Colonialism Americas

European colonialism in the Americas (beginning 1492 with Columbus) produced the greatest demographic catastrophe in human history — the indigenous population of the Americas declined by an estimated 90% within 150 years of European contact, from approximately 60 million to 6 million. While violence, slavery, and warfare contributed, epidemic diseases (smallpox, measles, influenza, typhus) against populations with no immune experience caused most deaths — sometimes spreading inland faster than Europeans themselves, producing ghost civilizations. The Spanish conquistadors (Hernán Cortés conquering the Aztec Empire 1519-21 with 600 men; Francisco Pizarro conquering the Inca Empire 1532-33 with 168 men) succeeded not through military superiority alone but because smallpox had already killed much of the population (including the Aztec emperor Cuitláhuac) and because they exploited existing political divisions. The encomienda system (forced indigenous labor on Spanish estates) and the mita system (forced Andean labor in silver mines) extracted enormous wealth and killed millions through overwork and unsafe conditions.