The plague in Tournai New light on the

The plague in Tournai New light on the Black Death London plague burials Fundación Ramón Areces Bruce M. S. Campbell Professor of Medieval Economic History, Y. Pestis phylogenetic tree The Queen’s University of Belfast b. m. campbell@qub. ac. uk

Today, plague is a global disease with 1, 000 -2, 000 cases a year reported to the World Health Organisation. Plague cases and deaths are both greatest in sub. Saharan Africa. August 2013): WORLD NEWS ( ue in g la p f o s ie d n a m 15 -year old herds sta. Nn. E. ry. Og. Ry. Lz. D KW WS (July 2014): Chinese city of Y umen sealed of f after a man contracts plagu e from an infect ed marmot and dies. 5): 1 0 2 y r a u n a J ( S WORLD NEW n i 4 1 0 2 n i s h t a 40 plague de Madagascar!

Today, plague is a global disease with 1, 000 -2, 000 cases a year reported to the World Health Organisation. Plague cases and deaths are both greatest in sub. Saharan Africa. Fear of plague derives from history’s 3 great pandemics: q AD 541: First Pandemic (Justinianic Plague) – devastated the Byzantine Empire. q 1346: Second Pandemic (Black Death) – spread throughout the Known World and killed 30%40% of a European population of c. 80 million (2432 m. ). q 1855: Third Pandemic – broke out in Yunnan Province of China; spread worldwide; the first to be medically analysed and diagnosed.

The impact of the Black Death and its sequel plagues upon European populations was massive and long lasting: 125 Indexed population (100 = AD 1300) 100 75 50 Europe (100 = 79 m) 25 England (100 = 4. 75 m) Italy north-centre (100 = 7. 75 m) 0 1250 1300 1350 Decades 1400 1450 1500

Economic output also contracted almost everywhere, as plague killed both producers and 140 consumers: Indexed GDP (100 = mean 1340 s) England Italy 120 Spain 100 80 60 40 1300 1350 1400 Quinquennia 1450

GDP per head (100 = mean 1310 s-1340 s) In terms of GDP per head, loss of numbers proved to be beneficial for England Holland, a mixed blessing for Italy, and a significant setback for Spain: 175 150 125 100 75 Indexed GDP per head England Spain Italy Holland 50 1300 1350 1400 Decades 1450

In England the sudden scarcity of labour triggered the single greatest inflation in labourers’ daily wage rates on historical record. 200 Black Death Nominal wages of farm workers as % of previous 31 years (source: Gregory Clark) % wage 175 Napoleonic Wars Tudor price inflation 150 125 100 75 Reformation 50 1250 1350 1450 1550 Years 1650 1750 1850

In Siena work on the vast new nave being added to the cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta was abandoned and never resumed.

In Siena work on the vast new nave being added to the cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta was abandoned and never resumed. In neighbouring Florence, work on Giotto’s new Campanile was suspended at the second stage and only resumed after an

q Construction activity almost ceased. q Farmland was abandoned. 60 Indexed wage / Cumulative start dates Across Europe woodland regenerated as: 50 40 30 20 PRE-PLAGUE POST-PLAGUE Irish Net cumulative total oaks started English Real farm wage rate (5 yr m. a. ) 10 0 1300 -10 1325 DEPLETION 1350 1375 REGENERATION

Epidemiologically, demographically, environmentally, economically and culturally, the Black Death was a watershed historical event. What disease was it?

The list of suspects has included: q bubonic plague (Shrewsbury, 1971, and many others) q anthrax (Twigg, 1984) q a viral haemorrhagic fever (Scott & Duncan, 2001) q a now extinct disease (Cohn, 2002) q biological fallout from an extraterrestrial impact in Jan. 1348 (Baillie, 2006) q something else entirely. . .

PNAS Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America November 2000, Volume 97, no. 23, pp. 12800 -12803. e v i t a t n s i e s c e e r r imp conta nrep u mina e ted Claimed to have identified the DNA of Yersinia pestis (bubonic plague) in the dental pulp of medieval plague burials at Montpellier in southern France. The f fore irst n evid sic ence

October 7, 2010 STOP PRESS a. DNA analysis proves the Black Death was vector-borne Yersinia Pestis after all!

