What Wiped Out the Aztecs?

[Gee.S]

What Wiped Out the Aztecs? Scientists Find New Clues

[Stan]

I'm betting on Euro diseases and guns.

[Gee.S]

Not so much as it turns out, which is the point of the article. I'll admit, the article does not provide the best take on the study. Read the study, it's very interesting.

[Stone Jaguar]

Anyone who has studied Pre-Colombian demographics in Mesoamerica and the steep 16th century depopulations will view this kind of breathless announcement as just a tad suspect (see comments from others who did not participate in the study). There is plenty of iconographic evidence in codices as well as oral accounts provided to Spanish chroniclers showing evidence of severe smallpox, malarial, etc. outbreaks in the indigenous populations throughout this period. Because of the amount of trade between the central Mexican plateau and the rest of the region, and the ease of transmission of many of these diseases to previously unexposed populations as well as their mortality rates, many areas are known to have been depopulated well in advance of conquering Spanish forces and their indigenous allies. Complex questions rarely have simple answers; much less those that can be clicked on and assimilated on the 21st century internet and quickly resolved "with DNA evidence". What to say? Apparently, a whopping 24 individuals were sampled from a single site to reach this conclusion. While pandemics that had their origins in the Old World almost certainly played a huge role in Mesoamerican population declines, subsequent societal upheavals probably also drove people away from more-or-less organized urban centers and into more perilous hand-to-mouth existences on the edge of wilderness.

An interesting footnote to this is that by the time the great European naturalists arrived to explore and inventory what were once densely-populated areas of Mesoamerica in the 18th and 19th centuries, throughout the wet lowlands they found magnificent forests that they assumed had existed for millennia. In fact, many of these ecosystems had recovered to what by all accounts were visually near pristine conditions well within 400 years of having been under intensive cultivation. A famous Mexican ecologist once observed that there was probably no piece of ground in Mexico that had not felt the tread of a human foot sometime since the arrival of the first invaders.

[Gee.S]

Almost any study of ancient pathologies is likely "a tad suspect". Given what little I know of the area and the times, I found the study fascinating, and conclusions do not seem unreasonable. The source of later epidemics might still be traced to European contact, and the study in no way diminishes the impact of smallpox and other familiar pathogens.

Let's try to remember, it is still early days for this type of study and analysis. Hats off to these pioneers. Nicely done, IMHO.

And of course, 24 individuals would be ridiculous. It was 29.

[Stan]

I had had read that the North American Indian also had to endure never documented mass killings. I'm sure the Spanish had no qualms eliminating villages while never leaving a trace.

[Gee.S]

How did you read it, if it wasn't documented?

[Stone Jaguar]

Gee, just to clarify, the diseases I mentioned are also all believed to have been brought to the New World during the Conquest. It would be tough to argue that waves of pestilence that accompanied the Spanish presence in SE Mexico and Guatemala-Honduras were not originated by them.

Stan, both the Aztec (popular sense) and the Quiché Maya, two dominant Mesoamerican cultures at the time of first contact in the late 15th and early 16th century, were both hegemonic and unspeakably cruel to those they subjugated, by any current definition. They were quite capable of wiping out rival population centers on their own. I am by no means defending the wretched excesses of many Spaniards or Criollos (afterwards), but to ignore home grown mayhem is to ignore historical evidence. This would also apply to some cultures further north, that also routinely conducted ethnic cleansings. Wars/skirmishes over scarce/desireable resources are common to all mankind throughout recorded history.

[Gee.S]

Have either of you actually read the study? These well-known and widely accepted factoids, such as poor treatment of subjugated indigenous peoples and old world pathogen introductions, are prominent considerations within.

Salmonella enterica genomes from victims of a major sixteenth-century epidemic in Mexico

[Stone Jaguar]

Yes, I read the summary. My beef is with the isolation of salmonella as the source of this pandemic, based on a tiny sample. Am I mistaken, or is that the headline conclusion?

A broader read on this topic suggests MANY moving parts.

[Gee.S]

Since I am not a pathologist, I cannot comment on the likelihood of salmonella as either prime or secondary in this instance. That salmonella evidence was discovered seems beyond contestation, and that such outbreaks can reach pandemic proportions is also beyond contestation.

And the study, as I read it, suggests many moving parts, of which salmonella was apparently one.

[Stone Jaguar]

The authors note that they are using a new tool (MALT) that may or may not be proven to be infallible, or discarded in the future. Since the particular pathogen they mentioned could conceivably have been deposited at a later date, via leached fecal contamination or other routes, they emphasize the importance of a timeline of degradation to make their case. They may well be right, or not. The skeletal remains examined may just be unlucky buggers that died of this disease, while a greater portion of the populace might have died from, say, the plague or indigenous or introduced viral hemorrhagic fever/s.

Interesting stuff, but by no means conclusive as to “What Wiped Out the Aztecs?”, which is the topic of this post. I would note that researchers on the ground in México postulate a virus as the source of cocoliztli and that this screening technique would have missed it, if a virus was indeed the culprit.

As you have no doubt noticed, the US media is going bananas with this, suggesting “double dragon”, Chipotle Mexican Grill-type digestive disorders as the the near certain cause of depopulation of the central Mexican plateau post Conquest. This is by no means the authors’ doing, it’s just the internet doing what it does best; turning gold into pig iron and vice versa.

[Gee.S]

Yeah, the Nat Geo article I linked is a pretty awful misinterpretation. But I enjoyed the study. Had not seen the Chipotle angle, but there may be something to that...

