Measuring and Comparing Economic Interaction Based on the Paths and Speed of Infections: The Case Study of the Spread of the Justinianic Plague and Black Death

Boerner and Severgnini study the spread of plagues from a comparative perspective. They investigate the determinants of the speed of the spread of the Black Death and the Justinianic Plague. In addition, they compare the speed of infection during both periods of time. The investigation finds that the Justinianic Plague follows a similar pattern as the Black Death. In particular, the study detects that the speed of transmission between two destinations along a trade route is determined by the trade technology and trade geography, which is the physical time to travel between two destinations following the ORBIS data set. This supports claims made by other scholarly work that argues that both diseases were spread by human interaction, particularly through trade activities.