'Black Death pit' unearthed by Crossrail project

bbc ^ | 14 March 2013 Last updated at 22:11 ET

[BenLurkin]

Excavations for London's Crossrail project have unearthed bodies believed to date from the time of the Black Death.

A burial ground was known to be in an area outside the City of London, but its exact location remained a mystery.

Thirteen bodies have been found so far in the 5.5m-wide shaft at the edge of Charterhouse Square, alongside pottery dated to the mid-14th Century.

Analysis will shed light on the plague and the Londoners of the day.

The skeletons' arrangement in two neat rows suggests they date from the earliest era of the Black Death, before it fully developed into the pandemic that in later years saw bodies dumped haphazardly into mass graves.

Archaeologists working for Crossrail and the Museum of London will continue to dig in a bid to discover further remains, or any finds from earlier eras.

The £14.8bn Crossrail project aims to establish a 118km-long (73-mile) high-speed rail link with 37 stations across London, and is due to open in 2018.

Because of the project's underground scope, significant research was undertaken into the archaeology likely to be found during the course of the construction.

In addition, the bodies may contain DNA from the bacteria responsible for the plague - from an early stage in the pandemic - helping modern epidemiologists track the development and spread of differing strains of a pathogen that still exists today.

[Perdogg]

ping

[trisham]

Interesting.

[Puppage]

[Olog-hai]

Guess they gotta find some way to justify the over-$300 million per mile cost of this project. (Thought tunnel boring machines were supposed to save money?)

[stars & stripes forever]

Great, now Black Death germs are being unearthed in the name of archeology.

[Jmouse007]

My thoughts exactly. They were buried because what they died of was killing MILLIONS of people all over Europe. They didn’t call it “The Black Death” for nothing.

[Fiji Hill]

The term “Black Death” was coined in the nineteenth century. When it was occuring, the epidemic was simply called the plague or the pestilence.

[FroggyTheGremlim]

"Bring out yer dead" scene from Monty Python in

3

2

1

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[mbarker12474]

“Bring out yer dead” scene from Monty Python in

3

2

1

...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grbSQ6O6kbs

[Cowboy Bob]

That guy’s teeth looks better than those of modern day Brits!

[rottndog]

Guess they gotta find some way to justify the over-$300 million per mile cost of this project.

Only $300 mil? Chump change....the LA subway cost over $600 million per mile...

[Puppage]

That guy’s teeth looks better than those of modern day Brits!

LOL

[HereInTheHeartland]

Too bad they didn’t have ObamaCare; this would not have happened.

[Olog-hai]

That’s on average. IINM, about half of the project is tunnels and half is surface rails, which cuts down the average total.

[RedMonqey]

Great, now Black Death germs are being unearthed in the name of archeology.

Two reasons for little to fear from these germs:

One) Unless you are from rare isolated tribe that has never been exposed to this germ, you already have the antibodies inside you to fight off the supposed infection(Say "Thank you" to your surviving ancestors for that)

Two) Unless the sanitary systems(clean water, waste disposal, sewer) Health care, and food supply systems completely collapses, there will never be another mast die off from germs like the Black Death


Of course all the above are still possible(especially with the likes of Obama in charge)

Plenty of diseases now could have had the effects the plague had were it not for good sanitary and modern living standards we have today.

People died of these diseases simply because the body weakened until exhaustion and died. Modern medical techniques allow people to be sustained and replenished until the body's defenses builds up...

[RJS1950]

The bacteria are long dead and gone. They are hoping to find bacterial DNA that can help them find out how those ancient bacteria caused the infections and how it has changed over the centuries. Nobody is going to be infected from these graves.

[IYAS9YAS]

Great, now Black Death germs are being unearthed in the name of archeology.

Rabbits in New Mexico carry bubonic plague. Nothing new.

[JLLH]

I find this very interesting. As for fearing infection, there are already drugs on the market which can treat this since the “plague” still exists in some parts of the world, and there have even been some cases here, though it’s rare. It’s still potentially fatal (as many things still are), but there’s even a vaccine now which can be administered to those traveling to high-risk areas...so I wouldn’t put it on the top of my “scariest things” list.

[SunkenCiv]

GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach	join list or digest view topics view or post blog bookmark post a topic subscribe
Thanks Perdogg. Just adding to the catalog, not sending a general distribution. To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.