The American catastrophe

The depopulation of the Americas took place in the 16th and 17th centuries.  Naturally, regional collapses had already taken place earlier.  Maybe the most famous is the Mayan culture’s collapse.  The Mayans suffered overpopulation in the 9th century.  Then the worst drought in millennia hit.  Millions of people starved to death and many cities were abandoned.  However, that does not mean the Mayans disappeared entirely.  Today there are many Native American tribes all culturally descended from Ancient Mayans.  The are foremostly found in Mexico, Guatemala and Belize.

The Spanish royal couple was sponsor of Cristoforo Colombo’s expedition.  This gave Spain a head start during the following colonialism.  The Mesoamericans were conquered early as was the peoples of the Andes.  The areas they inhabited became mainly Spanish colonies.  What later happened to them was due to the Europeans’ mistakes.  Without knowing it they took with them contagions causing epidemics.  The ones I know about were:

• influenza

• malaria

• measles

• salmonella

• smallpox

The Native Americans lacked earlier contact with these diseases.  For this reason they lacked opportunity to evolve resistance too.  As a result people dropped like flies.  With many repeated epidemics the population decrease dramatically.  It is estimated that present-day Mexico lost 96% in less than a century.  I think it was the same over the entire of Mesoamerica.  Also, the Andes must have been hit by something comparable.  Did it suffer to a less degree it was due to a cooler climate.

Attempts to conquer the Amazon during the colonial era failed.  The various conquest attempts took with them contagious diseases killing loads of peoples.  The Amazon was for this reason hit too, despite it not being conquered.  The Mound Builders met the same fate as the Amazon’s state societies.  Both collapsed as result of epidemics before their areas were conquered.

Virtually all Native American peoples have been hit by epidemics.  Outside already established state societies the decrease in population was slower.  Diseases spread more slowly if the population is sparser.  Still, the population there decreased to nearly as high degree.  It is estimated that 90% of those living there lack living descendants.  However, these peoples are not biologically extinct.  Although some are culturally as result of later forced assimilation.

One may wounder why earlier contacts did not result in catastrophe.  The only ones documented today are Polynesians and Scandinavians.  Both island-hopped there step by step in open sailboats.  The Scandinavians had more domesticated animals but came to an area which was more sparsely populated.  I am not sure if they even met any farmers.  Spaniards and later colonialists sailed over in one go.  They used closed boats for early expeditions too.  Infectious disease being conveyed then become much likelier.

Their colonies’ large depopulation came to ruinate Spain.  It did not help that they took home enormous amounts of gold and silver.  These materials are considered precious partially because of their rarity.  When so much more of these materials were now available in Europe they became much less valuable.  Spain had too much money and too little being there to be bought.  It became possible for other countries to become large colonial powers.  These includes England (later Britain), France and the Netherlands.  Portugal had already laid claims on some areas.  However, there were too few Portuguese for much of a colonial rule.

The Transatlantic slave trade was born out of desperation for manpower.  At the time Europe did not yet have any population pressure.  Neither are Europeans adapted to the climate of many of the colonies.  For this there were needed people from the tropics.  Along Africa’s west coast there were people willing to sell slaves.  Less than half of those enslaved survived long enough to become useful manpower.  But the desperation was so severe that it was still considered profitable.

 

Uploaded on the 11th of August 2025.