Plague and the End of Antiquity
Using twelve essays to form a volume, Plague and the End of Antiquity attempts to address the Justinianic Plague that ravaged the entire globe from 540 to 750. History, archaeology, epidemiology, and molecular biology are combined to “produce a comprehensive account of the pandemic’s origins, spread, and mortality, as well as its economic, social, political, and religious effects.” Because of the sheer magnitude and scope of the Justinianic Plauge, the editor of Plague and the End of Antiquity, Lester K. Little, claims that the time has not yet come for a single author to undertake such a colossal narrative of the pandemic that spanned centuries. Instead, The Plague and the End of Antiquity gives readers twelve different essays on the subject. After one reads Plague and the End of Antiquity, it will be abundantly clear that a single, comprehensive, and cohesive narrative of the Justinianic Plague is desperately needed.
Following a brief introduction, the initial essays contained in Plague and the End of Antiquity are grouped according to region: The Near East, The Byzantine Empire, and The Latin West. With a combined eight authors covering the same subject (albeit in different regions of the world) much information is covered at least twice, and sometimes three times. The symptoms of bubonic plague are described again and again. The effects of bubonic plague are examined over and over. Indeed, almost each and every topic that has a connection with the bubonic plague is explored, researched, and written about repeatedly. A single narrative would be able to succinctly and less-repetitively provide an account of the life-extinguishing Justinianic Plague. Too much time, space, and research effort is expended in the organizational approach of The Plague and the End of Antiquity.
The one bright spot among the regional organizational method is the commonalities revealed during the Justinianic Plague pandemic, especially given the enormous geographical regions touched by bubonic plague. Every region experienced a morbid surplus of dead bodies. Economic stagnation was reported from Ireland to China. Urban flight was observed on every continent. The essays also point to similar trends of spread and infection across the globe.
Written sources remain historians primary source when researching the Justinianic Plague. We are left with sources from four languages to discern the history of the earliest pandemic of bubonic plague: Syriac, Arabic, Greek, and Latin. The longest account in any language is found in the Ecclesiastical History by John, Bishop of Ephesus, written in Syriac. Another Syriac source is theChronicle of Zuqnin. Arabic sources were not left to us directly, but incorporated later “into larger, more systematic works.” The main Greek source of the Justinianic Plague was that of the historian Procopius of Caesarea. His Persian War and Secret History reveal the spread and intensity of the plague in Byzantium, and he also does a surprisingly remarkable job of describing the symptoms of bubonic plague and the progression of the disease given his lack of medical training or experience. Other Greek sources that are relied on in the twelve essays of Plague and the End of Antiquity are lawyers Agathias and Evagrius. With regards to Spain, one literary source is noted, the Chronicle of Zaragoza. The Justinianic Plague devastated Ireland as well. Written sources are even more limited there, as Ann Dooley relies on annalistic sources to document the death of important families. There are other Irish legal and paralegal sources that offer vague clues to the scope of the Plague, but the majority of these need to be used with conjecture. Finally, Gregory of Tours left a fascinating and notable record of the Justinianic Plague and its effects on the port city of Marseilles. His observations of the transmission of the disease off of ships are insightful and on target.
To say that the lights dimmed in the literary record after the sixth century is an understatement. John Maddicott refers to the seventh century as “notoriously unchronicled.” In addition, throughout the Justinianic Plague pandemic, there were no chroniclers with a medical background. So how can literary sources be relied upon for information about the Justinianic Plague? The twelve authors of Plague and the End of Antiquity validate the literary sources by referencing them to the microbiological and archaeological records. Some chroniclers, such as John of Ephesus, tended to use hyperbole when reporting on the Justinianic Plague, so each written testament of the plague needs to be corroborated as much as possible with the extant physical record and the emerging research in molecular biology and epidemiology.
There is little argument that sixth century people had not faced any type of pandemic disease equal to the range of bubonic plague. There was no precedent on how to live with or cope with the deadly outbreak. The reactions of the people who lived during the Justinianic Plague are revealing. Again and again the authors in Plague and the End of Antiquity describe the people’s flight from bubonic plague. This flight had “the attendant likelihood of the onward transmission of the disease.”Escape from death would have been the people’s first reaction from such an unbiased killer. Also, in England the plague resulted in “the abandonment of the most binding obligations.” Fields went unharvested. Parents ceased parenting. The dead were left unburied. Entire villages were depopulated.
