Arjun Walia – Prior to the ‘discovery’ of the Americas by  Europeans, scholars have estimated the pre-contact era population to be as high as 100 million people. For example, American anthropologist and ethnohistorian Henry F. Dobyns, most known for his published research on American Indians and Hispanic peoples in Latin and North America, estimated that more than one hundred and twelve million people inhabited the Americas prior to European arrival. He approximated that ten million alone inhabited an area north of the Rio Grande before European contact. In 1983, he revised that number to upwards of eighteen million. (source)(source)(source)

It’s also important to note that other scholars have estimated the number to be as low as ten million, and everything in between. For example, William M. Denovan, Professor Emeritus of Geography at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, believes there were approximately fifty four million inhabitants. (source)

The important point to take from this is that there were already a lot of people inhabiting the Americas prior to European Contact. People that were advanced, with extensive knowledge of medicine, the cosmos, and much more.

What Happened? Disease, Genocide, or Both?

What happened when “first contact” transpired? A massive decline of the indigenous population, that’s what. It’s one of, if not the, most dramatic declines of population in the known history of our planet. Continue reading →