Rats and the Archaeology of Trade, Urbanism and Disease in past European Societies

老鼠与过去欧洲社会的贸易、城市化和疾病考古学

• 批准号: EP/X03058X/1
• 负责人: David Orton
• 金额: $ 219.62万
• 依托单位: University of York
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=EP%2FX03058X%2F1
• 关键词: Rats; Archaeology; Trade; Urbanism; Disease

The black and brown rat are among the most globally successful commensal species, and the most significant for European history. Each has spread far beyond its native range in Asia by colonising niches around human settlements, likely reaching Europe in the Iron Age and 18th C respectively. The resulting association with shifting patterns of settlements and trade makes rats potentially valuable proxies for human history-if this anthrodependency can be understood. At the same time, rats have profound impacts on human societies as food pests and agents of disease, most notoriously-if controversially-implicated in historic plague pandemics including the 14th C Black Death. RATTUS aims to chart the history of rats in Europe from late prehistoric origins to the 19th C. While fundamentally archaeological, the project also draws on genetics, textual sources, and ecological modelling to move beyond documentation of dispersal history and build an understanding of underlying processes. How has human history shaped the distribution and ecology of rats over the past 2500 years? What in turn can rat remains tell us about key debates in human history, such as the post-Roman reconfiguration of economic and settlement systems and the emergence of medieval towns and trade? And what roles can rats really have played in the First and Second Plague Pandemics? Despite a recent revolution in plague history bringing unprecedented detail on the evolution and geographic spread of the bacterium itself, knowledge of the rodent populations most widely blamed for its transmission remains superficial, holding back understanding. Addressing these issues in detail has only recently become feasible thanks to advances in bioarchaeological methods: a single rat bone can now reveal taxonomic ID, genetic affinity, disease, diet, and date. The time is thus ripe for a systematic effort to unlock the potential of these most fascinating and significant of rodents as a source for-and factor in-human history

黑鼠和棕鼠是全球最成功的共生物种之一，也是欧洲历史上最重要的物种。它们都通过在人类住区周围殖民，远远超出了它们在亚洲的原生范围，很可能分别在铁器时代和公元18世纪到达欧洲。由此产生的与定居点和贸易模式变化的关联使老鼠成为人类历史的潜在有价值的代表--如果这种对人类的依赖可以被理解的话。与此同时，老鼠作为食物害虫和病原体对人类社会产生了深远的影响，最臭名昭著的--如果有争议的话--与历史上的鼠疫大流行有关，包括14C黑死病。Rattus的目标是绘制从史前晚期到19世纪欧洲老鼠的历史图表，虽然该项目基本上是考古的，但该项目也利用遗传学、文本来源和生态模型来超越对扩散历史的记录，并建立对潜在过程的理解。在过去的2500年里，人类历史是如何塑造老鼠的分布和生态的？反过来，关于人类历史上的关键辩论，例如后罗马时代经济和定居点系统的重新配置，以及中世纪城镇和贸易的出现，老鼠遗骸能告诉我们什么？在第一次和第二次鼠疫大流行中，老鼠究竟扮演了什么角色？尽管最近鼠疫历史上的一场革命为这种细菌本身的进化和地理传播带来了前所未有的细节，但人们对最常被指责为其传播原因的啮齿动物种群的了解仍然很肤浅，阻碍了人们的理解。由于生物考古方法的进步，详细解决这些问题直到最近才变得可行：一块鼠骨现在可以揭示分类ID、遗传亲和力、疾病、饮食和日期。因此，现在是时候进行系统的努力，释放这些最迷人和最重要的啮齿动物作为人类历史来源和因素的潜力。