Scientists have unearthed an ancient strain of plague that may have had a hand in wiping out some of our early ancestors.
A young woman who died 5,000 years ago was struck down by a previously unknown form of the disease, which has killed around 500 million people across its 12,000-year history.
The plague likely spread among ancient European settlements via traders traveling from camp to camp, scientists said.
Its deadly advance across the continent may have contributed to the decline of these settlements seen at the start of the early Bronze Age around 3,000 BC.
“Plague is maybe one of the deadliest bacteria that has ever existed for humans,” said study author Dr. Simon Rasmussen, of the University of Copenhagen.
“The kind of analyses we do here let us go back through time and look at how this pathogen that’s had such a huge effect on us evolved.”
https://nypost.com/2018/12/06/oldest...human-remains/