: The Evidence of Non-Literary Sources", in Lester K. Little (ed.),Plague and the End of Antiquity: The Pandemic of 541–750, Cambridge University Press, pp. 119–132, at 121–123
^Michael McCormick (2007), "Toward a Molecular History of the Justinianic Pandemic", in Lester K. Little (ed.),Plague and the End of Antiquity: The Pandemic of 541–750, Cambridge University Press, pp. 290–312, at 303–304.
^Wagner, David M.; et al. (April 2014). "Yersinia pestis and the Plague of Justinian 541–543 AD: a genomic analysis".The Lancet.14 (4):319–326.doi:10.1016/S1473-3099(13)70323-2.PMID24480148.
^Cyril A. Mango (1980).Byzantium: The Empire of New Rome. emphasizes the demographic effects;Mark Whittow (1990). "Ruling the late Roman and Byzantine city".Past and Present (33). argues against too great reliance on literary sources.
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