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| This skull, from a 5-year-old child from Man Bac, Vietnam shows skeletal lesions consistent with congenital treponemal disease. (Image credit: Vlok et al. 2026, CC BY-NC 4.0) |
Evidence found in Vietnam shows a disease capable of congenital transmission (from parent to child) was present around 4000 years ago - and which distinctly was not syphilis when the DNA was examined. This presents a fundamental challenge to a key aspect of the 'Columbian' theory of the origin of syphilis. Quoting from Kristina Killgrove's article for LiveScience -
"Our new research flips the script," Nicola Czaplinski, a doctoral candidate in health sciences at the University of Notre Dame Australia, said in an email to Live Science. According to their findings, "congenital transmission isn't unique to syphilis." - LiveScience
The finds of three children in Vietnam with congenital treponematosis - but which was not syphilis - changes several aspects of our current understanding of the origin and spread of the disease. Of the four diseases that result from Treponema pallidum, only syphilis was believed to be capable of congenital transmission.
In palaeopathology it was, until relatively recently, the consensus that syphilis was present in the Americas prior to the voyages of Columbus. The theory developed that the introduction of the disease to Eurasia (where its history has been somewhat difficult to pin down) was the result of it being carried by sailors via sexual transmission. This is what is known as the 'Columbian hypothesis'. However in the last ten years there have been questions as to the validity of this argument. Since 2020 there has been increasing evidence that the disease existed in Europe long before the voyages of Columbus and his fellow colonizers. One UK example comes from the Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Apple Down and was analysed by Garrard Cole and Tony Waldron.
'The researchers noted that because most of the individuals with treponematosis across both studies were children and adolescents, the disease was likely not transmitted sexually. But the existence of congenital cases complicates the assumption that mother-to-child transmission was exclusive to syphilis, a cornerstone to the "Columbus hypothesis" that leans on the idea that syphilis originated in the Americas.' - LiveScience
It has been suggested elsewhere that advances in aDNA analysis may aid research into the origins of the disease since it is able to distinguish between syphilis and other diseases with similar symptomology. However, aDNA work faces a number of challenges, including that Treponema pallidum is notoriously difficult to recover and analyse from skeletal remains.
This study moves us one step closer to establishing a possible transmission route, and adds to our understanding of the disease itself - a disease which had a distinct and clear impact on human history.
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