People desperately looked for reasons behind the bubonic plague. Many people equated the plague with God’s punishment for their sins. John of Ephesus and the Zuqnin chronicler explained plague epidemics as a call for repentance and “the rod of God’s gentle mercy.” In one city on the border between Palestine and Egypt, people there “reverted to paganism and worshipped a brass statue to avert the plague” and its consequences. Alain J. Stoclet points to one physician in the 588 outbreak of plague in the vicinity of Constantinope who was passed back and forth between Gregory of Tours and Chilperic. Scott argues that Gregory was acting not to protect his assemblage against the plague, but “against charlatans whose supposed remedies were far less harmful in his view than the false doctrines that they were wont to spread.” In Syria, excavations have revealed church building that continued despite epidemics of plague. Hugh N. Kennedy maintains that church building during these times should not be mistaken for a vitality or prosperity of the village, just that there were people still living who had the means to construct such a building. Clearly, people were living in a confused time period and searched for explanations and reasons behind the plague in many different ways.
Despite the trials of the Justinianic Plague pandemics and its deadly effects, Maddicott maintains “that fertility outstripped mortality as the main determinant of demographic change.” Maddicott also points to a monastic boom as a sign of the growth of population in the decade following the plague’s disappearance.Outside the monastic aspect of society, Maddicott admits that there is little evidence of what happened to the people of the English countryside. The archaeological record is virtually all that remains of the eighth and ninth centuries. Of those, Maddicott points out that the few sites from that time period were not reoccupied by rural peoples after the plague vanished. Not only that, but there was a near-cessation of building activity in the years that followed. Of the building activity that is evident, there was a significant change of housebuilding styles. Most importantly, missing from existing archaeological sites is the sceatta, a common Anglo-Saxon coin. The Justinianic Plague caused people to begin anew.
All of these changes in society that occurred after the Justinianic Plague pandemic, are suggestive of an end to antiquity and the dawning of the Middle Ages. Rural flight of the survivors, as noted elsewhere, reshaped the demography of every region. Monasticism, one of the great tenants of the Middle Ages, rose to prominence in the years after the plague disappeared. Robert Sallares claims that the effects of the plague on early medieval history “undoubtedly played a major role in undermining the old order of the sub-Roman world and paved the way for the immigration of less Romanized newcomers.”
In the preface of Plague and the End of Antiquity, Little explains that the appearances of bubonic plagues from 541 to 750 coincided with a “distinctive shaping of the Byzantine Empire, a new prominence of monasticism and of the Roman papacy, the gradual Christianizing of the Celtic and Germanic peoples, the beginnings of Islam, the rapid accumulation of the Arabic Empire, the ascent of the Carolingian dynasty in Frankish Gaul, and, not coincidentally, the beginnings of a positive work ethic in the Latin West.”The twelve essays that follow the preface attempt to address each of these effects, some with greater energy than others. For instance, at no other place in the book is work ethic mentioned than in Little’s quote from the preface.
As for future research hopes of the Justinianic Plague pandemic, the path is bright. Taken in tandem with the literary sources, archaeology will continue to yield findings and important information. But, however helpful archaeology may be, it cannot tell us other vital facts such as the progress of epidemic disease in any period. The effects on the countryside remain certain, but unquantifiable. The archaeological evidence is too imprecise to be interpreted alone.
Molecular biology and epidemiology have both emerged as fields that will illuminate the cause, virulence, spread, and effects of the Justinianic Plague. Michael McCormick avows that molecular biology “offers the first real prospect of resolution” on the much-debated cause of the bubonic plague. Epidemiology will benefit researchers by examining the suspected pathogen of bubonic plague, Yersinia pestis. In addition, knowing the vectors of transmission and infection can help us learn to prevent diseases such as bubonic plague. By studying the plague epidemics of the Middle Ages, when cycles of plague and other diseases occur today, research can be used to better identify those diseases, working toward the ultimate goal of amelioration, prevention, and extermination.
