%0 Journal Article %A Zhemin Zhou %A Inge Lundstrøm %A Alicia Tran-Dien %A Sebastián Duchêne %A Nabil-Fareed Alikhan %A Martin J. Sergeant %A Gemma Langridge %A Anna K. Fotakis %A Satheesh Nair %A Hans K. Stenøien %A Stian S. Hamre %A Sherwood Casjens %A Axel Christophersen %A Christopher Quince %A Nicholas R. Thomson %A François-Xavier Weill %A Simon Y.W. Ho %A M. Thomas P. Gilbert %A Mark Achtman %T Millennia of genomic stability within the invasive Para C Lineage of Salmonella enterica %D 2017 %R 10.1101/105759 %J bioRxiv %P 105759 %X Salmonella enterica serovar Paratyphi C is the causative agent of enteric (paratyphoid) fever. While today a potentially lethal infection of humans that occurs in Africa and Asia, early 20th century observations in Eastern Europe suggest it may once have had a wider-ranging impact on human societies. We recovered a draft Paratyphi C genome from the 800-year-old skeleton of a young woman in Trondheim, Norway, who likely died of enteric fever. Analysis of this genome against a new, significantly expanded database of related modern genomes demonstrated that Paratyphi C is descended from the ancestors of swine pathogens, serovars Choleraesuis and Typhisuis, together forming the Para C Lineage. Our results indicate that Paratyphi C has been a pathogen of humans for at least 1,000 years, and may have evolved after zoonotic transfer from swine during the Neolithic period.One Sentence Summary The combination of an 800-year-old Salmonella enterica Paratyphi C genome with genomes from extant bacteria reshapes our understanding of this pathogen’s origins and evolution. %U https://www.biorxiv.org/content/biorxiv/early/2017/02/14/105759.full.pdf