The Great Mortality: Medieval Plague across the Globe

Join us Tuesday, December 15th, as Dr. Mary Valante walks us through the global impacts of The Great Mortality. We have learned the Bubonic Plague, killed 1/3 of the people in Europe. However, before the Plague ever arrived in Kaffa or Sicily, people across Central Asia were dying. People in the Byzantine Empire and the Islamic world were dying. For a disease that struck over half a millennia ago – and still exists today – it is surprising how many questions we still have. How can we be sure it was Plague? Where did it originate? How far did it spread? How many pandemics did this one disease cause? The answers to those questions lie in historical sources from many regions of the world, archaeological investigations, and modern DNA studies. Now, as we live through a new pandemic, what have we learned and what mistakes do we seem doomed to repeat?

Zoom: https://zoom.us/j/99965311006?pwd=UjBXS25CUUFSVVpqaVRVUnBrSGd1Zz09