What the archaeological record reveals about epidemics throughout history – and the human response to them

(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.)

Charlotte Roberts, Durham University; Gabriel D. Wrobel, Michigan State University, and Michael Westaway, The University of Queensland

(THE CONVERSATION) The previous pandemics to which people often compare COVID-19 – the influenza pandemic of 1918, the Black Death bubonic plague (1342-1353), the Justinian plague (541-542) – don’t seem that long ago to archaeologists. We’re used to thinking about people who lived many centuries or even millennia ago. Evidence found directly on skeletons shows that infectious diseases have been with us since our beginnings as a species.

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