Timothy Newfield
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 1018216 |
|---|---|
| NOME | Timothy Newfield |
| PRENOMES | Timothy |
| SOBRENOME | Newfield |
| ASSINATURA | NEWFIELD T |
| AFILIAÇÕES | Georgetown University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-1451-5024 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 29 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 45 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 29 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2009 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2025 |
| ÍNDICE H | 4 |
Discovery and Dilemma
This article presents the first paleogenetic evidence for Yersinia pestis, the causative agent of plague, in the immediate area of Constantinople in the sixth century, the epicenter of surviving first-pandemic narratives. Construction of a natural gas pipeline led to the discovery and excavation of a late antique necropolis in the Bosna Çiftliği locality (near modern Silivri, ancient Selymbria) of Fatih Mahallesi, some fifty miles west of Istanbu…
Problems, Progress, and Prospects
Pathogen Paleogenetics and Late Antique Disease
The First Plague Pandemic in the Byzantine Empire – Toward a New Dynamic Consensus
Burial Archaeology and the First Plague Pandemic
Archaeological evidence from funerary contexts is largely ignored in current scholarship on the First Plague Pandemic, despite the important information that burials and cemeteries can provide about how plague might have affected societies. Skeletal (mainly dental) remains are used in the paleogenomic search for victims of plague (Yersinia pestis), but significant contextual information is to be gained from plague-positive graves through bioarcha…
The Circulation of Yersinia pestis in Central Eurasia before and during the First Plague Pandemic (Second to Eighth Century CE)
Modern Yersinia pestis genomes show the greatest diversity of the plague pathogen in Central Eurasia. This region is now widely linked to the origins of the Y. pestis lineages responsible for two historic plague pandemics: one starting with the so-called “Justinianic Plague” of the mid-sixth century and the other with the “Black Death” of the mid-fourteenth century. These pandemics have mostly been studied in the Mediterranean region and Europe. …
The Emergence of Interdisciplinary Environmental History
With the efflorescence of palaeoscientific approaches to the past, historians have been confronted with a wealth of new evidence on both human and natural phenomena, from human disease and migration to landscape change and climate. These new data require a rewriting of our narratives of the past, questioning what constitutes an authoritative historical source and who is entitled to recount history to contemporary societies. Humanities-based histo…
Past Answers to Present Concerns. The Relevance of the Premodern Past for 21st Century Policy Planners
How is history relevant to the present, or indeed the future? Governments around the world have used history to inform planning and decision‐making in various fields for years, but more recently it has taken on a renewed importance as governments grapple with increasingly complex challenges arising from the impacts of climatic change. Yet identifying “lessons from the past” is not straightforward. Especially in the case of big questions about his…
Mudanças climáticas, vulnerabilidade e resiliência no Mediterrâneo medieval (apresentação)
Este artigo pretende apresentar um quadro geral da historiografia a respeito do tema das mudanças climáticas. Nosso foco não são as mudanças em si, mas a maneira como as comunidades reagiram a elas. Esse tem sido o principal objeto das reflexões mais recentes sobre o tema e, ao mesmo tempo, o eixo em torno do qual os autores deste dossiê redigiram os seus artigos. Pretendemos mostrar que é um equívoco atribuir às comunidades pré-modernas uma gran…
Climate change, vulnerability, and resilience in the medieval Mediterranean (presentation)
This article aims to present an overview of the historiography about climate change. Our focus is not on the changes themselves, but on how communities reacted to them. This has been the main object of the most recent reflections on the subject and, at the same time, the central point around which the authors of this dossier have written their articles. We intend to show that it is a mistake to attribute great vulnerability to climate phenomena t…
Nested Environments
The late antique (ca. mid. 5th century CE) infant and child cemetery at Poggio Gramignano near Lugnano in Teverina (Umbria, Italy) is well-known for its association with malaria. However, less is known about the community members most closely connected to this cemetery space–in particular, the the infants' mothers. This paper more closely explores the health of the 62 individuals who have been recovered from the cemetery to date with the goal of …
One Plague for Another? Interdisciplinary Shortcomings in Plague Studies and the Place of the Black Death in Histories of the Justinianic Plague