Since 2010 confirmation that the Black Death was indeed bubonic plague, i. e. Yersinia pestis, has come from a. DNA analysis of dental remains from datable 14 th-century plague burials in 5 Western European countries: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. France (Saint Laurent-de-la-Cabrerisse) Italy (Parma & Venice) Southern Germany (Augsburg) The Netherlands (Bergen op Zoom) England (Hereford and East Smithfield, London). A Rapid Diagnostic Test has yielded complementary results. Crucially, these a. DNA results have been obtained in separate laboratories by independent teams of

Meanwhile, a 23 -strong team of biologists & geneticists has reconstructed the Yersinia pestis phylogenetic tree: Giovanna Morelli and 22 others (2010), ‘Yersinia pestis genome sequencing identifies patterns of global phylogenetic diversity’, Nature Genetics 42 (12), 1140 -43.

This has since been amplified and redefined in a key paper by Yujun Cui and 32 others to show where the Black Death genomes fit in: ‘Population structure of Y. pestis revealed by core genome SNP analysis’, PNAS 110 (2), 2013, 577 -82.

Genetic reconstruction has yielded the following key conclusions: 1. Y. pestis evolves clonally; small mutations 2. 3. 4. 5. differentiate plague’s different branches (polytomies) and strains. Fresh polytomies are prone to emerge during major epizootics/panzootics. Almost all strains are capable of infecting and killing humans. There is nothing to suggest that the genomes responsible for the Black Death were more dangerous than any others. The 1 st and 2 nd Pandemics arose from different crossovers of the pathogen from animals to

Genetic reconstruction has yielded the following key conclusions: 6. The plague genome embodies its own evolutionary history and pattern of spread. 7. Individual strains tend to be country-specific. 8. Regions where plague has existed longest tend to exhibit the greatest genomic diversity and the presence of the earliest genotypes.

Genetic reconstruction has yielded the The Qinghai-Tibet Plateau of Western China following key conclusions: 6. The plague genome embodies its own evolutionary history and pattern of spread. 7. Individual strains tend to be country-specific. 8. Regions where plague has existed longest tend to exhibit the greatest genomic diversity and the presence of the earliest genotypes. 9. Geographically, the semi-arid Qinghai-Tibet Plateau of Western China appears to have been the ultimate origin of the Black Death.

Genetic reconstruction has yielded the following key conclusions: 6. c. 1268/1282 The plague genome embodies its own evolutionary history and pattern of spread. 7. Individual strains tend to be country-specific. 8. Regions where plague has existed longest tend to exhibit the greatest genomic diversity and the presence of the earliest genotypes. 9. Geographically, the semi-arid Qinghai-Tibet Plateau of Western China appears to have been the ultimate origin of the Black Death. 10. Temporally, the Black Death genome emerged during a biological ‘big bang’ shortly after 1268 (Cui and others, 2013) or 1282 (Bos and

Qinghai-Tibet is one of several regions where permanent (enzootic) reservoirs of plague exist among groundburrowing and hibernating sylvatic rodents, in this case great gerbils :

The plague cycle: The transformation of plague from an enzootic disease among maintenance hosts of wildrodents to a fastspreading and deadly human pandemic entailed at least 4,

1 The plague cycle: Stage 1 – enzootic plague

2 The plague cycle: Stage 2 – epizootic plague

3 The plague cycle: Stage 3 – panzootic plague

4 350 The plague cycle: Stage 4 – Zoonotic Number of deaths 300 250 200 Givry (Burgundy), 1348 Penrith (N England), 1597 -9 150 100 50 0 A S O N D J F M A M J J A S O N D J F Month

The plague cycle: Stage 5 – Pandemic 5

The plague cycle: Historically, climatic conditions in Arid Central Asia have exercised a powerful influence upon the incidence of plague, either lowering or raising the risks of enzootic plague becoming amplified into

The Oslo plague team led by Nils Chr. Stenseth has investigated and established a link between climate, gerbil populations, and outbreaks of Yersinia pestis in the water-limited steppe grasslands of southern Kazakhstan:

