Why did the Native American population in Mexico fall after 1519?

Why did the Native American population in Mexico fall after 1519?

The native people of Mexico experienced an epidemic disease in the wake of European conquest (Figure 1), beginning with the smallpox epidemic of 1519 to 1520 when 5 million to 8 million people perished. The Mexican population did not recover to pre-Hispanic levels until the 20th century.

How long did the cocoliztli epidemic last?

The disease, called cocoliztli, appeared for the first time in 1545 and in three years, it killed an estimated 5–15 million people, or up to 80% of the native population at the time. This represents the worst epidemic in recorded Mexican history [9, 10].

Why did the Aztec civilization collapse?

Lacking food and ravaged by smallpox disease earlier introduced by one of the Spaniards, the Aztecs, now led by Cuauhtemoc, finally collapsed after 93 days of resistance on the fateful day of 13th of August, 1521 CE.

Why did the native population decline so dramatically?

War and violence. While epidemic disease was by far the leading cause of the population decline of the American indigenous peoples after 1492, there were other contributing factors, all of them related to European contact and colonization. One of these factors was warfare.

What happened in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605?

Gunpowder Plot. Around midnight on November 4, 1605, one of the conspirators, Guy Fawkes (1570-1606), was discovered in the cellar of the Parliament building with barrels of gunpowder. Fawkes and other men involved in the plot were tried and executed for treason. Every November 5, the British celebrate Guy Fawkes Day by burning Fawkes in effigy.

How many people were killed by the Spanish conquests of Mexico?

Overall, Europe lost 25 million people. There were approximately 25 million people living in what is now called Mexico when Hernando Cortes arrived in 1519. A smallpox epidemic killed between 5 and 8 million of the native population in the following two years.

How many people died from the Black Death in 1918?

Approximately 60,000 people died. The plague still occasionally causes smaller outbreaks in parts of sub-Saharan Africa. The great flu pandemic of 1918 and 1919 is estimated to have killed between 30 million and 50 million people worldwide. Among them were 675,000 Americans.

How did the European conquest of the new world affect the Americas?

Many of the epidemic diseases that were well established in the Old World were absent from the Americas before the arrival of Christopher Columbus in 1492. The catastrophic epidemics that accompanied the European conquest of the New World decimated the indigenous population of the Americas.