Ἡ πανώλη του Ἰουστινιανοῦ

The Justinianic Plague: An Inconsequential Pandemic?

Conclusion

The consensus maximalist position asserts that the JP reduced the population of the late antique Mediterranean and Europe by more than a third, killing tens of millions and ending antiquity. Such extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence. We find little evidential support for the claim that the JP was a watershed event. In this paper, we have introduced recent evidence and contextualized old evidence relevant to the discussion of the first recorded plague pandemic. We have built upon work in distinct but complementary fields of study, integrating multiple independent high-resolution lines of data: Papyri, inscriptions, and coins, alongside more comprehensive surveys of lower-resolution data, such as pollen and burials. We also critically assessed late antique Y. pestis finds.

Our survey of this evidence reveals that a massive plague mortality is all but invisible in contemporary quantitative datasets. We contend that this is sufficient evidence to reject the current scientific and humanistic consensus of the JP as a major driver of demographic change in the 6th century Mediterranean region.

Although precise estimates are beyond the currently available evidence, the multiple quantitative and qualitative datasets collected here indicate no plague-related empire-wide demographic contraction. We have no more basis for the current maximalist estimate of a 50% demographic loss than we would have for a minimalist estimate of 0.1%. Late antique plague mortality was spatially uneven, as plague ecology and epidemiology dictates. Some regions may have suffered higher mortality at certain times—such as Constantinople during the first outbreak—but it cannot be assumed all did. On the basis of the available data, sudden and dramatic population loss was almost certainly the exception, not the rule. All high-resolution and most low-resolution quantitative measures the authors know of show no observable effect of plague on late antique demographics.

We suggest that further research should analyze plague events at the local level in regions endowed with multiple lines of evidence instead of constructing grand narratives of “Roman decline” and demographic collapse. For each site, the available direct and indirect evidence for plague should be employed to understand if and how disease transformed local communities. Such microstudies would serve as a foundation for a more nuanced interpretation of late antique plague.

Based on the evidence presented above, we believe that the JP and the so-called “First Pandemic” bear comparatively little resemblance to the Second Pandemic and the Black Death, which significantly affected the demography, economy, and landscape of western Eurasia and North Africa (75⇓–77). In light of the paucity of supporting evidence, the “First Pandemic” label is problematic. More broadly, the scholarly treatment of the JP demonstrates the dangers of uncritical multidisciplinarity (78). Although interdisciplinary approaches to the study of the past frequently advance research, they can also inadvertently employ circular reasoning to produce and reinforce erroneous narratives that are often difficult to detect.