Drought lowered the risks of plague outbreaks by depressing biomass output, food availability, and gerbil populations and, at the same time, inhibiting flea activity. Sunspot numbers from dendro 150 1270 s-1330 s Wolf Minimum Indexed value (100 = average 1000 -1500) Total Solar Irradiance from ice cores 100 Medieval Solar Maximum 1070 s 1260 s 50 800 s 900 s 1000 s 1100 s Decades 1200 s 1300 s These were the conditions that prevailed in Arid Central Asia throughout the Medieval Solar Maximum between the end of the 1 st Pandemic in the 8 th century and start of the 2 nd Pandemic in

Drought lowered the risks of plague outbreaks by depressing biomass output, food availability, and gerbil populations and, at the same time, inhibiting flea activity. Total Solar Irradiance from ice cores 1270 s-1330 s Wolf Minimum < DRIER Index WETTER > 1. 0 Increasing aridity 0. 5 0. 0 900 1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 -0. 5 800 s -1. 0 Arid Central Asia moisture index Decades These were the conditions that prevailed in Arid Central Asia throughout the Medieval Solar Maximum between the end of the 1 st Pandemic in the 8 th century and start of the 2 nd Pandemic in

Onset of pluvial conditions increased the risks of plague outbreaks by raising biomass output, food availability, and gerbil populations and, at the same time, stimulating flea activity. Total Solar Irradiance from ice cores 1270 s-1330 s Wolf Minimum < DRIER Index WETTER > 1. 0 0. 5 0. 0 900 1000 1100 1200 -1. 0 1400 Increasing humidity -0. 5 800 s 1300 Arid Central Asia moisture index Decades These were the conditions that prevailed in Arid Central Asia following onset of the Wolf Solar Minimum and especially from the 14 th century as part of a global reorganization of atmospheric

< DRIER Moisture/Precipitation index WETTER > 1. 0 0. 5 0. 0 900 1000 1100 1200 -0. 5 -1. 0 Decades 1300 1400

Changes in atmospheric circulation across inner Eurasia Arid Central Asia moisture index Morocco precipitation index Scotland precipitation index < DRIER Moisture/Precipitation index WETTER > 1. 0 0. 5 0. 0 900 1000 1100 1200 -0. 5 -1. 0 Decades 1300 1400

Changes in atmospheric circulation across inner Eurasia Arid Central Asia moisture index Morocco precipitation index Scotland precipitation index < DRIER Moisture/Precipitation index WETTER > 1. 0 0. 5 0. 0 900 1000 1100 1200 -0. 5 -1. 0 Decades 1300 1400

Changes in atmospheric circulation across inner Eurasia Arid Central Asia moisture index Morocco precipitation index Scotland precipitation index < DRIER Moisture/Precipitation index WETTER > 1. 0 0. 5 Strong Westerlies 0. 0 900 1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 Weak Westerlies -0. 5 -1. 0 Decades

Parallel changes were taking place in the strength of the South Asian Monsoon: Weakening monsoon 0. 50 Mega drought 0. 00 800 -0. 50 850 900 950 1000 1050 1100 1150 1200 Strong monsoon Oort Solar Min. Medieval Solar Maximum -1. 00 Decades 1250 1300 1280 s drought < DRIER Precipitation index WETTER > 1. 00 Wolf Solar Minimum 1350

< DRIER Moisture/Precipitation index WETTER > Plague’s reactivation from an enzootic to an epizootic state sometime after 1268/1282 coincided anmoisture episode of global climate Arid with Central Asia index Morocco precipitation index 1. 0 reorganisation: 0. 5 0. 0 900 1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 Weak Westerlies -0. 5 -1. 0 Decades

Dendrochronologies from Central Asia bring this episode into sharper focus: Indexed ring width (100 = mean 1150 -1349) 150 Mongolia (Siberian pine) Tien Shan (Juniper ) NE Tibet (Juniper) 125 100 75 50 1270 1290 1310 Years 1330

