INFORMAZIONI NASCOSTE NELLE MUMMIE, NELLE SEPOLTURE E NEGLI ANTICHI AMBIENTI ABITATIVI: L’ARCHEOENTOMOLOGIA MEDICA DEGLI INSETTI VETTORI

Hidden information within mummies burials and ancient houses: Medical archaeoentomology of insect-vectors for investigating past epidemics In recent years there was a new, strong interest for the cemeteries of ancient epidemics and new archaeological and molecular methods of looking at this question were adopted, and many mass and multiple burials were explored. We can mention in England the accurate excavations of the Black Death cemetery (1349), at East Smithfield in London, in France the Observance convent (1720-1722), at Marseille, the trenches of the Capucins of Ferrières in Martigues, at Bouches-du-Rhône, of same period, and the cemetery of hospital of Fédons (1590), at Lambesc. In Italy we had the discovery of the large plague cemetery of Saint Michael at Alghero (1582-1583) in Sardinia. At present, the molecular studies clarified that the plague epidemics were caused by different strains of Yersinia pestis. Regarding the insect-vectors, only the genus Pediculuswas intensively studied so far, but a great research work remains still to do about the insects involved not only in the plague pandemics but also in epidemic typhus and in some diffuse endemic infections, as for example malaria and Chagas’ disease. In conclusion, the medical archeo-entomology will offer a potent tool for understanding the epidemiology of epidemics, eventual effects of other diseases on the emergence of plague and human-pathogen and insect-vector coevolution, addressing questions of great interest for different researchers, as historians, paleopathologists and geneticists.