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If this were true, Black Death cemeteries would provide unbiased cross-sections of demographic and epidemiological conditions in 14th-century Europe. Using skeletal remains from medieval England and Denmark, new methods of paleodemographic age estimation, and a recent multistate model of selective mortality, we test the assumption that the mid-14th-century Black Death killed indiscriminately. Skeletons from the East Smithfield Black Death cemetery in London are compared with normal, nonepidemic cemetery samples from two medieval Danish towns (Viborg and Odense). The results suggest that the Black Death did not kill indiscriminately\u2014that it was, in fact, selective with respect to frailty, although probably not as strongly selective as normal mortality.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1073\/pnas.0705460105","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2008,1,28]],"date-time":"2008-01-28T21:28:09Z","timestamp":1201555689000},"page":"1436-1441","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1073\/pnas.cm10313","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":205,"title":["Selectivity of Black Death mortality with respect to preexisting health"],"prefix":"10.1073","volume":"105","author":[{"given":"Sharon N.","family":"DeWitte","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"*Department of Anthropology, University at Albany, Albany, NY 12222; and"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"James W.","family":"Wood","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Anthropology and"},{"name":"Population Research Institute, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"341","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2008,2,5]]},"reference":[{"key":"e_1_3_3_1_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/CBO9780511802676"},{"key":"e_1_3_3_2_2","first-page":"717","volume-title":"Encyclopedia of Population","author":"Wood JW","year":"2003","unstructured":"JW Wood Encyclopedia of Population, eds P Demeny, G McNicoll (Macmillan, New York), pp. 717\u2013720 (2003)."},{"key":"e_1_3_3_3_2","first-page":"467","volume-title":"Skeletal Biology of Past Peoples","author":"Milner GR","year":"2000","unstructured":"GR Milner, JW Wood, JL Boldsen Skeletal Biology of Past Peoples, eds S Saunders, M Katzenberg (Wiley-Liss, New York), pp. 467\u2013497 (2000)."},{"key":"e_1_3_3_4_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1086\/204084"},{"key":"e_1_3_3_5_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1002\/ajpa.1330890208"},{"key":"e_1_3_3_6_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1002\/evan.1360030306"},{"key":"e_1_3_3_7_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1002\/ajpa.10000"},{"key":"e_1_3_3_8_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1017\/CBO9780511542428"},{"key":"e_1_3_3_9_2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1023\/A:1021200925063"},{"key":"e_1_3_3_10_2","unstructured":"BM Usher (Pennsylvania State Univ University Park PA PhD dissertation. 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