A 5,000-year-old hunter-gatherer already plagued by Yersinia pestis

2021/06/01 by Julian Susat, Harald Lübke, Alexander Immel +18 · 1 voice · 3 citations
Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · Immunology and Microbiology · #Bacillus and Francisella bacterial research #Vector-borne infectious diseases #Yersinia bacterium, plague, ectoparasites research

paper · doi:10.1016/j.celrep.2021.109278

openalex publication_date 2021/06/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/23

Abstract

A 5,000-year-old Yersinia pestis genome (RV 2039) is reconstructed from a hunter-fisher-gatherer (5300-5050 cal BP) buried at Riņņukalns, Latvia. RV 2039 is the first in a series of ancient strains that evolved shortly after the split of Y. pestis from its antecessor Y. pseudotuberculosis ∼7,000 years ago. The genomic and phylogenetic characteristics of RV 2039 are consistent with the hypothesis that this very early Y. pestis form was most likely less transmissible and maybe even less virulent than later strains. Our data do not support the scenario of a prehistoric pneumonic plague pandemic, as suggested previously for the Neolithic decline. The geographical and temporal distribution of the few prehistoric Y. pestis cases reported so far is more in agreement with single zoonotic events.

Citations

• Posterior Summarization in Bayesian Phylogenetics Using Tracer 1.7

Cited by

• The Circulation of Yersinia pestis in Central Eurasia before and during the First Plague Pandemic (Second to Eighth Century CE): Palaeogenetic and Historical Evidence and Sociopolitical, Ecological, and Climatic Factors
• Modelling cultural responses to disease spread in Neolithic Trypillia mega-settlements
• The source of the Black Death in fourteenth-century central Eurasia

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