What are some disturbing ancient historical facts?

 Biological warfare is not actually a modern concept. In 1346 the Mongol Golden Horde laid siege to the city of Kaffa located in Crimea that was controlled by the Italian Republic of Genoa at the time. The Mongols were frustrated by the resilience of the city, having tried to take the city in 1343. To make matters worse the Mongol forces were suffering from an extremely deadly disease which was sweeping through western Asia at the time.

The rampant spread of the disease made it impossible for the Mongol army to manage making them lose interest in the ongoing siege. Noticing that the city was overcrowded after taking in refugees from the surrounding area who had fled Mongol army. This led to the besieging army trying one final simple tactic.

According to contemporary historian Gabriele De’ Mussi the Mongols, quote, “ordered corpses to be placed in catapults and lobbed into the city in the hope that the intolerable stench would kill everyone inside.”

Thanks to modern biology we know these corpses carried more than just a bad smell. What the Mongols didn’t know was they were introducing the dreaded black death to the city of Kaffa. This very early employment of biological warfare was very effective and almost straight away the people of Kaffa began to die in huge numbers.

Unfortunately, matters would worsen exponentially when sailors began to depart from the city port and return to Western Europe unknowingly bringing the plague with them to major trading cities such as Venice and Genoa. It is possible that this is was the event that first introduced the 14th century Black Death into Europe which would go on to kill 30% to 60% of the European population.

Despite all this the Golden Horde never actually managed to take the city of Kaffa and made peace with the Genoese in 1347