Late antique plague has never been more contested. Recent scholarship has repeatedly questioned whether the Justinianic plague caused catastrophic mortality and supporters of the traditional narrative of a vast, depopulating sixth-century pandemic have dug in. Scholars have repeatedly assessed evidence thought to prove traditional narratives about the Justinianic plague, but never to everyone’s liking. Things have gotten ugly and no resolution is…
Smallpox's antiquity in doubt
Smallpox, caused by the variola virus (VARV), is prominent in modern histories of the ancient Mediterranean world. The disease, or the diagnosis of it, has shaped estimations of the scale and significance of epidemics and pandemics, notably the 2nd-c. Antonine plague, and the burden of disease in large cities and regions densely populated in antiquity. Here we synthesize recent paleogenetic and evolutionary biological literature that casts signif…
Syndemic theory, methods, and data
Syndemics and the history of disease
L'émergence d'une histoire environnementale interdisciplinaire
Avec l'efflorescence des approches paléoscientifiques du passé, les historiens ont été confrontés à une multitude de nouveaux indices sur des phénomènes tant humains que naturels, des maladies aux migrations en passant par les transformations du paysage et le climat. Ces données inédites exigent une réécriture des récits portant sur les périodes lointaines, remettant en cause à la fois les fondements de l'autorité des sources historiques traditio…
Towards a rigorous understanding of societal responses to climate change
History meets palaeoscience
History and archaeology have a well-established engagement with issues of premodern societal development and the interaction between physical and cultural environments; together, they offer a holistic view that can generate insights into the nature of cultural resilience and adaptation, as well as responses to catastrophe. Grasping the challenges that climate change presents and evolving appropriate policies that promote and support mitigation an…
Plagues, climate change, and the end of an empire. A response to Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome (2)
This is the second of a three‐section review of Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome in which we examine in detail Harper's treatment of two allegedly widespread and mortal Roman outbreaks of disease. In the case of the second‐century Antonine plague, we demonstrate that Harper overlooked a major controversy and instead portrayed an oversimplified narrative of a catastrophic event. In the case of the third‐century Cyprianic plague, we call attention to…
Plagues, climate change, and the end of an empire
Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome , written for a popular audience, uses the environment to explain the decline and fall of the Roman Empire. The book asserts that Rome fell as a result of environmental stress, in particular through a combination of pandemic disease and climate change. Although we agree that the environment can and should be integrated within traditional historical accounts, we challenge the book's claims on several issues. These in…
Plagues, climate change, and the end of an empire
This is the last of a three‐part review of Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome . Here, we scrutinize Harper's treatment of the Justinianic Plague, demonstrating how he crafts a convincing narrative based on rhetorical flourishes but little evidence. We call further attention to several internal contradictions within the chapter and misinterpretations of evidence. We conclude this series of articles with a reflection on Harper's deterministic approach …
Livestock plagues in late antiquity, with a disassembling of the bovine panzootic of A.D. 376-386
The history of late-antique animal plagues requires a fresh start. Over the last 30 years, scholars have amassed copious quantities of written and material evidence for major shifts in the natural world experienced, or reported, as disasters in late antiquity. They have read textual passages more critically and interwoven written with physical data more meticulously than researchers before them. As a result, much more is known now about human pla…
Malaria and malaria‐like disease in the early Middle Ages
Malaria impairs human reproduction, augments excess mortality, and lowers productivity. It can exercise a debilitating effect so profound that it defines regions. The disease is an essential element in histories of places and periods in which it was endemic. Although many European regions are thought to have had a long association with malaria, evidence for the disease, the parasites that cause it, and the mosquitoes that transmit it, is thin bef…
Realizing Consilience in Studies of Pre-Instrumental Climate and Pre-Laboratory Disease
A special issue of the journal Quaternary Science Reviews-entitled "Mediterranean Holocene Climate, Environment and Human Societies"-demonstrates why and how historians interested in premodern environmental history should work collaboratively across disciplinary boundaries to draw conclusions. A series of mini-case studies and a survey of recent scholarship, as prompted by this collection, explores the advantages and challenges of attempting to r…
