See also Justinian's Flea, by William Rosen. This was an outbreak of the Black Death in 542 CE. Millions of people around the Mediterranean died, and the plague likely assisted in the subsequent rise of Islam.
Around 1100 BCE the Mediterranean Bronze Age ended with a population collapse. Homer's Iliad mentions a plague sent by Apollo of the Rats. Scientists today have correlated every instance of global cooling to volcanic eruptions, so it is likely that volcanic eruptions caused both of these outbreaks of the Black Death, because the cooler temperatures compromised the immune systems of rodents (so rodents who got the plague passed it on to their fleas).
See also Justinian's Flea, by William Rosen. This was an outbreak of the Black Death in 542 CE. Millions of people around the Mediterranean died, and the plague likely assisted in the subsequent rise of Islam.
Around 1100 BCE the Mediterranean Bronze Age ended with a population collapse. Homer's Iliad mentions a plague sent by Apollo of the Rats. Scientists today have correlated every instance of global cooling to volcanic eruptions, so it is likely that volcanic eruptions caused both of these outbreaks of the Black Death, because the cooler temperatures compromised the immune systems of rodents (so rodents who got the plague passed it on to their fleas).
There was also the Plague of Cyprien around 250 AD, during the Crisis of the Third Century!