“The plague is upon us” might have been a familiar cry in ancient Jordan, where a mysterious disease killed scores of people and left an indelible mark on society and history.
Today, researchers are uncovering new details about that crisis. An interdisciplinary team at the University of South Florida is studying the Plague of Justinian and its far-reaching effects. The group led by Raze HY Jiang, associate professor in the College of Public Health, has published a third paper in an ongoing series examining what is believed to be the first recorded outbreak of bubonic plague in the Mediterranean Sea.
Their latest study, “Bioarchaeological Signatures during the Plague of Justinian (541-750 CE) in Jerash, Jordan,” appears in the Journal of Archaeological Science. It expands scientific understanding of the outbreak that killed millions of people in the Byzantine Empire.
“We wanted to move beyond identifying the pathogen and focus on the people who were affected by it, who they were, how they lived and what pandemic deaths looked like inside a real city,” Jiang said.
A mass grave reveals the scale of death
At the height of the Plague of Justinian, affected individuals came from different communities that were often cut off from each other. However, in death, they were brought together. A large number of bodies were placed on top of pottery debris in an abandoned public area, which became the central focus of this study.
Jiang served as principal investigator, working with colleagues from USF’s Center for Genomics, Global Health Infectious Disease Research, and departments including anthropology, molecular medicine and history. Additional contributions came from archaeologist Karen Hendricks of the University of Sydney, Australia, and the DNA Laboratory of Florida Atlantic University. Earlier research in the series focused primarily on Yersinia pestis, the bacterium responsible for plague. This new work explores how the disease has affected society in the short and long term, and what lessons it may offer today.
“Earlier stories had identified a plague creature,” Jiang said. The Jerash site turns that genetic signal into a human story of who died and how a city experienced crisis.”
First confirmed plague mass grave
Historical accounts describe widespread disease during the Byzantine era, but many suspected plague burial sites lack concrete evidence. Jerash is now the first location where a plague-related mass grave has been confirmed through both archaeological evidence and genetic testing.
The researchers determined that the burial represented a single event, unlike traditional cemeteries which developed gradually. In Jerash, hundreds of individuals were buried within a matter of days. The discovery reshapes the understanding of the first pandemic by providing clear evidence of mass mortality and insight into how people lived, moved and became vulnerable in ancient urban environments.
Mobility and hidden connections
The findings also help resolve a long-standing question. Historical and genetic data indicate that people traveled and mingled across different regions, yet evidence from burials often suggests that communities remained local.
The Jerash site shows that both patterns could co-exist. Migration usually unfolds gradually over generations and blends into everyday life, making it difficult to detect in standard cemeteries. However, during a crisis, individuals from more mobile backgrounds are brought together in one place, making those hidden connections visible.
Evidence shows that the individuals buried at Jerash belonged to a mobile population that was part of the wider urban community. Normally dispersed throughout the region, in moments of crisis they were united in a single burial.
Understanding the human impact of the pandemic
“By combining biological evidence from cadavers with archaeological settings, we can see how disease affected real people in their social and environmental context,” Jiang said. “This helps us understand epidemics in history as lived human health events, not just outbreaks recorded in text.”
This research is helping to change the way scientists look at pandemics, emphasizing not only how they start and spread, but also how they affect daily life and social structures. Dense cities, travel and environmental changes played as much of a role then as they do today.
“Epidemics are not just biological phenomena, they are social phenomena, and this study shows how disease intersects with daily life, movement and vulnerability,” Jiang said. Because the pandemic reveals who is vulnerable and why, those patterns still shape how the disease affects society today.
research team
In addition to Jiang, the USF team on the three papers included:
- Swami R. Adapa, Research and Development Scientist, Department of Global Environmental and Genomic Health Sciences, COPH
- Andrea Vianello, PhD, Visiting Research Fellow, Department of Anthropology, College of Arts and Sciences
- Elizabeth Remilly-Wood, Proteomics Core Director, Department of Molecular Medicine, Morsani College of Medicine
- Gloria C. Ferreira, PhD, Professor, Department of Molecular Medicine, Morsani College of Medicine and College of Arts and Sciences
- Michael Decker, PhD, Maroulis Professor of Byzantine History and Orthodox Religion, Department of History, College of Arts and Sciences
- Robert H. Tycott, PhD, Professor, Department of Anthropology, College of Arts and Sciences