Smallpox devastated the Mandan.
Craig Rullman is reading a book about the Mandan, the riverine trading culture that once thrived along the Missouri River in what is now the Dakotas. In the 18th Century, smallpox reduced them to a shadow of their former glory. We were talking the other night over dinner about the acceleration of the spread of disease on the Great Plains, thanks to the introduction of the horse. (Yes, this is dinner table conversation for history geeks).
The rapid transmission of disease — which of course is lightning-quick today — contributed to the relative depopulation of the Plains. Another friend was recently talking about the massive herds of buffalo found by Lewis & Clark and the early mountain men as a phenomenon of imbalance, created in part by that depopulation.
The utter biological catastrophe that struck the Americas in the Age of Discovery just boggles the mind. It’s hard to conceive of the scale. The Black Death took out about a third of the European population in the 14th Century. That’s mind-blowing enough. Imagine an apocalypse that took out 90 percent of a population.
It’s becoming increasingly evident that this was the scale of the devastation of the indigenous populations of the “New World” with the advent of the Europeans. It was an extinction event.
Historical accounts suggest that the arrival of Christopher Columbus and other Europeans in 1492 coincided with a significant reduction in the indigenous population of South, Central and North America. As many as 90 percent of all Native Americans are believed to have died around that time, wiped out by waves of new diseases such as smallpox, measles and influenza. In the first large-scale study of ancient DNA from early Americans, scientists trace the human journey over some 23,000 years and three continents, confirming the cataclysmic impact of the European arrival on the New World’s pre-Columbian population.
In the new study, published last week in the journal Science Advances, an international team of researchers sequenced the mitochondrial DNA from skeletons and mummies of 92 indigenous Americans ranging from 500 to 8,600 years old. Most were from the western part of South America, between Mexico and Chile.
Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is the genetic material located in the power-producing structures of human cells. Passed down from mother to child, it provides a way of tracing maternal lines of kinship over generations. The scientists found at least 84 genetic lineages among the 92 pre-Columbian Native Americans. When they compared the ancient DNA to that of modern Native American populations, they were shocked to discover that all 84 sequences were completely missing from the modern population.
“Surprisingly, none of the genetic lineages we found in almost 100 ancient humans were present, or showed evidence of descendants, in today’s indigenous populations,” the study’s lead author, Dr. Bastien Llamas, said in a statement. Though other pre-Columbian genetic lineages may still exist, and it’s possible the 84 lineages they found live on in some of the modern population not yet sampled, Llamas and his fellow researchers argue their findings suggest a “high extinction rate” among pre-Columbian lineages right around the time of European colonization.
Not advocating an ideological point or writhing in white guilt. It is what it is, and there will come a day when some superbug travels on a jet plane and gets us all. History turns on microbes.
Keith West says
I would love to have dinner with you guys sometime, just for the educational experience.
I would amend your last sentence to add “and predator species.” We’ve been seeing a similar thing involving snakes in the South Pacific for years to give just one example. They’ve been hitching rides on airplanes, hidden in the cargo. Open crates and such. The bird populations on islands that previously had no snakes have been devastated.
On an unrelated note, what’s the status on your Kickstarter? I haven’t missed it, have I? Things have been crazy lately, & I’ve not kept up with blogs consistently.
JimC says
Haven’t missed it. Still getting organized — had to set aside for first part of April due to major day-job and Folk Festival projects.
A massive feast in the long hall is what is in order, you ask me — all of this motley crew of scholars and woodsrunners.
lane batot says
Dang, but I’d like to attend. but it’d take me a coupla years at least to sail/row the dragon ship down the Atlantic coast, around South America and then all the way up the Pacific coast. Er maybe it’d be easier and quicker to take a dogteam North, and come across Canada, then back down a bit. Of course my main experience(ahem!) is with dogteams. Either way, please give my PLENTY of notice…..
JimC says
Dog team all the way…
lane batot says
….question is, have you seen VISUAL EVIDENCE that this could be possible for moi?(ahem!)–it’d only take you about five minutes…….
JimC says
In the queue for tomorrow.
Craig Rullman says
Just came across this bit last night, from the book. “On November 11, 1795, the Mackay-Evans party arrived at the settlements of the Omaha Indians in modern-day Nebraska. With winter closing in, Mackay elected to halt and build a for there to wait out the season. Byu spring he had decided to send Evans and a smaller party ahead without him. Their charge was to proceed to the Mandans, to the Rocky Mountains, and then to the Pacific Ocean. They were to keep their eyes peeled for unicorns–‘an animal which has only one horn on its forehead’–along the way. They set out on June 8, 1796.” As late as 1796 we still had people looking for unicorns in north America. Other parties were convinced that the Mandans were Welsh, because sightings of blonde haired natives using Welch words were claimed. In 1797, David Thompson, was sent by the NWTC to convince the Mandan’s and Hidatsas to come north to trade, rather than vice-versa. Thompsons population estimate of the 5 villages was 2,946. “The numbers reveal a tragic reality…over the previous three centuries they had lost 75-90 percent of their population.”
JimC says
Hunting for unicorns and Welshmen…
Thompson was a great one. I didn’t know that he had made that statement. So it was evident even then.
Craig Rullman says
I should clarify, he didn’t make the percentage claim–that’s the author of the book, deducing from earlier reports and also the archaeological evidence.
