The Role of Disease in European Exploration and Colonization

One of the most interesting questions to ponder: is can a link be drawn directly to show the causation of why and when countries adopted customs or habits that are now fundamental in the present day. With secondary sources, these correlations can be shown and provide statistics as proof, based upon analysis of important primary sources. The journal article The Columbian Exchange: A History of Disease, Food and Ideas is a secondary source detailing what occurred in the years after the voyage of Columbus and how both the New World and the Old World were affected during this period of colonization. An interesting perspective was given in this paper, unlike many others that describe the same topic, in which the authors chose to focus on how the Old World was affected more so than what transpired in the areas being colonized. There was an extravagant biological exchange of both crops and disease, which provided serious lifestyle changes for both Europeans and the native people of the Americas, and there were also consequences elsewhere in the world associated with the Columbus exchange in the years after its commencement. Secondary sources are also very important to historians and this is a source that is very well written, backed up by diagrams and detailed evidence found in primary sources.

The speed with which the disease was spread in a largely rural and, by modern standards, not densely populated, society; the short interval between infection and death;

Europeans implemented their military might when conquering Native Americans. The European technology of weaponry included guns and cannons that were far more advanced than the typical bow and arrow and tomahawks used by Indians. Over the years, colonists used weapons along with other tactics to intimidate natives into conversion or ceding land. With the lack of advanced armament, along with modest numbers, natives were unable to defend themselves from impeding colonial attacks. The invaders were infamously renowned as “mechanical, soulless creatures that wielded diabolically ingenious tools and weapons to accomplish mad ends.”

People of the Old World had domesticated pigs, horses, sheep, and cattle(1), which had acted as pathogens to infect the Europeans with diseases. In addition, diseases were constantly circulated with centuries of war, exploration, and city building. During the process of natural selection, disease-intolerant

Irrigation and domestication of animals led to an ideal environment for the spread of infectious epidemic diseases. Irrigation contributed to the spread of disease by transforming a naturally hot

The European conquest of the new world was most commonly attributed to the superiority of the Europeans in all the facets of their confrontation. They had the superior weaponry, and were thought to have a superior intellect. After all, they were just bringing "civilization" to the new world, right? It sounds nice when you are learning about Columbus in grade school, but the traditional story is pretty far from the truth. The truth is that the Europeans, when they discovered this was a brand new world and not the spice islands, sought to rape the land for its gold and natural resources and enslave the Amerindians (native Americans), who were regarded to

A time period that brought two previously isolated worlds together was the Age of Exploration. Great and lasting changes happened for both the Old and New World. This was caused by the European Explorers. Most people argue that European exploration of the Americas had both beneficial and harmful effect. There were more harmful effects brought into the New World.

1. What fundamental factors drew the Europeans to the exploration, conquest, and colonization of the New World? What was the impact on the Indians, Europeans, and Africans when each of their previously separate worlds “collided” with one another? What caused the shift from indentured servant to African slaves as the dominant labor force in the southern colonies?

The author states, " Finally, the mere fact that agriculture encouraged people to clump together in crowded societies, many of which then carried on trade with other crowded societies, led to the spread of parasites and infectious disease. " Diseases were more likely to spread in these agricultural societies because they were clumped together and also because they did not move around a lot since their society is built to become a permanent settlement. Diseases would not affect the hunter-gatherers as much because these people were nomadic. Diamond states, "Epidemics couldn't take hold when populations were scattered in small bands that constantly shifted camp." This quote helps reveal that it would not have an effect on the hunter-gatherers as much as it would to a population because they constantly shifted around looking for animals to hunt and for plants to gather. In conclusion, agriculture is shown to have many downsides compared to hunting and gathering which helps demonstrate that agriculture was an error in human

Smallpox was endemic in the Old World, which means that the overwhelming majority of Europeans were exposed to the virus in childhood” (Resendez 15). The infections presented in the Americas by the Europeans were swarm infections: that is, people who have once gotten the illness and survived end up immune to the disease. The early Europeans knew that sicknesses were obliterating the Native American people group. Many of the English pioneers saw the infections as confirmation of God's arrangement for them to settle the territory. Numerous Europeans, both Spanish and English, see the overwhelming infections as confirmation of God's anger coordinated toward the Indians and proof of the corrupt existence of the Indians. Since Native Americans were heathens the worst sin of all, it was normal that God ought to demolish them with such a disease. “Since both causes of death, disease and famine, were so common throughout Europe, many historians find it difficult or impossible to distinguish between those who died of disease and those who merely starved to death” (Stannard 58). Nourishment deficiencies and soaring costs were an unavoidable truth for as much as a century prior to the plague. Wheat, oats, hay, and

Diseases can be preventable and curable but many still manage to devastate on international scales, whether it was during the Middle Ages or today. These illnesses are sometimes underrated in their effects on the human race where symptoms can range from minimal to down-right devastating and painful. No matter where it started, they can bring devastating effects to the surrounding area. When someone wants to know about a disease, they want to know where it came from, it's symptoms, and how it affected the community in which it appeared. The Black Death, Ebola, and the Zika virus are examples of large-scale illnesses that vary in all three of these topics but still managed to threaten humans on a bigger scale than expected. Diseases like the

When a disease has existed in a community for years, the members of said community develop a natural, inherited defense after some generations. After initial entrance, the disease runs through the population and the more susceptible individuals acquire the disease and die from it. Those individuals "hardy" enough to survive then dominate the gene pool and the disease become less fatal to the remaining population. (Meltzer, 39)

Along with famine, pestilence was also a great enemy to the early farmer. One of the most famous plagues began in the 1330s, which became known as the Black Death. It was caused by fleas carrying Yersinia Pestis, a bacterium which began to infect humans when fleas bit them. One study estimated that “it claimed an estimated 60% of the European population” (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [CDC], 2015, History of Plague, para. 4). Some towns were completely wiped out, while other towns suffered so much that there weren’t enough living to bury the dead. On the other hand, hunter-gatherers would not have to worry so much about this problem due to them thriving in much lesser numbers. A source of food from gathered plants and hunted animals didn’t support a giant population, so these nomads groups need not worry much about these invisible enemies, for their smaller groups weren’t such a hotbed for the spread of

The first thing the book brings into topic the the small pox disease which first started in 1350 B.C. Killing between three and seven million people! Of the infected people that were fortunate enough to live, most of them were left blind. According to the text in 1717 the small pox disease spread to the west. When this happened people came up with the idea of inoculations. Inoculations is when an infected person purposely spreads the disease to a non infected person, hoping they can build an immunity faster and more efficiently. The disease causes a rash and the rash causes hemorrhaging. after about a week the rash will turn into boils covering the body and filling with puss, which leads them to burst. Leaving scars on survivors. Cow pox was

After a civilization gains domesticable animals they will contract some of the diseases those animals hold. One key example are the Spanish, they contracted smallpox from some of their domesticable animals, and although it did kill much of their population eventually they gained an immunity to the disease, but they were still carriers of it. The Inca, which the Spanish later came into contact with, contracted smallpox. This was because they didn’t have an immunity to the disease, because they didn’t have any domesticable animals except llamas, which didn’t carry