Great gerbils – not black rats – were chief cause of the great plague, study says

Researchers claim Black Death was imported from Asia over 400 years of the pandemic via native rodents such as great gerbils and marmots which harboured the plague bacteria

The gruesome waves of bubonic plague that began with the Black Death in medieval Europe and ended with the Great Plague of London may have been driven more by great gerbils than black rats, researchers claim.

In a study that threatens to overturn the popular history of one of the world's greatest health disasters, scientists suggest that the disease had little to do with pest-ridden rats lurking in European cities, but was instead imported from Asia time and again over the four hundred years of the pandemic.

Related: You dirty rat! Turns out giant gerbils were responsible for the Black Death