JimC says
Ah, got it. Still, the picture’s awfully consistent.
lane batot says
…..and regarding the Mandans(and other tribes)–tragic as it all is, THANK GOODNESS Catlin got there and did his paintings and records before that epidemic hit them. Reading Catlin’s accounts are magnificent, but depressing to me…….And that DNA study, where North American natives trace their origins to western SOUTH America–I’ve often wondered what occurred regarding the HUMANS in North America during the great Pleistocene Megafauna extinctions–some theorize humans were the CAUSE of those extinctions–others say it was some kind of catastrophic natural disaster(like another meteor hit)–others, like myself, feel it likely to have been a combination of things. One predator that apparently went extinct in North America, but then later repopulated the north from South America, was the Puma(Cougar, Mountain Lion, Panther, Painter, Catamount–whichever name you prefer for the critter)–something that came to light in a similar genetic study on them. This just makes a MAJOR cataclysmic natural disaster in the north more plausible, as at least part of the explanation of all those megafauna(and not-so mega species!) extinctions…..
Craig Rullman says
Catlin’s work was simply heroic, from our shared point of view. We would have virtually nothing of that…except, and only perhaps, the painted robe given to Lewis and Clark now in residence at the Peabody. According to Clark, the robe depicted a pitched battle between Mandan-Hidatsas against the Sioux and Arikara. And since it is two dimensional and crude by comparison, it doesn’t give us much. Interestingly, some scholars suggest that Bodmer and Catlin’s work actually inspired native drawing and painting as well, as some of them began to use linear perspective after seeing how it was done.
JimC says
But that’s cultural appropriation!
John says
Last year, I read an interesting bit of fiction, “The Children of the First Man”, by James Alexander Thom. It traces the Mandan back to the purported arrival of Prince Madoc, a Welshman, and his people in 1170, and their assimilation into the aboriginal culture over the centuries that followed. There is extensive “coverage” of the smallpox epidemics that decimated the Mandan tribes towards the end of the book. Thom obviously did extensive research in putting together this novel. I found it a worthy read.
I also remembered an article from Discover Magazine, from the early 90’s, called “The Arrow of Disease”. It’s still around, thanks to the web.
http://discovermagazine.com/1992/oct/thearrowofdiseas137
It is an interesting read, and illustrative of how critical epidemic was to the European conquest of the new world.
John C.
JimC says
Thx bro — will check that out.
lane batot says
Ha! I already got that book via a former blog reader recommendation right here on “Frontier Partisans”! I haven’t read it yet–it’s in that “to read” herd…….I read somewhere else(the Catlin books, maybe?) where the Mandans even had some ancient Welsh coins they kept as sacred talismans–don’t know if that’s verifiable now……
john roberts says
Following up on remarks made about the Vikings article below, is there any evidence for a large die-off of Northeastern Native Americans following the Norse expeditions of the 11th century. They were Europeans and should have been vectors of European diseases just as the 15th-16th century Europeans were.
JimC says
You’d think — but the dating seems to be oriented to late 15th Century.
john roberts says
I just read an article in the Smithsonian speculating that the Neanderthals may have fallen prey to new diseases carried by the modern humans who were fresh from the African tropics. It wouldn’t have been like the massive epidemics that ravaged the Americas, because populations were much smaller and more scattered, but over many generations, bands of Neanderthals may have been wiped out or at least reduced by contact with the newcomers. It’s interesting to speculate, at any rate.
lane batot says
People often forget how significant diseases can be in species’ extinctions–I find that disease playing a part in the Neanderthal demise perfectly plausible. I often wonder if it played a part in the Megafauna(mammal) extinctions in the Pleistocene(as well as other factors). A more modern example with animals is the extinction of the thylacines(Tasmanian Wolves/Tigers) on mainland Australia right about the time it is believed Dingos got introduced. No doubt some direct competition only speeded things up, but this seems a very similar example to the Cro- Magnon/Neanderthal controversy. Of course there are those who profess thylacines AREN’T extinct(I HOPE they are right!)–that a few might have hung on in remote Outback Australia, and of course their namesake island of Tasmania–where no doubt direct European settler persecution had it’s effect, but they also introduced dogs with their virulent diseases that those marsupials were so susceptible to–which would account why they disappeared even in the remotest corners far from human development. And there’s the modern phenomenon of all the frogs species dying off from diseases believed to be worsened by Climate Change(sigh)……
JimC says
Just read a story about a fungus killing off frogs in Australia.
lane batot says
I often wonder about plagues wreaking havoc on the dinosaurs, too–some prehistorical hoof-and-mouth epidemic. And I have feared for many years that some super virus is going to mutate and erupt affecting humans–it’s what Nature tends to do when species without other means of population control get out of control! If it happens, I think it will be not unlike the scenario that they used in the spooky final credits of the Ape film franchise remake “Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes”–with or without the anthropoids’ participation. Especially with common international flight travel, something could spread that quick…….
John says
Or, something like The Andromeda Strain, if anyone remembers that book and movie from the early 70’s. Boy am I old.
John C.
JimC says
But you can still rock.
lane batot says
I’m that dang old. And also Stephen King’s “The Stand”. And the REAL LIFE “Hot Zone”–now THAT’S a dang scary book!