Western Civilization I / Unit 16 WC1 1510 short lesson, about 20 seconds
The Great Dying: Why Epidemic Decided the Conquest
Captions available
The idea
The anchor puts mortality in the Americas at about ninety percent over the century after contact, one estimate among several, attributed. The conquest's speed depended on it: armies of hundreds beat empires because the empires were dying.
In practice
Smallpox in Tenochtitlan during the siege.
Where people slip
The figure is contested; the catastrophe is not.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
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