Ancient strain of plague found in Sweden – and it could rewrite history

A group of researchers from Sweden, Denmark and France analyzed skeletons from a tomb outside Falköping and found DNA traces of yersinia petis, the bacteria that cause plague.

The remains belonged to farmers who lived in the area around 4900 years ago.

All strains of the plague discovered in later periods – of which the most well-known being the Black Death which killed more than 50 million in the 14th century – are variants of this one, the researchers said.