RT Journal Article SR Electronic T1 Eighteenth century Yersinia pestis genomes reveal the long-term persistence of an historical plague focus JF bioRxiv FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory SP 036509 DO 10.1101/036509 A1 Kirsten I. Bos A1 Alexander Herbig A1 Jason Sahl A1 Nicholas Waglechner A1 Mathieu Fourment A1 Stephen A. Forrest A1 Jennifer Klunk A1 Verena J. Schuenemann A1 Debi Poinar A1 Melanie Kuch A1 Brian Golding A1 Olivier Dutour A1 Paul Keim A1 David M. Wagner A1 Edward C. Holmes A1 Johannes Krause A1 Hendrik N Poinar YR 2016 UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/01/12/036509.abstract AB The 14th-18th century pandemic of Yersinia pestis caused devastating disease outbreaks in Europe for almost 400 years. The reasons for plague’s persistence and abrupt disappearance in Europe are poorly understood, but could have been due to either the presence of now-extinct plague foci in Europe itself, or successive disease introductions from other locations. Here we present five Y. pestis genomes from one of the last European outbreaks of plague, from 1722 in Marseille, France. The lineage identified has not been found in any extant Y. pestis foci sampled to date, and has its ancestry in strains obtained from victims of the 14th century Black Death. These data suggest the existence of a previously uncharacterized historical plague focus that persisted for at least three centuries. We propose that this disease source may have been responsible for the many resurgences of plague in Europe following the Black Death.