{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,20]],"date-time":"2026-08-20T15:11:46Z","timestamp":1787238706896,"version":"build-2736575974"},"reference-count":51,"publisher":"Cambridge University Press (CUP)","issue":"4","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,2,17]],"date-time":"2025-02-17T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1739750400000},"content-version":"unspecified","delay-in-days":139,"URL":"http:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by-nc-nd\/4.0"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["cambridge.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Med. Hist."],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2024,10]]},"abstract":"<jats:title>Abstract<\/jats:title>\n                  <jats:p>\n                    This essay responds to Brack\n                    <jats:italic>et al<\/jats:italic>\n                    ., \u2018Plague and the Mongol Conquest of Baghdad (1258)? A reevaluation of the sources\u2019, which is a critique of our 2021 essay in this journal, \u2018Plague and the Fall of Baghdad (1258)\u2019. We argue that Brack and colleagues have misunderstood our investigation as an attempt to pinpoint the exact timing of the outbreak of plague connected with the Mongol siege of Baghdad, and so believe that an altered timeframe invalidates our suggestion that plague was involved. Taking this opportunity to revisit the state of plague historiography in western Asia, we address four issues: (1) why Mongol historiography has, until recently, avoided the question of plague\u2019s late mediaeval resurgence within the Mongol Empire and why the \u2018new genetics\u2019 of plague now makes the question unavoidable; (2) why reconstruction of the biological processes of \u2018focalisation\u2019 is now the most urgent question in plague historiography since it constitutes what we call the prodromal stage of the Black Death pandemic; (3) how a newly informed biological perspective on disease history can allow a more sensitive reading of past observers\u2019 reports of epidemics; and finally, (4) what a plausible scenario might look like for plague\u2019s presence in western Asia and the eastern Mediterranean region in the late-thirteenth and early-fourteenth centuries as an emerging\n                    <jats:italic>zoonotic<\/jats:italic>\n                    disease with occasional epizootic and human outbreaks, before the more catastrophic outbreaks of the 1340s commonly referred to as \u2018the Black Death\u2019.\n                  <\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1017\/mdh.2024.29","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,2,17]],"date-time":"2025-02-17T03:05:47Z","timestamp":1739761547000},"page":"411-435","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1017\/policypage","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":5,"title":["Plague history, Mongol history, and the processes of focalisation leading up to the Black Death: a response to Brack\n                    <i>et al.<\/i>"],"prefix":"10.1017","volume":"68","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0001-8978-9631","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Monica H.","family":"Green","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-0232-5821","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Nahyan","family":"Fancy","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"56","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2025,2,17]]},"reference":[{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref17","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.cub.2023.01.064"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref19","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1353\/sys.2021.0028"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref14","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/S135618632200044X"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.31857\/S0031184723040014"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref16","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1038\/s42003-022-04394-6"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref20","first-page":"1","article-title":"Buboes in Thirteenth-Century China: Evidence from Chinese Medical Writings","volume":"8","author":"Hymes","year":"2022","journal-title":"The Medieval Globe"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref27","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.5617\/jais.9292"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref7","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.25162\/sudhoff-2012-0020"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref5","volume-title":"Plagues and Peoples","author":"McNeill","year":"1976"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref22","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1016\/j.chom.2016.05.012"},{"key":"S0025727324000292_ref40","first-page":"282","volume-title":"The Mammals of the Caucasus. 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