Medieval Technological Innovation
More than fifty years after its first publication, Lynn White, Jr.’s Medieval Technology & Social Changecontinues to call forth a debate among historians with respect to Medieval technology. As articles by Bernard S. Bachrach, D. A. Bullough, and Alex Roland attest, White’s important work at the very least forms the cornerstone of the fascinating topic of technological innovation and the rise of social groups during the Middle Ages. White expounds upon the importance of the stirrup and how this seemingly insignificant implement spurred feudalism, how new technologies in agriculture led to a surge in population, and how the advances of machine power in the lives of Medieval peoples led to urbanization.
The thesis of Medieval Technologypoints to the significance of technology during a time period that is usually considered as technically moribund. White begins his work centering around a seemingly inconsequential implement: the stirrup. White argues that the stirrup enabled Charles Martel to engage in mounted shock combat, which “inevitably” led to feudalism. Prior to the stirrup mounted warriors had little stability. Riders used saddles that would prevent them from falling over the horse’s tail, but saddles did not add lateral stability, something which was much needed during combat.White also argues that mounted combatants who used two-handed lances would have been compelled to lay the reins on the “horse’s neck and to guide him solely by voice and pressure of the knees at the most critical moments of battle.”Essentially, mounted warriors would not have had much of an advantage over regular foot soldiers because of the lack of stability and the occasional loss of control of the mount.
The foot-stirrup began as a way for riders to control their mounts without losing stability and the use loss of control of the mount. Developed in China during the fifth century, the foot-stirrup added to the effectiveness of the mounted fighter.The the stirrup evolved and spread west, White declares that under the direction of Charles Martel, the stirrup helped spur European feudalism. Now that riders could engage in mounted shock combat, held in place on their mounts by stirrups, Martel began to seize ecclesiastical properties to endow the growing use of cavalry. According to White, “mounted warriors could only be maintained in large numbers by landed endowment,” and so in effect, history has the stirrup to thank for European feudalism.
Moving on, Medieval Technology and Social Change goes on to explain the importance of the plow in Medieval society and how it spurred a shift of power, wealth, and resources within Europe. White puts great emphasis on the plow and argues that it was the first application of non-human power to agriculture For the first time, with the harness the plow substituted animal power for human power. As the first, the plow helped to usher in the manorial system in Europe. The plow had many advantages. It could handle clods better than previous rudimentary implements, saved peasant labor, and increased the area of arable land. Significantly, White gives credit to the heavy plow for changing the shape of fields from squarish to long and narrow. This shift in field shape particularly galvanized the communal aspect of villages. Villagers situated their arable fields next to each other and, with this arrangement, all fields were productive for the benefit of the whole community. Through the cooperative labor of many peasants, these communities were a primitive form of the manorial economy that Northern Europe would later see.
White contends that the plow and the new farming technologies it inspired spurred a population upsurge because more food was made available. However, he is cautious in that although the new productivity that made the heavy plow possible quickly increased the population, it was only adopted in areas already enjoying a certain density of settlement. In conjunction with a balanced approach between herding and agriculture, the heavy plow produced an unprecedented prosperity and vigor in the Frankish heartland. Man became nature’s exploiter.
The plow and new farming technologies combined to expand production, made possible the accumulation of surplus foods that would spearhead the population growth, made practical the growth of leisure time that would lead to the development of skilled artisans and merchants, and were responsible for urbanization. European peasant society was reshaped with a bursting vigor.
White begins his analysis of an agricultural revolution on the plow, saying, “the heavy plow is only the first major element in the agricultural revolution.” After the plow, the harness, in conjunction with nailed horseshoe, made the horse an economic and military asset. There were advantages for the peasant population to utilize equine power over oxen. Farm horses were stronger than oxen and had more endurance.Use of the horse-drawn plow soon became standard in European agriculture.
White contends that Medieval peasants soon developed another method of farming that would revolutionize agriculture. Known as the “greatest agricultural novelty of the Middle Ages in Western Europe,” the triennial system of crop rotation allowed peasants to produce more crops and enriched the soil. The horse-drawn plow and triennial field planting “increased the returns from the labor of the Northern peasant,” raised the standard of living, and consequently the ability to buy manufactured goods. Again, White emphasizes the surplus of food that would have been made available, that would ultimately propel urbanization.
