Born to Die: Disease and New World Conquest, 1492-1650

by Noble David Cook

Book Overview

Noble David Cook explains, in vivid detail and sweeping scope, how the conquest of the New World was achieved by a handful of Europeans--not by the sword, but by deadly disease. The Aztec and Inca empires with their teeming millions were destroyed by a few hundred Europeans whose most important weapons, though the conquerors did not realize it at the time, were diseases previously unknown in the Americas. The end result of the colonizing experience...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0521627303
• ISBN13: 9780521627306
• Release Date: February 1998
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Length: 268 Pages
• Weight: 0.86 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.7" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

WORST DISEASE OUTBREAK EVER

From discovery in 1492 to the mid 17th Century, the Americas were hit with one outbreak of infectious disease after another. Cook describes waves of smallpox, typhus, measles and influenza that killed off a continent of people. He is almost certainly right that these plagues destroyed more than the Spanish. Unfortunately he is unable to give any precise figures, or even anything close to it, as to how many actually perished. We can be confident, though, that this was the worst disease outbreak ever.

A masterful summary

This is simply the best account of the depopulation of Spanish America in the sixteenth century. It deals with the range of diseases involved, the regional death rates, the native responses, and the arguments pro and contra the high estimates of death.

Thorough and Scholarly Study of Crucial Issue

This is a very thorough and well organized study of one of the most important and ghastly events in human history. In the century following the European discovery of the Americas, approximately 90% of the native population perished. The agents of this demographic and cultural catastrophe were an apparently unceasing series of epidemics transmitted by European and African immigrants to the Western Hemisphere. Isolated for millenia from the Western Hemisphere, the native peoples of the Americas were virgin soil for smallpox, plague, influenza, measles, and a wide range of other serious infections. Native American susceptibility to epidemic disease and not any technological or cultural advantage was the key factor allowing Europeans to conquer the Americas. The conquest of Western Hemisphere and European dominance of its resources resulted in a huge economic and ecological windfall for European states. This windfall was a key factor propelling the global dominance of European culture and states. Cook does an excellent job of systematically surveying the various epidemics and their demographic impacts. This is difficult because of the need to cover an extended period of time, a broad variety of regions, and the fragmentary nature of the data. This book is an excellent summary of available knowledge on this important topic. Very organized and written competently, this book will be the standard reference on this topic.

It shocks in its gritty realism yet keeps you interested

An excellent account of the history of the Americas, it focuses on the diseases while keeping in touch with both the cruelty suffered by the natives and the culture shock. It goes deeper into the less dramatic side (where less writers dwell in) and makes this a must read for anyone interested in the period.

Compelling assesment of diseases in 16th century America

The collapse of the native population of the western hemisphere, where some 90 percent of the inhabitants perished within a century, was one of the greatest demographic disasters in history. In this well-detailed analysis, Cook lays the effect of Old World epidemics on a virgin soil population. Completely free of the impassioned polemical tones which so often characterized many of the books on the Columbian exchange,Cook presents a the framework needed for students of 16th century America. While not ignoring cruelty and war as a factor in the decline of certain groups, Cook points out that the number of Spaniards present during the 16th century was too small(less than 250,000)to have killed or worked to death the tens of millions already present in the Western Hemisphere. Smallpox,measles, and influenza ripped through the natives like a hurricane,preparing the way for European conquest and settlement.