Although the plague affected the population of many parts of Europe - there were areas where the impact was negligible or the plague did not occur at all - scientists, e.g. from Poland, as reported in "Nature Ecology and Evolution". Such conclusions were reached, among others, thanks to the research ... of fossil spores and pollen.
The Black Death that plagued Europe, West Asia, and North Africa between 1347 and 1352 is considered the most terrible pandemic in history. It was the first wave of the so-called second plague pandemic. Historians have so far estimated that up to half of Europe's inhabitants died during it, and on this basis, they attributed the Black Death to the transformation of religious and political structures, and even the acceleration of major cultural and economic changes, such as the advent of the Renaissance or the rise of capitalism. Meanwhile, although research on ancient DNA has allowed identifying the bacterium Yersinia pestis as a factor causing black death, and even trace its evolution over the millennia, data on the demographic effects of the plague are still little researched - emphasized in the press release sent to PAP on Thursday by the participating participants in research universities: Uniwersytet named Adam Mickiewicz in Poznań and the University of Białystok.
New research proves, however, that the mortality caused by the plague in Europe in the mid-fourteenth century was not as common and as high as previously thought, scientists write in the pages of "Nature Ecology and Evolution" (https://www.nature.com / articles / s41559-021-01652-4).
The new publication is the result of the work of an international team of researchers consisting of scientists from many European centers, including Poland: the University of Białystok, the University of Adam Mickiewicz in Poznań, the Institute of Botany W. Szafer of the Polish Academy of Sciences in Krakow, the Institute of Geography and Spatial Organization Stanisław Leszczycki PAS, the Institute of Geological Sciences of the Polish Academy of Sciences, the University of Gdańsk, the Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń and the Jagiellonian University in Kraków.
Scientists analyzed pollen samples from the sediments of 261 lakes and wetlands in 19 modern European countries. This allowed them to determine how landscapes and agricultural activity changed between 1250 and 1450, roughly 100 years before and 100 years after the pandemic. Their analysis confirms the damage that some regions of Europe have suffered. It also shows that the Black Death did not affect all regions equally, the authors of the study report.
"Palynology, i.e. the study of fungal spores and plant pollen, is a good tool for discovering the demographic effects of the Black Death. This is because the human influence on the landscape in pre-industrial times, primarily agriculture and forestry-based on building needs, was largely dependent on on the availability of employees "- emphasizes dr hab. Adam Izdebski, head of the Palaeo-Science and History group at the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, quoted in a press release sent to PAP.
Using a new approach called Big Data Palaeoecology (BDP), researchers analyzed 1,634 pollen samples from locations across Europe to see which plants were growing in an area and to determine if agricultural activities the pandemic in a given place was slowed down, whether its intensity decreased or increased, which must have been associated with fluctuations in the number of the population. They also checked whether there were any signs of revival of wild vegetation, which could have meant a reduction in human pressure on the landscape.
Research from an international team shows that mortality from the epidemic varied widely. Some areas suffered damage on an unprecedented scale, while others suffered much more gently. The sharp decline in agricultural production in Scandinavia, France, southwest Germany, Greece and central Italy confirms the high mortality rate, as evidenced by medieval historical and archaeological sources. Meanwhile, many regions, including most of Central and Eastern Europe and parts of Western Europe, including Ireland and the Iberian Peninsula, show evidence of continuity or uninterrupted growth in agriculture.
"The large variation in mortality rates, which we have confirmed with pollen data and the BDP method, requires clarification in further studies that will take into account local cultural, environmental, economic, and social contexts. A number of local circumstances may have influenced plague bacterial incidence, morbidity, and mortality" - says dr hab. Piotr Guzowski from the University of Białystok.
Scientists emphasize the uniqueness of this research: most of the historical sources that have so far been used in the study of the Black Death came from urban areas that were characterized by a higher culture of writing and bureaucracy, but also by denser population and poor sanitation. Meanwhile, by the mid-fourteenth century, more than three-quarters of the population of all regions in Europe was rural. Current research shows that in order to reliably determine the scale of human losses in a given region, data from local sources should be used - not only historical but also using nature archives and BDP as a method of reconstructing changes in the landscape.
The variations in Black Death mortality across Europe show that the plague was a dynamic disease, with cultural, ecological, economic, and climatic factors influencing its spread and conditioning its impact on societies. The authors of the study hope that in the future, paleoecological data will be used even more extensively to understand how different local variables have influenced and shaped past - and current pandemics.
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