Rats have long been blamed for helping spread the plague in Europe . `` If we 're right , we 'll have to rewrite that part of history , '' Professor Nils Christian Stenseth of the University of Oslo , one of the authors of the study , told the BBC . But scientists say gerbils in Central Asia could have played a bigger role . The researchers found that rats from central Asia, which are known to carry plague, were more likely than those from other parts of Eurasia and Africa to be infected with the disease.
Rats have long been blamed for helping spread the plague in Europe . But scientists say gerbils in Central Asia could have played a bigger role . The researchers found that rats from central Asia, which are known to carry plague, were more likely than those from other parts of Eurasia and Africa to be infected with the disease.