Dendrochronologies from Central Asia bring this episode into sharper focus: Indexed ring width (100 = mean 1150 -1349) 150 Mongolia (Siberian pine) Tien Shan (Juniper ) NE Tibet (Juniper) 125 100 75 50 1270 1290 1310 Years 1330

Dendrochronologies from Central Asia bring this episode into sharper focus: Indexed ring width (100 = mean 1150 -1349) 150 Mongolia (Siberian pine) Tien Shan (Juniper ) NE Tibet (Juniper) 125 100 75 50 1270 1290 1310 Years 1330

Dendrochronologies from Central Asia bring this episode into sharper focus: Indexed ring width (100 = mean 1150 -1349) 150 Mongolia (Siberian pine) Tien Shan (Juniper ) NE Tibet (Juniper) Mean chronology 125 100 75 50 1270 1290 1310 Years 1330

Ecological stress in Arid Central Asia, generated by increased climatic instability, appears to have ignited the epizootic that led to the Black Death. Mongolia (Siberian pine) Indexed ring width (100 = mean 1150 -1349) 150 D R O U G H T 125 NE Tibet (Juniper) D R O U G H T 100 75 P L U V I A L 50 1270 1290 1310 Years 1330

From its source in Qinghai, as aridity eased, plague then spread westwards across desert and mountains to Issyk-Kul in Kirgizia:

From its source in Qinghai, as aridity eased, plague then spread westwards across desert and mountains to Issyk-Kul in Kirgizia: Issyk-Kul, Kirghizia Qinghai / Tibet? W. Europe Christakos, Olea & Hwa-Lung (2007) c. 1½-6 kms per day Messina, Sicily 1346 1347 Kipchak Khanate / Golden Horde 1338/9 c. 7 years 4, 000 kms c. 1½ kms per day c. 40 years 2, 000 kms c. 1 km per week 1290 s? The speed of the Black Death’s spread implies that humans must in some way have been complicit in its dissemination.

The Catalan World Atlas, 1375: “the intensification of over-land caravan movement across Asia that reached its climax under the Mongol empires. . . affected both macro- and micro-parasitic patterns in far-

The World-system of commerce c. 1300 according to Janet Abu-Lughod, 1989. Traders and travellers were material to the relentless westward spread of the pathogen, its vectors and hosts, until the Genoese port of Kaffa in the Crimea was reached

“In the same year [1346], God’s punishment struck the people in the eastern lands, in the town Ornach [on the estuary of the R. Don], and in Khastorokan, and in Sarai, and in Bezdeh, and in other towns in those lands; the mortality was great. . . so that they could not bury them” (Benedictow, 2004) Gabriele de Mussis, Michele da Piazza, Nicephoros Gregoras, Emperor John VI & Ibn al-Wardi: Spring 1346: plague first surfaced in the lands of the Kipchak Khanate of the Golden

The Black Death - some fresh insights from recent research: 1. The Black Death WAS Yersinia pestis. 2. Its geographical origin was the semi-arid Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in Western China, where its maintenance hosts were wild gerbils and marmots. 3. Its biological re-activation from a dormant enzootic state to a more virulent epizootic state occurred during the closing decades of the 13 th century. 4. This vital biological transformation took place under conditions of mounting ecological stress generated by the alternation of drought and pluvial events, as global patterns of atmospheric circulation de-stabilized and changed.

The Black Death - some fresh insights from recent 5. Traders and travellers were instrumental research: in aiding and abetting plague’s westward spread across the interior of Eurasia. 6. Genoese mariners performed the same function once plague reached the Black Sea coast and had crossed over and infected commensal rodents (i. e. black rats). 7. In Europe, poverty, over crowding, high levels of commercial activity, war, harvest failure and unusually humid weather conditions combined to ensure that the Black Death’s spread was rapid and its mortality heavy.

The Black Death - some fresh insights from recent research: 9. The Black Death was the product of a unique conjuncture of biological, climatic and human developments.

The Black Death - some fresh insights from recent research: 10. The fate of medieval Europeans was intimately bound up with environmental developments taking place 6, 000 kilometres to the east, in the semi-arid and sparsely populated interior of Central Asia.

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