Justinian's Flea: Plague, Empire and the Birth of Europe

Justinian's Flea: Plague, Empire and the Birth of Europe. William Rosen. Jonathan Cape. [pounds sterling]20.00. xi + 367 pages. ISBN 978-0-224-07369-1. This history, first published in the US, recalls the old adage about missing nails, shoes, horses, battles and victories. It is a study in the role of health in history, in particular, the pandemic that swept over Europe after the Emperor Justinian had reincorporated modern Italy, Spain and North Africa into the Roman Empire governed from Constantinople.

Mr Rosen looks at the collapse of imperial authority in these areas, at the role and importance of Justinian (527-565), at the nature of bubonic plague and, finally, at the pandemic which spread to what is now Persia, France, Britain and Italy. Interestingly he also looks at the two important areas that escaped the plague: the Arabian peninsula and China. In the event the book becomes a history of the Roman Empire in the sixth century, albeit one with an interesting and unusual slant. (A.C.)

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