Mysterious and Mortiferous Clouds
What influence did climate have on disease in Late Antiquity? Natural archives of pre-instrumental temperature indicate significant summer cooling throughout the period. The coolest stretch spanned the 6th and 7th c., and corresponds startlingly to the appearance of the Justinianic Plague in the Mediterranean region. Drawing on principles from landscape epidemiology, this paper marries textual evidence for disease with palaeoclimatic data, in ord…
Syndemic theory, methods, and data
Plagues, climate change, and the end of an empire
Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome , written for a popular audience, uses the environment to explain the decline and fall of the Roman Empire. The book asserts that Rome fell as a result of environmental stress, in particular through a combination of pandemic disease and climate change. Although we agree that the environment can and should be integrated within traditional historical accounts, we challenge the book's claims on several issues. These in…
Malaria and malaria‐like disease in the early Middle Ages
Malaria impairs human reproduction, augments excess mortality, and lowers productivity. It can exercise a debilitating effect so profound that it defines regions. The disease is an essential element in histories of places and periods in which it was endemic. Although many European regions are thought to have had a long association with malaria, evidence for the disease, the parasites that cause it, and the mosquitoes that transmit it, is thin bef…
Smallpox's antiquity in doubt
Smallpox, caused by the variola virus (VARV), is prominent in modern histories of the ancient Mediterranean world. The disease, or the diagnosis of it, has shaped estimations of the scale and significance of epidemics and pandemics, notably the 2nd-c. Antonine plague, and the burden of disease in large cities and regions densely populated in antiquity. Here we synthesize recent paleogenetic and evolutionary biological literature that casts signif…
Syndemics and the history of disease
Plagues, climate change, and the end of an empire
This is the last of a three‐part review of Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome . Here, we scrutinize Harper's treatment of the Justinianic Plague, demonstrating how he crafts a convincing narrative based on rhetorical flourishes but little evidence. We call further attention to several internal contradictions within the chapter and misinterpretations of evidence. We conclude this series of articles with a reflection on Harper's deterministic approach …
Human-Bovine Plagues in the Early Middle Ages
Two independent molecular clock analyses (mcas) reveal that measles (mv) diverged from rinderpest (rpv) c. 1000 c.e. This evidence, when conjoined with written accounts of non-Justinianic plagues in 569-570 and 986-988 and zoo-archaeological discoveries regarding early medieval mass bovine mortalities, suggests that a now-extinct morbillivirus, ancestral to mv and rpv, broke out episodically in the early Middle Ages, causing large mortalities in …
Burial Archaeology and the First Plague Pandemic
Archaeological evidence from funerary contexts is largely ignored in current scholarship on the First Plague Pandemic, despite the important information that burials and cemeteries can provide about how plague might have affected societies. Skeletal (mainly dental) remains are used in the paleogenomic search for victims of plague (Yersinia pestis), but significant contextual information is to be gained from plague-positive graves through bioarcha…
Past Answers to Present Concerns. The Relevance of the Premodern Past for 21st Century Policy Planners
How is history relevant to the present, or indeed the future? Governments around the world have used history to inform planning and decision‐making in various fields for years, but more recently it has taken on a renewed importance as governments grapple with increasingly complex challenges arising from the impacts of climatic change. Yet identifying “lessons from the past” is not straightforward. Especially in the case of big questions about his…
Nested Environments
The late antique (ca. mid. 5th century CE) infant and child cemetery at Poggio Gramignano near Lugnano in Teverina (Umbria, Italy) is well-known for its association with malaria. However, less is known about the community members most closely connected to this cemetery space–in particular, the the infants' mothers. This paper more closely explores the health of the 62 individuals who have been recovered from the cemetery to date with the goal of …
L'émergence d'une histoire environnementale interdisciplinaire
