One factor in the defeat of the American Indian

One factor in the defeat of the American Indian civilizations was their demographic collapse. There has been debate among researchers as to the cause of that collapse. Some identify genocidal acts by the Europeans as the main cause. Some attribute it to the introduction of new diseases and still others to both factors. Scholars now believe that, among the various contributing factors, epidemic disease was the overwhelming cause of the population decline of the Native Americans because of their lack of immunity to new diseases brought from Europe.[14] The American researcher HF Dobyns estimates that 95% of the total population of the Americas died in the first 130 years.[15] Cook and Borak of the University of California at Berkeley claim that the population in Mexico declined from 25.2 million in 1518 to 700 thousand people in 1623, less than 3% of the original population.[16] In 1492, the combined populations of Spain and Portugal did not exceed 10 million people.[13]:136 There is some consensus that the demographic collapse of the original population of the Americas was the main cause of its military defeat.[citation needed] One factor often overlooked is that there were few strong diplomatic relationships among the vast and greatly dispersed indigenous peoples of the Americas. Most peoples lived in isolated communities, with only limited trade contact and no regular communication. Limited trading was the only constant contact between most New World cultures.



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