Study Concludes Fall of Eastern Rome is Falsely Linked to Climate and Plague

It has widely been accepted that climate (in the form of the Late Little Ice Age or LLIA and the Justinianic Plague were the primary culprits of empirical change, causing a massive dwindling of the population, driving Rome to its knees in the 6th century AD. But a new study has refuted this claim and argues that, in fact, there was likely a spike in population size around the second half of the 6th century AD, and thus the plague and climate change had limited impact.

Primary Movers of Change: Not Climate and Disease

This new study, published in the journal Klio by researchers Haggai Olshanetsky, from the University of Warsaw, and Lev Cosijns, from the University of Oxford carefully analyses available archaeological evidence, data from settlements, shipwrecks, and trade patterns in the Mediterranean.

They posit that human and military factors, including Persian invasions and Islamic expansion in the 7th century, were the primary movers of change. Agriculture, the base economy of most empires like this one, was thus not as affected by LLIA as was erroneously thought, relying on selected textual evidence, and archaeological evidence outside of the boundaries of the Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire.

In fact, the researchers suggest that agriculture and commercial activity could actually have both been maintained and increased in the eastern Mediterranean area, which a lot of previously considered sources have conveniently not consulted. The researchers write in the paper:

“Why do empires fall? This is one of the questions that fascinate many, both in academia and among the general public. In the search for an answer, emotions are high, and imagination can run wild. Human intervention, mostly in the form of war, is commonly attributed to the decline of empires. Up until 40 years ago, historical research was oriented to this line of thinking. However, in recent decades, new suggestions have emerged that attributed the rise and fall of empires to climate and disease”.

Hagia Sophia in Constantinople (now Istanbul) was built by Emperor Justinian. (blackdiamond67/Adobe Stock)

In any case, it seems that LILA’s impact has been grossly overstated, and was definitely less severe in the Eastern Roman empire, reports LBV Magazine. In the higher latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere, annual average temperatures fell by as much as 1.6°C, the effects in the south, like Egypt and Judea, was only about 0.25°C!

“So, it seems that 536 AD was not the worst year to be alive. At least, not for most people who lived during that time. It was a terrible period for people living in Scandinavia, but for people who lived in the eastern Roman Empire, there were limited effects, and so life went on as usual”, said Cosjins.

Even the Plague of Justinian, often described as one of the deadliest pandemics in history, is blown out of proportion. Archaeological evidence does not support such a rapid population collapse, or an ensuing economic crisis that was irreversible.

St Sebastian pleading for the life of a gravedigger afflicted with plague during the 7th-century Plague of Pavia. (Josse Lieferinxe/Public domain)

Irrefutable Evidence: Analyzing Genetics, Trade, Pottery, Population

In fact, there are minor outbreaks mentioned by reputable sources in this period; other sources point to how studies conducted on the genetics of the plague show that it arrived in Europe much earlier than previously believed, co-existing with the population.

Looking at trade, they analyzed shipwrecks from the Mediterranean at Marseille, Naples, Carthage, eastern Spain, and Alexandria. At some point in the second half of the 7th century, Roman ships, which lined the shores by the hundreds, started disappearing.

Roman goods from this period across Israel, Tunisia, Jordan, Cyprus, Turkey, Egypt, and Greece point to a prosperity and flow of trade still very much intact. In fact, there seemed to be an increase in prosperity and demography – witnessed with a rise in the number of settlements, after the 550s.

The information “led us to conclude that the eastern Roman Empire started to decline … after a [disruption in trade] and military failures,” Cosijns and Olshanetsky told The Daily Mail.

The researchers also considered 16,000 pieces of pottery uncovered in Nessana, southwest Negev (Judea), bordering modern-day Egypt. The trade of pottery flourished during the late 6th and early 7th centuries – in fact, there was a ‘stark increase’ after 550 AD, reflective of an ‘increase in the industrial capacity and prosperity of the region.’

The final piece of analysis was one of the in-depth case studies of Elusa, also in the Negev Desert. Previous studies had alleged that an abandonment of municipal dumps here was indicative of social collapse – the dating of trash seems to be limited and not representative of a whole set.

There was likely a gradual decline in stability and the socio-economic fabric slowly eroded over the invasions from Persia, and the general expansion of the Islamic sultanates. A slow fragmentation of trade activity and disruption in agricultural practices confirms this.

“We think that looking for climate change and plague as the cause for every significant change in history is problematic. This approach can especially harm the current climate change debate when claiming that past climate change caused catastrophic disruptions in society, in cases when there were none or limited effects. Such claims may inadvertently support arguments that state since climate change has always occurred, the current man-made one is not a serious issue”, the researchers conclude.

Top image: View across Istanbul (ancient Constantinople).       Source: Shchipkova Elena/Adobe Stock

By Sahir Pandey