Yersinia pestis and the plague of Justinian 541-543 AD: a genomic analysis.
Level 4 - case-series / case-control
Paleogenomic analysis of skeletal remains from two historical individuals (graded by design analogy as a non-clinical case series).
PubMed 24480148 · doi:10.1016/S1473-3099(13)70323-2
What was done
Ancient DNA was extracted from the teeth of two individuals (A120 and A76) excavated from the early medieval Aschheim-Bajuwarenring cemetery in Bavaria, Germany. Extracts were screened for the Yersinia pestis-specific pla gene on plasmid pPCP1, enriched, and sequenced to generate draft genomes. The sequences were compared with a reference database of 131 Y pestis genomes from the second and third pandemics to construct a maximum likelihood phylogenetic tree alongside radiocarbon dating of the skeletal remains.
What was found
Radiocarbon dating placed individual A120 at 533 AD (plus or minus 98 years) and A76 at 504 AD (plus or minus 61 years). Phylogenetic analysis identified a novel branch leading to the two Justinian samples with 100% bootstrap support across relevant nodes. This branch was interleaved between extant groups 0.ANT1 and 0.ANT2, distant from strains associated with the second (Black Death) and third pandemics, and lacked any known living descendants.
Why it matters
This study provides molecular confirmation that the Plague of Justinian was caused by Y pestis and demonstrates that historical plague pandemics arose through independent cross-species emergences from wild rodent reservoirs rather than direct lineage continuation.
Limits
The analysis is restricted to draft genomes derived from only two individuals from a single cemetery site. The abstract does not report coverage depth or assembly completeness, and it cannot definitively determine whether the identified lineage is fully extinct or merely unsampled in modern rodent populations.
Cited by
- supports The pathogen responsible for the Plague of Justinian (beginning in 541 AD) was Yersinia pestis, as confirmed by modern pathogen isolation.