According to the old chroniclers, the year 589 was a miserable one, weather-wise, for Italy; and after a dreary, dark, and rainy summer, Rome was hit that autumn with a disastrous flood. Bishop Gregory of Tours, citing an eye-witness in his Histories, describes churches collapsing and granaries destroyed. He also says that dozens of water-snakes and a giant dragon were washed through town by the deluge. Snakes and dragons weren’t the worst of it, though, because no sooner had the flood abated than “a pestilence” ravaged Rome, claiming many lives, including that of Pope Pelagius II.
Pelagius was succeededhe recounts another flood, again quoting an eye-witness, that also occurred in the autumn of 589, but this time in Verona.
