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

黑鼠和褐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。每一种都通过在人类居住地周围的小生境殖民，远远超出了它们在亚洲的原生范围，可能分别在铁器时代和18世纪到达欧洲。由此产生的与定居和贸易模式变化的联系，使老鼠成为人类历史的潜在有价值的代用品——如果这种人类依赖性能够被理解的话。与此同时，老鼠作为食物害虫和疾病的媒介对人类社会有着深远的影响，最臭名昭著的是——如果有争议的话——与历史上的瘟疫大流行有关，包括14世纪的黑死病。RATTUS旨在绘制从史前晚期到19世纪欧洲老鼠的历史。虽然从根本上来说是考古学的，但该项目也利用遗传学、文本来源和生态模型来超越对传播历史的记录，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？老鼠的遗骸又能告诉我们什么关于人类历史上的关键争论，比如后罗马时代经济和定居系统的重构以及中世纪城镇和贸易的出现？老鼠在第一次和第二次瘟疫大流行中究竟扮演了什么角色？尽管最近鼠疫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，但对最被广泛指责为其传播的啮齿动物种群的了解仍然很肤浅，阻碍了人们的理解。直到最近，由于生物考古方法的进步，详细解决这些问题才变得可行：一根老鼠骨头现在可以揭示分类ID、遗传亲和力、疾病、饮食和日期。因此，现在时机已经成熟，可以系统地努力释放这些最迷人、最重要的啮齿动物作为人类历史的来源和因素的潜力

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