[Stan]

Well,It was the anthropologists who later came into mass graves that most likely put 2 and 2 together. Indians thrived for 15,000 years in the America's. 100 years after Cortez they were pretty much wiped out.
Just like large Mammals thrived for a million years or more in the America's,and in a thousand years just about all were gone after the Indians arrived. That's what human's do.

Its like when Steven Hawkings says "Advanced civilizations pretty much kill off the less advanced".. BUT,As Neil Tyson says "We only know that as true of human behavior" we don't know what Alien advanced far past us will do".

I'm more likely to believe Alien space ships off of San Diego then native strain malaria suddenly kicked in on the native Indian.

[Gee.S]

^ And yet ancient Arizona Native American cultures wiped themselves out without any assistance from Europeans, sometime around 1450. That is a subject near and dear to my heart, and I have my own notions about that. For the sake of brevity, let's just say I place much of the blame on an unusually warlike and viscous people known as the Anasazi. BTW, some Anasazi may have wound up in NW Mexico post regional culture collapse, and when Conquistadors finally made it that far north, locals handed them their arses and drove them into the hills with their tails between their legs. There is no Spanish record of further contact attempt for near 100 years.

[Stan]

Also,Eric the Red must have thought a country that isn't covered in ice most of the year and with verdant forests might be a good place to stay. But Eric and the Vikings had weapons no worse then spears or bow and arrows. So,Indians sent them on their way.

[Shmuel]

And one of my favorite Marshal Macluhan quotes: "We are proud of our museums where we display a way of life we have made impossible."

Where did the cliff dwellers go?

[Agavemonger]

See House of Rain by Craig Childs for an excellent primmer on what actually happened to the Anasazi and the Hohokam, based largely upon relatively recent scientific investigation and migration theory. This book is an exceptional read.

The latest scientific evidence is that the massive southwest cultures pretty much moved away in waves to the Rio Grande and to Hopi and on south to Zuni, including Homol'ovi and many Mogollon rim sites, to include The White Mountains area and the south draining canyons of the Mogollon Rim. There was a merging of the Northern peoples with the Hohokam which led to the establishment of the Salado Horizon. Eventually, with the Spanish Intrusions, the cultures evolved further (and quite dramatically) into the current tribes of the Southwest (save for the Navajo, which were a different tribe altogether which came down from much further to the Northwest just prior to 1500 A.D.).

My personal view is that a massive and long-lasting failure of the Pinon Nut crop, due to extreme drought over several decades, would figure largely in the successive migrations.

There is very little evidence of warlike conditions amongst the Anasazi, save for a few incidents of cannibalism and defensive construction among the stragglers as the culture devolved away from the Anasazi homelands. And, of course, there was massive resistance to the Spanish invasions much later.

The Monger

[Gee.S]

The Childs book is an excellent read. He actually discusses in some detail the craven warlike ways of the Anasazi, and how it bled down through AZ over several generations.

Anasazi were probably worse than the Aztecs. Prehistoric horrors at Chaco Canyon are the stuff of nightmares. Mass graves of sacrificed children, ugh.... Modern archeologists don't usually write about that stuff because Hopi, Zuni and other Puebloan tribes don't like it and cut off access to archeologists who do so.

[Agavemonger]

I have perhaps a hundred tomes on Chaco itself, and many more on that extended horizon. I am a little confused about prehistoric horrors, mass graves of children, etc., as I don't recall any reference to that besides some very limited incidences of cannibalism (more up in the Four Corners region, and at the end of the Anasazi Horizon).

I spent 12 days in Grand Gulch on two different occasions; I have to say that each and every ruin in this extensive canyon system had both a lower Pueblo and also a virtually inexcessible, clearly defensive, combination granary/survival pueblo on the alcove cliff directly above the larger primary Pueblo. So, obviously, there was an on-going need to defend foodstuffs near the end of the migration periods of the entire culture in the Four Corners Region.

The Monger

[Gee.S]

No, Chaco was at the very center of it. The old myths of the Ansazi as peaceful farmers are just that -- myths. Current theory as I understand it, is that Anasazi faced no significant external threats, and that much of the bloodletting (aside from the ritual horrors of Chaco) involved infighting amongst the Anasazi themselves. That infighting drove some Anasazi south through AZ into Mogollon territory, and eventually into Hohokam territory, where that cultural merger spawned what we call the Salado. Arch records suggest the uneasy Anasazi/Mogollon alliance ended with a series of horrifying mass murders. So really just more of the same infighting that drove them there in the first place. All just a lot of theory of course. With no written language as a basis, all this stuff does seem a bit out on a limb.

[Agavemonger]

Interesting, and certainly plausible. When it comes to these cultures, there certainly seems to be no end to the mysteriousness about them.

A forewarning: Studying these cultures at length (and especially visiting the extended Chaco and Hohokam Horizon sites throughout the Southwest) can easily lead to a life-long obsession!

The Monger

[Stan]

That drought the Anasazi endured was epic. What was fertile and reliable became sand. That right there would make a tribe cranky. It sort of ties in with "Why we don't find any evidence of high intelligence anyplace in the Universe". Society's it seems wipe themselves out long before they colonize other worlds. The Fermi Paradox. You would think that as we look out billions of light years we would have spotted a super race- they made a square shaped star that defies logic,say. But no.
Look- North Korea,Russia's continent killing torpedo..I mean,how can we colonize Mars,when it would take only a single deranged scientist on Mars to kill off everybody? Pull the air plug basically.
Its like this 80f weather in the bay area in February..enjoy it. While we all still can.

[Stan]

Go Eagles!

[Spination]

Go Condors!