Devastating Roman-era plagues were ushered in by cold snaps, study finds | Live Science
Cold snaps may have ushered in devastating pandemics for ancient Romans that killed countless people, new research finds.
The new study links periods of climate variation with major pandemics and found that the three largest pandemics of the Roman period occurred during some of the most abrupt and deepest cold snaps on record.
There could be a mix of reasons to explain this overlap, said study co-leader Kyle Harper, a Roman historian at the University of Oklahoma and the Santa Fe Institute.
“When you shake the climate system it really impacts the pathogens, ecosystems and, above all, human societies,” Harper told Live Science.
The research focuses on a long core of sediments drilled out of the Gulf of Taranto, the wide gulf under the “sole” of Italy’s “boot.” This area captures sediment washed out from the Po River and other rivers that drain the Apennine Mountains essentially the heart of the Roman Empire, Harper said.
Such are the wages of driving around in those all terrain chariots and keeping too many slaves.