First plague pandemic

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This article is about the series of outbreaks of plague, 541–767. For the first episode of the First Plague Pandemic, 541–549, see Plague of Justinian.

The first plague pandemic was the first historically recorded Old World pandemic of plague, the contagious disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis. Also called the early medieval pandemic, it began with the Plague of Justinian in 541 and continued until 750 or 767; at least fifteen or eighteen major waves of plague following the Justinianic plague have been identified from historical records.[1][2][3] The pandemic affected the Mediterranean Basin most severely and most frequently, but also infected the Near East and Northern Europe,[4] and potentially East Asia as well.[5] The Roman emperor Justinian I's name is sometimes applied to the whole series of plague epidemics in late Antiquity.

The pandemic is best known from its first and last outbreaks: the Justinianic Plague of 541–549, described by the contemporary Roman historian

divine punishment for human misdeeds.[4]

Terminology

While

Byzantine Greek texts treated the disease as a generic pestilence (Ancient Greek: λοιμός, romanized: loimós, Latin: plaga), only later did Arabic writers term the condition ṭāʿūn (to some extent interchangeable with wabāʾ, 'plague').[4][6]

In

AG 854 (AD 542/3).[7]

Plague in Africa and South Arabia

Several sources attest the plague's origins in Africa. According to

Himyar (Yemen). An inscription dated to 543 records how Abraha, the Ethiopian ruler of Himyar, repaired the Maʾrib dam after sickness and death had struck the local community. The Chronicle of Seert records that Aksum (al-Habasha) was hit by the pandemic.[7]

Early Arabic sources record that plague was endemic in Nubia and Abyssinia.

commercial links with India or in growing Roman religious links with Nubia and Aksum.[9] A link with India is rendered less likely by the fact that the plague arrived in the Roman Empire before arriving in Persia or China, which had closer links with India. According to Peter Sarris, the "geopolitical context of the early sixth century," with an Aksumite–Roman alliance against Himyar and Persia, "was arguably the crucial prerequisite for the transmission of the plague from Africa to Byzantium."[8]

Plague of Justinian (541–549)

Main articles: Plague of Justinian and Plague of Mohill

Plagues in Francia (541–)

According to the

Kingdom of the Franks after the Justinianic Plague struck Arelate (Arles) and the surrounding region in the late 540s.[10] Various portents were witnessed and to expiate them the inhabitants of affected areas resorted to processions, prayers, and vigils.[10]

Gregory records an epidemic in 571 in the Auvergne and in the cities of Divio (Dijon), Avaricum (Bourges), Cabillonum (Chalon-sur-Saône), and Lugdunum (Lyon).[10] Gregory's description of the plague as causing wounds in the armpit or groin that he described as resembling snakebite and of patients dying delirious within two or three days allow identification of the disease as bubonic plague; the "wounds" are the characteristic buboes.[10]

In 582 Gregory of Tours reports an epidemic in Narbo Martius (Narbonne). According to him, the majority of the townsfolk at Albi in 584 died of an outbreak of plague.[10]

Massilia (Marseille) was hit by plague in 588; there the king Guntram of Francia recommended a strict diet of barley bread and water.[10] Gregory blames a ship arriving from Hispania for being the source of the contagion, and the epidemic recurred several times thereafter.[10]

In 590 Gregory records another plague epidemic at Vivarium (Viviers) and at Avenio (Avignon) at the same time as the plague broke out in Rome under Pope Pelagius II.[10]

Plague of Rome (590–)

Main article: Roman Plague of 590

Plague of Sheroe (627–628)

Main article: Plague of Sheroe

Plague of Amwas (638–639)

Main article: Plague of Amwas

Plague of 664

Main article: Plague of 664

Plagues of 698–701 and of 746–747

These plagues affected the Byzantine Empire, West Asia, Syria, and Mesopotamia[11] and the Byzantine Empire, West Asia, and Africa[12] respectively.

Possible occurrences in China

In 610, Chao Yuanfang mentioned an endemic plague of "malignant bubo" described as "coming on abruptly with high fever together with the appearance of a bundle of nodes beneath the tissue."[13] Sun Simo, who died in 652, also mentioned a "malignant bubo" and plague that was common in Lingnan (Guangdong). Ole Benedictow posits that it was an offshoot of the first plague pandemic that reached Chinese territory around 600.[5]

Consequences

The historian Lester Little suggests that just as the Black Death led to the near disappearance of serfdom in western Europe, the first pandemic resulted in the end of ancient slavery, at least in Italy and Spain.[14] A 2019 study, however, suggests that the first plague pandemic was not a major cause of the demographic, economic, political, and social changes across Europe and the Near East from the 6th to 8th centuries AD and that upper estimates of the pandemic's mortality are unsupported by historical, archaeological, genetic, and palynological evidence.[15]

References

  1. S2CID 221882331
    .
  2. ISBN 978-0-19-866262-4
    , retrieved 2020-05-16, The first - called the Plague of Justinian and described by Procopius - spread through Europe and Asia Minor from Egypt in 541 and included fifteen epidemics until 767
  3. ISBN 978-0-19-866277-8
    , retrieved 2020-05-16, bubonic plague that began in 541 and returned in some eighteen waves (approximately one every twelve years) until 750
  4. ^
    ISBN 978-0-19-866277-8
    , retrieved 2020-05-16
  5. ^
    ISBN 9781783275168
    .
  6. ^ Van Den Bossche, Gowaart (22 April 2020). "Contagion in the Corpus: The Black Death and Where to Find It". kitab-project.org. Archived from the original on 11 August 2020. Retrieved 16 May 2020.
  7. ^ a b Michael G. Morony (2007), "'For Whom Does the Writer Write?': The First Bubonic Plague Pandemic According to Syriac Sources", in Lester K. Little (ed.), Plague and the End of Antiquity: The Pandemic of 541–750, Cambridge University Press, pp. 59–86, at 61–63.
  8. ^ a b 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.
  9. ^ 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.
  10. ^
    ISBN 978-1-4381-2923-5
    .
  11. ISBN 978-0-521-84639-4
    .
  12. S2CID 153709117
    .
  13. ISBN 9781843832140
    .
  14. ISBN 978-0-521-84639-4
    .
  15. PMID 31792176
    .

Sources

Further reading
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