Justinianic Plague was nothing like flu and may have hit England before Constantinople | University of Cambridge

Detail of the mosaic of Justinianus I in the Basilica di San Vitale, Ravenna, Italy Credit: Petar Miloševic 'Plague sceptics' are wrong to underestimate the devastating impact that bubonic plague had in the 6th- 8th centuries CE, argues a new study based on ancient texts and recent genetic discoveries. The same study suggests that bubonic plague may have reached England before its first recorded case in the Mediterranean via a currently unknown route, possibly involving the Baltic and Scandinavia. We have a lot to learn from how our forebears responded to epidemic disease Peter Sarris The Justinianic Plague is the first known outbreak of bubonic plague in west Eurasian history and struck the Mediterranean world at a pivotal moment in its historical development, when the Emperor Justinian was trying to restore Roman imperial power. For decades, historians have argued about the lethality of the disease; its social and economic impact; and the routes by which it spread. In 2019-20, several studies, widely publicised in the media, argued that historians had massively exaggerated the impact of the Justinianic Plague and described it as an 'inconsequential pandemic'. In a subsequent piece of journalism, written just before COVID-19 took hold in the West, two researchers suggested that the Justinianic Plague was 'not unlike our flu outbreaks'. In a new study, published in Past & Present , Cambridge historian Professor Peter Sarris argues that these studies ignored or downplayed new genetic findings, offered misleading statistical analysis and misrepresented the evidence provided by ancient texts.