Avec l'efflorescence des approches paléoscientifiques du passé, les historiens ont été confrontés à une multitude de nouveaux indices sur des phénomènes tant humains que naturels, des maladies aux migrations en passant par les transformations du paysage et le climat. Ces données inédites exigent une réécriture des récits portant sur les périodes lointaines, remettant en cause à la fois les fondements de l'autorité des sources historiques traditio…
From Constantine to Charlemagne
Charlemagne
The Environmental History of the Late Antique West
Human-Bovine Plagues in the Early Middle Ages
Two independent molecular clock analyses (mcas) reveal that measles (mv) diverged from rinderpest (rpv) c. 1000 c.e. This evidence, when conjoined with written accounts of non-Justinianic plagues in 569-570 and 986-988 and zoo-archaeological discoveries regarding early medieval mass bovine mortalities, suggests that a now-extinct morbillivirus, ancestral to mv and rpv, broke out episodically in the early Middle Ages, causing large mortalities in …
Mysterious and Mortiferous Clouds
What influence did climate have on disease in Late Antiquity? Natural archives of pre-instrumental temperature indicate significant summer cooling throughout the period. The coolest stretch spanned the 6th and 7th c., and corresponds startlingly to the appearance of the Justinianic Plague in the Mediterranean region. Drawing on principles from landscape epidemiology, this paper marries textual evidence for disease with palaeoclimatic data, in ord…
Livestock plagues in late antiquity, with a disassembling of the bovine panzootic of A.D. 376-386
The history of late-antique animal plagues requires a fresh start. Over the last 30 years, scholars have amassed copious quantities of written and material evidence for major shifts in the natural world experienced, or reported, as disasters in late antiquity. They have read textual passages more critically and interwoven written with physical data more meticulously than researchers before them. As a result, much more is known now about human pla…
Malaria and malaria‐like disease in the early Middle Ages
Malaria impairs human reproduction, augments excess mortality, and lowers productivity. It can exercise a debilitating effect so profound that it defines regions. The disease is an essential element in histories of places and periods in which it was endemic. Although many European regions are thought to have had a long association with malaria, evidence for the disease, the parasites that cause it, and the mosquitoes that transmit it, is thin bef…
Realizing Consilience in Studies of Pre-Instrumental Climate and Pre-Laboratory Disease
A special issue of the journal Quaternary Science Reviews-entitled "Mediterranean Holocene Climate, Environment and Human Societies"-demonstrates why and how historians interested in premodern environmental history should work collaboratively across disciplinary boundaries to draw conclusions. A series of mini-case studies and a survey of recent scholarship, as prompted by this collection, explores the advantages and challenges of attempting to r…
History meets palaeoscience
History and archaeology have a well-established engagement with issues of premodern societal development and the interaction between physical and cultural environments; together, they offer a holistic view that can generate insights into the nature of cultural resilience and adaptation, as well as responses to catastrophe. Grasping the challenges that climate change presents and evolving appropriate policies that promote and support mitigation an…
Plagues, climate change, and the end of an empire. A response to Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome (2)
This is the second of a three‐section review of Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome in which we examine in detail Harper's treatment of two allegedly widespread and mortal Roman outbreaks of disease. In the case of the second‐century Antonine plague, we demonstrate that Harper overlooked a major controversy and instead portrayed an oversimplified narrative of a catastrophic event. In the case of the third‐century Cyprianic plague, we call attention to…
Plagues, climate change, and the end of an empire
Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome , written for a popular audience, uses the environment to explain the decline and fall of the Roman Empire. The book asserts that Rome fell as a result of environmental stress, in particular through a combination of pandemic disease and climate change. Although we agree that the environment can and should be integrated within traditional historical accounts, we challenge the book's claims on several issues. These in…
Plagues, climate change, and the end of an empire
This is the last of a three‐part review of Kyle Harper's The Fate of Rome . Here, we scrutinize Harper's treatment of the Justinianic Plague, demonstrating how he crafts a convincing narrative based on rhetorical flourishes but little evidence. We call further attention to several internal contradictions within the chapter and misinterpretations of evidence. We conclude this series of articles with a reflection on Harper's deterministic approach …
Towards a rigorous understanding of societal responses to climate change