The stirrup, the heavy plow, new farming technologies, the switch to horse from oxen, and the horse all gave way to power technology. Water was the first source of power to be tamed. Water wheels and mills were implemented to mill crops and even to treat cloth and hemp. In the thirteenth century, “windmills became one of the most typical features of the landscape of the great plains of northern Europe.” Windmills assisted Medieval people in the manufacture of textiles and grinding grain just to cite a few examples. Vapor and steam were harnessed to aid fire combustion as a bellows. Jets of steam would also turn turbines and eventually the steam-turbine was developed. Hot air and air under pressure were also utilized by Europeans. In the late fifteenth century, for example, engineers were “setting in the flues small turbines geared to turn a spit.” Eventually, rockets, cannons, and other primitive forms of guns and explosives would be exploited as a result of using air as a source of power.
White presents a charming case for the Medieval control of gravity. Torsion, by way of the twisting of fibers, was developed in Graeco-Roman Antiquity. However, this method of gravitational control proved unsatisfactory because elasticity issues in certain climates. In the thirteenth century, technicians used gravity to harness one of their most significant problems: the need for an accurate and reliable clock. Not only did Medieval people explore sources of power like gravity, but they also invented ways to control and guide this power. As the middle of the fourteenth century passed, clocks became a status symbol in communities. Clocks were intricate, elaborate, and coveted. In spite of the enthusiasm and eagerness that Medieval people chased the accurate measurement of time, the design for a working clock did not come from clockmakers, but instead White argues that “the interdependence of all aspects of technology” borrowed from military engineers initiated the standard clock.
While modernist thinking in Europe and the United States has touted western civilization as the greatest ever, or “The West is Best” mantra, White’s Medieval Technological Innovation paints a noteworthy difference. In nearly every significant development, from the rudimentary forms of stirrups, the water wheel, artillery and cannon fire, and farming, White denotes that most original ideas developed in the Orient. Far from diminishing western influence, White explains the origins of objects or ideas, and then goes on to document the way in which these things were influenced by Europeans. For instance, White’s foremost implement, the foot-stirrup, probably originated in China.
Bernard Bachrach gives White due credit in his critique of Medieval Change and Social Technology.Looking to the future, Bachrach advocates for the more frequent use of archaeology to back up White’s contentions regarding the stirrup. Bachrach also interprets the data differently than White, by claiming that the Carolingian world was not as impressed with the stirrup as White leads readers to believe. Bachrach makes another important fact that White omits: the armies of Charles Martel and those of his sons excelled in siege warfare in which horsemen play at most a limited role. His statements infer that the stirrup, although it may have been used, would not have been a necessity in early Medieval battles, especially those of Charles Martel. Finally, Bachrach argues that Charles Martel did not make use of heavily armed horsemen in his military force that would have required the use of securing armed support and lands that White avows led to the European Feudal system.
Alex Roland provides an informative critique of Lynn White, Jr.’s Medieval Technology and Social Change.Roland begins with a succinct summarization of Medieval Technology, but moreover goes on to address several attacks against White’s work. Foremost is White’s argument that the stirrup is innately tied to feudalism. Roland’s main point is that White did not mean to intimate that the stirrup inevitably lead to feudalism, but that the stirrup made the succeeding social changes possible. Roland also defends White from the harsh criticism, notably from P. H. Sawyer and R. H. Hilton. Roland argues that Sawyer and Hilton misinterpreted what White was trying to convey. Namely, they “refuted arguments that White did not make, inferred motives that White did not manifest, and accused him of views he did not hold.” Roland does concede that the nature of White’s writing leaves room for misunderstanding and misinterpretation. “He (White) favored evidence that supported his argument, apparently overlooking some.” Above all, Roland decides that Medieval History is better for having White’s Medieval Technology and Social Change. Roland sees the work as a challenge to the scholarly community to revise and accept or revise and edit White’s conclusions, something that cannot help but further our understanding of all history.
