Ancient Amazon Population 20 million

[Minimalist]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02302.html

But scientists now believe that instead of stone-age tribes, like the groups that occasionally emerge from the forest today, the Indians who inhabited the Amazon centuries ago numbered as many as 20 million, far more people than live here today.

"There is a gigantic footprint in the forest," said Augusto Oyuela-Caycedo, 49, a Colombian-born professor at the University of Florida who is working this swath in northeast Peru.

[Digit]

I read about it ealier Min, but the account just suggested the 20 million and no details as to how that figure had been arrived at, this is much more informative.

Roy.

[Rokcet Scientist]

Well, the white man's fire water, metal knives, gunpowder, and especially the white man's diseases – like consumption, influenza, gonorrhea, and syphilis – killed over 95% of them. So all we need to do is multiply the current number of Amazon indians by between 11 and 20 to get a ballpark figure of the number indians that lived in the Amazonas basin in the pre-Columbian era.

[Digit]

I was just wondering Min if Cog, using his genentic and population growth knowledge, could work back from that estimate to ascertain when colonisation began?
Could be revealing.

Roy.

[Minimalist]

I imagine he could....assuming that there was an unbroken expansion. I think that might be a huge assumption, though.

Let's just speculate for a moment. Given a large and growing agriculturally-based civilization is there any reason to think that they would have avoided the political/warfare problems of other such civilizations?

[Digit]

Very possibly not Min, but I'll bet that someone somewhere has come up with a formula that takes all this sort of thing into account, if he could give us a figure, plus or minus, it would be interesting.
Fingers crossed that Cogs awake!

Roy.

[Minimalist]

I wonder if someone ever did a study on what the population of Europe would have been in 1600 if the Black Death had not happened?

[Rokcet Scientist]

Let's just speculate for a moment. Given a large and growing agriculturally-based civilization is there any reason to think that they would have avoided the political/warfare problems of other such civilizations?

Afaic there's no such reason. Do you think there was?

[Cognito]

I was just wondering Min if Cog, using his genentic and population growth knowledge, could work back from that estimate to ascertain when colonisation began?
Could be revealing.

There are too many variables involved to successfully work back any population figure to its inception. With that said, Mann's estimate of 100 million for the Americas at 1491 versus 70 million for Europe is as good as any. Europe's population was continually being thinned by new cattle-borne diseases whereas the Americas was not.

Interestingly enough, the population of South and Cental America with its cities was far greater than that of North America. That fact does not corroborate the Beringea migration hypothesis.

[Digit]

That fact does not corroborate the Beringea migration hypothesis.

Absolutely Cog. Thus we are faced with one or more sea borne landings over either a short or long term time scale.
In either case the numbers are unlikely to have been large, therefore to reach 20 millions, assuming population set backs, promotes an early date for colonisation IMO.
I was hoping that genetic change from suggested parent groups might give us a clue.

Roy.

[Minimalist]

Let's just speculate for a moment. Given a large and growing agriculturally-based civilization is there any reason to think that they would have avoided the political/warfare problems of other such civilizations?

Afaic there's no such reason. Do you think there was?

No. People are people and greed is greed.

[Rokcet Scientist]

I wonder if someone ever did a study on what the population of Europe would have been in 1600 if the Black Death had not happened?

The accepted wisdom is that the Black Death killed about 100 million Europeans in the middle of the 14th century. Said to have been between 35% and 45% of the population*. And that it took 150 years to recover from it.
It must have been hell on earth, at some point.

What befell the Amazon Indians however, was of another magnitude altogether! Over 95% of them died within a half century of contact with Europeans! They were nearly wiped off the face of the earth!
Something we did manage with the Hottentots of South Africa, BTW... A whole race totally wiped out. About a century later. The earliest evidence of one of the devastating genocidal effects of global navigation, discovery, and empire.

*so Europe had about 250 million people in the middle of the 14th century? Wow, that was a pretty densely populated area then. With no sewer systems. No wonder disease propagated easily.

[Minimalist]

Those numbers seem excessive for overall population.

I'll have to do some checking around.

[kbs2244]

I was interested in the concept of this area of the upper Amazon being able to support a population of 20 million.

So I did a quick research project.
I looked up the population of 3 Midwest, USA, states that are geographically agricultural.
Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois.
I then subtracted the populations of the 2 largest urban centers in each state to get the mostly rural population.
I do not know how the square mile totals of the 2 areas may compare.
It was just a WAG.

This is what I came up with:

Ohio Total population 11,500,000
Cincinnati 332,000
Cleveland 480,950
Result 10,687,050

Indiana Total population 6,423,100
Indianapolis 795,450
Ft. Wayne 251,250
Result 5,376,400

Illinois Total population 12,910,400
Chicago Metro Area 9,910,400
(This included far
NW Indiana.
Gary, etc.)
Rockford 157,270
Result 2,960,130

Adding up the rural populations gives a total of 19,023,580

In the end, I guess I would have to say their 20,000,000 was very possible.

[Cognito]

The accepted wisdom is that the Black Death killed about 100 million Europeans in the middle of the 14th century. Said to have been between 35% and 45% of the population*. And that it took 150 years to recover from it....so Europe had about 250 million people in the middle of the 14th century?

RS, I don't know where you pulled your figures from (other than the standard location), but a 250 million population is way too high for Europe at 1347. The "accepted wisdom" is that Europe's population was circa 75-100 million at that time:

1. 73.5 million in 1340, Josiah C. Russell, "Population in Europe:, in Carlo M. Cipolla, ed., The Fontana Economic History of Europe, Vol. I: The Middle Ages, (Glasgow : Collins/Fontana, 1972), 25-71. See: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/pop-in-eur.html

2. 75 million in 1347, see "The Black Death: Bubonic Plague": http://www.themiddleages.net/plague.html

3. Estimated 100 million in 1347 based on one-fourth of population dying, or 25 million, see: http://www.river-styx.net/bubonic-plague.htm

Conclusion: About 25 million people in Europe died between 1347-1350, representing between one fourth and one third of the population.