One Plague for Another? Interdisciplinary Shortcomings in Plague Studies and the Place of the Black Death in Histories of the Justinianic Plague
Late antique plague has never been more contested. Recent scholarship has repeatedly questioned whether the Justinianic plague caused catastrophic mortality and supporters of the traditional narrative of a vast, depopulating sixth-century pandemic have dug in. Scholars have repeatedly assessed evidence thought to prove traditional narratives about the Justinianic plague, but never to everyone’s liking. Things have gotten ugly and no resolution is…
Smallpox's antiquity in doubt
Smallpox, caused by the variola virus (VARV), is prominent in modern histories of the ancient Mediterranean world. The disease, or the diagnosis of it, has shaped estimations of the scale and significance of epidemics and pandemics, notably the 2nd-c. Antonine plague, and the burden of disease in large cities and regions densely populated in antiquity. Here we synthesize recent paleogenetic and evolutionary biological literature that casts signif…
Syndemic theory, methods, and data
Syndemics and the history of disease
L'émergence d'une histoire environnementale interdisciplinaire
Avec l'efflorescence des approches paléoscientifiques du passé, les historiens ont été confrontés à une multitude de nouveaux indices sur des phénomènes tant humains que naturels, des maladies aux migrations en passant par les transformations du paysage et le climat. Ces données inédites exigent une réécriture des récits portant sur les périodes lointaines, remettant en cause à la fois les fondements de l'autorité des sources historiques traditio…
Nested Environments
The late antique (ca. mid. 5th century CE) infant and child cemetery at Poggio Gramignano near Lugnano in Teverina (Umbria, Italy) is well-known for its association with malaria. However, less is known about the community members most closely connected to this cemetery space–in particular, the the infants' mothers. This paper more closely explores the health of the 62 individuals who have been recovered from the cemetery to date with the goal of …
The Emergence of Interdisciplinary Environmental History
With the efflorescence of palaeoscientific approaches to the past, historians have been confronted with a wealth of new evidence on both human and natural phenomena, from human disease and migration to landscape change and climate. These new data require a rewriting of our narratives of the past, questioning what constitutes an authoritative historical source and who is entitled to recount history to contemporary societies. Humanities-based histo…
Past Answers to Present Concerns. The Relevance of the Premodern Past for 21st Century Policy Planners
How is history relevant to the present, or indeed the future? Governments around the world have used history to inform planning and decision‐making in various fields for years, but more recently it has taken on a renewed importance as governments grapple with increasingly complex challenges arising from the impacts of climatic change. Yet identifying “lessons from the past” is not straightforward. Especially in the case of big questions about his…
Mudanças climáticas, vulnerabilidade e resiliência no Mediterrâneo medieval (apresentação)
Este artigo pretende apresentar um quadro geral da historiografia a respeito do tema das mudanças climáticas. Nosso foco não são as mudanças em si, mas a maneira como as comunidades reagiram a elas. Esse tem sido o principal objeto das reflexões mais recentes sobre o tema e, ao mesmo tempo, o eixo em torno do qual os autores deste dossiê redigiram os seus artigos. Pretendemos mostrar que é um equívoco atribuir às comunidades pré-modernas uma gran…
Climate change, vulnerability, and resilience in the medieval Mediterranean (presentation)
This article aims to present an overview of the historiography about climate change. Our focus is not on the changes themselves, but on how communities reacted to them. This has been the main object of the most recent reflections on the subject and, at the same time, the central point around which the authors of this dossier have written their articles. We intend to show that it is a mistake to attribute great vulnerability to climate phenomena t…
Discovery and Dilemma
This article presents the first paleogenetic evidence for Yersinia pestis, the causative agent of plague, in the immediate area of Constantinople in the sixth century, the epicenter of surviving first-pandemic narratives. Construction of a natural gas pipeline led to the discovery and excavation of a late antique necropolis in the Bosna Çiftliği locality (near modern Silivri, ancient Selymbria) of Fatih Mahallesi, some fifty miles west of Istanbu…
Problems, Progress, and Prospects
Yersinia bacterium, plague, ectoparasites research (16 obras) · History (15 obras) · Geography (13 obras) · Archaeology (12 obras) · Medicine (11 obras) · Sociology (10 obras) · Ancient history (9 obras) · Biology (8 obras) · Art (7 obras) · Political science (7 obras)