When European colonists set foot in the Americas, they ultimately brought about the crippling depopulation of Native communities.
New research from Harvard University reveals, however, that the large-scale decline began more than a century later than is commonly believed.
Tracing the devastation of Native Americans in the Southwest U.S. to the missionary efforts of the 1620s, the study suggests that waves of epidemic diseases, violence, and famine which followed wiped out near-entire communities in just decades.
As European settlers arrived, they brought infectious diseases, including smallpox, measles, influenza, bubonic plague, diphtheria, typhus, cholera, scarlet fever, chicken pox, yellow fever, and whooping cough.
WHAT THE STUDY FOUND
The findings reveals that, among the 18 Pueblo villages investigated, populations sank from roughly 6,500 people, to less than 900 in just 60 years.
Researchers link this to the establishment of mission churches in the 1620s.
As European settlers arrived, they brought infectious diseases, including smallpox, measles, influenza, bubonic plague, diphtheria, typhus, cholera, scarlet fever, chicken pox, yellow fever, and whooping cough.
The Native populations also suffered from violence and famine as a result of the settlement.
And, as the populations suffered, the local environment was altered as well.
The depopulation initially resulted in increased forest fires, but this region also ultimately shows carbon sequestration from forest regrowth.