Malaria is one of the most devastating diseases on the globe. According to the World Health Organization, there were 198 million cases of malaria worldwide in 2013, with over half a million people dying from the mosquito-borne illness. Researchers are trying to understand the history of the disease, and some articles have come out that has look at malaria in antiquity and the early modern periods. In a paper delivered last week at the Annual Meeting of the Medieval Academy of America, new insights have been offered on the disease in the early Middle Ages.

In his paper, ‘Malaria and Malaria-Like Disease in the Frankish Empire, c.450-950, Timothy Newfield examines over fifty references to illnesses which appear in Merovingian and Carolingian sources such as Gregory of Tours’ Historia Francorum. The records reveal that malaria existed in parts of both northern and southern Francia during this period, and likely existed in northern Europe prior to the fifth century.


Malaria is a mosquito-born parasite that gets passed onto humans when the insect bites their skin. The disease ranges in severity depending on the species of the parasite, but they typically cause fevers that occur every three days (tertian) or every four days (quartan).

Newfield has found 52 references in early medieval written texts that refer to cyclical fevers, which he believes are likely cases of malaria (although he acknowledges that even the sources were unsure of what the causes of these fevers were). Of these cases, 29 involved adults and 5 children, with men infected in 26 cases and women in 8. Newfield also notes that 10 cases involved elite individuals such as rulers, while 14 he described as non-elite.

The size sample is too small to know whether or not malaria was getting worse or better in the region.


Until now, the most common evidence of malaria from historical times is paleopathological research, but this cannot provide definitive proof of the disease. Some research has just begun to find evidence of malaria parasites in DNA, but so far only one successful find from the pre-modern world – a case from 5th century Italy – has been recorded.

Timothy Newfield is currently a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Princeton University, and has already done extensive research into medical history and the prevalence of disease in the early Middle Ages. Click here to see his page on Academia.edu