"It was filled within days—hundreds of bodies. There's no ceremony, there's no grave goods. It's a bare minimum to get the bodies disposed of and away from the city. The city, unable to manage the dead and dying, converted those workshops into a mass grave."
"According to Jiang's earlier work, plague microbes isolated from the bodies at Jerash were extremely similar—suggesting that the bacteria was highly contagious, spread rapidly and claimed its victims quickly, before it had a chance to mutate significantly. All of the victims found were killed by a single strain."
"I did not know that so far back, a single strain of plague can spread so fast and kill so many. The Plague of Justinian began around 541 and killed tens of millions of people across the Mediterranean Basin, West Asia and Northern Europe from roughly 541 to 750."
In the 7th century, the Plague of Justinian devastated Jerash, a walled city in modern-day Jordan situated on a major trade route. Ceramicists abandoned their workshops under the Hippodrome, leaving unfired pottery as they fled. Hundreds of bodies were hastily deposited in these workshops, converted into mass graves with no ceremony or grave goods. A research team led by geneticist Rays Jiang analyzed remains from this site, discovering that all victims were killed by a single strain of Yersinia Pestis—the same bacterium responsible for the Black Death centuries later. The extreme similarity of plague microbes isolated from the bodies indicates the bacteria was highly contagious, spread rapidly, and killed victims quickly before significant mutation could occur. This pandemic, lasting from roughly 541 to 750, killed tens of millions across the Mediterranean Basin, West Asia, and Northern Europe.
#plague-of-justinian #yersinia-pestis #ancient-pandemics #archeological-genetics #7th-century-jerash
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