Posted on 02/08/2025 7:05:35 PM PST by SunkenCiv
Science Magazine reports that Robert Kelly of the University of Wyoming and his colleagues compiled more than 60,000 radiocarbon dates for artifacts from the United States and Canada. Then, assuming that the amount of radiocarbon data collected from a given region reflects its population at that time, the researchers made comparisons between the possible size of the populations over time and between regions. The study suggests that North American populations grew for about 2,000 years and peaked around A.D. 1150, then the size of the population decreased by at least 30 percent by 1500. Yet populations grew and declined in different regions at different times, likely reflecting regional climate shifts, disease, and warfare. "The entire continent is not in lockstep," Kelly said. For example, the population of Cahokia, which is situated near the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, had an estimated population of more than 10,000 by A.D. 1100. Droughts are thought to have brought about a reduction in crops, population collapse, and migration to other regions, leading to the abandonment of Cahokia by 1350. Overall, the population of North America began to rebound around 1450, the researchers suggest, but was then decimated by disease, violence, and loss of territory following the arrival of Europeans.
(Excerpt) Read more at archaeology.org ...
As usual, when you get into the weeds, things get a bit more complex.
How come none of them developed a written language to give us a clue what was going on?
Different Sq. miles in America are different.
Your general # may be correct, but America still has a wild disparity in peeps/mi^2.
YM^2MV
50 sq miles per person is an absurdly high figure, except for the Sahara or other desert region.
Tribes of the Americas were mostly semi-nomadic at most, with plenty of longer term settlements and lots of settled agricultural populations.
The rises and falls in Precolumbian populations have long been understood, this study appears to be expressed a percentages. I couldn’t find a complete PDF, just the abstract.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2419454122#abstract
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2419454122
They were too busy killing off one another during expansions and migrations, due to population booms as well as having fouled the previous nests (both of these have been common throughout the world; it’s repulsively racist and baseless to claim Precolumbian populations were immune), and climate change, which is 100% natural 100% of the time.
I remember reading a book, Centennial,” written by James Michener.
In the forward, estimates were given about population of the Americas.
The time, from the first human to step on the North American Continent until the humans reached the southern tip of South America, was 14,500 years.
The average movement, Southward, was 8 miles per generation!
The only reasons to move was war with enemies and loss of food and water.
No mention was made about population numbers.
Also, the “land bridge that connected Asia to North America was much wider than I thought. I thought 60 miles or so. Actually it is estimated to be 600 miles.
Humans moved from Asia to NA and Animals moved to Asia.
It is amazing that some destrudo kept them from establishing the type of civilization that could have supported such an essential tool, in what was clearly a land of plenty.
“How come none of them developed a written language to give us a clue what was going on?”
Answer is simple, they weren’t smart enough.
I’m a white guy, a decedent of many peoples that made wars
and killed not because it was necessary, but because they liked it.
I’ve thought about this a lot!
But I can honestly say if Evey Chinese Citizen were to be destroyed today, I could care less.
Same for most other peoples.
I’m pretty sure they feel the same way towards me.
I’m ignoring the loss of their talents to help all
mankind.
One thing I learned growing up is I will not be a SLAVE!
No matter the cost to me or society.
That is why white men scare people so much.
There is no study which seeks to answer the question effectively. It’s rather pathetic and I make no bones about hiding my derision of those who practice - and report on - orthodox archaeology. The derision is well-deserved.
If North America was so awesome, why did the Nahuatl migrate south from Aztlán to found Tenochtitlán and become so successful there as the Aztecs?
Why did the Anasazi retreat to cliff dwellings?
Why were nearly all other tribes in NA - save for some east coast peoples - nomadic?
I think the answers reflect a general threat in NA which - by consequence - limited population. The ancient mounds - a nice little thorn in the side of orthodox scientists - reflect a knowledge of sky-borne catastrophe, some of which was likely volcanic in nature (Cascades & Yellowstone), never mind natural, persistent climate shifts/cycles which affected vast swaths of NA over millennia.
I believe that the human history of NA extends FAR longer than the accepted orthodoxy. This is a DEEP subject to those with open minds (a facet which doesn’t extend to ‘science’).
In the absence of conflicting hard data - dna or otherwise - I believe that the total indigenous population of NA was WELL under a half million by the arrival of our European ancestors. There is little to no evidence to suggest otherwise.
If these ‘normally intelligent’ so-called ‘scientists’ genuinely wanted to establish population trends, they would have performed a DNA study of remaining indigenous populations.
Thus, the logical conclusion is that they don’t want answers, just more controversy to fuel additional studies (i.e., “$$”).
To-wit:
“The new study also questions the inevitability of the conquest of the content. If Europeans had arrived a few centuries earlier and faced much larger Indigenous populations and well-organized tribal confederacies, the study authors conclude, “the history of North America might have been very different.””
Translated: “We’re intentionally provoking controversy.”
The idea that there was one window of time available for the single Precolumbian peopling of the Americas persists, but is outmoded. Its defenders are dug in, but are getting older and older and will die off.
The Clovis-first-and-only model is, alas, getting superseded by the “anti-colonization” idealogy, which is inherently and irreparably antiscientific.
Humans didn’t move eight miles per generation, they were all the way down to Tierra del Fuego at basically the same time that the oldest cultural remains in Alaska. The strait wasn’t an impediment to migration (in the right time of the year, of course) and any folklore-driven culture would know the ancestors had crossed over from Asia, or had waved goodbye to the relatives as they migrated to the Americas.
There’s a broad variance in accomplishment, rather than retype it, here’s a link from the other day:
https://freerepublic.com/focus/chat/4295644/posts?page=11#11
Estimates are that the Bering Land Bridge formed around 35,700 years ago during the last ice age when sea levels dropped sufficiently to expose the landmass connecting Siberia to Alaska across the Bering Strait. The land bridge between Asia and North America, known as the Bering Land Bridge, disappeared around 11,000 to 13,000 years ago as rising sea levels flooded the Bering Strait, caused by the melting of glaciers at the end of the last ice age.
Maybe the melting happened because the great Native American chief in what’s now called Alaska named Doneli-jont-Rump didn’t think that the Sabre-Toothed Smelt was worth saving, though it might have actually been wiped out by the poisonous dangerous fish some called the caring bass. And thus the sea level rose. A lot of family reunions between the Siberians and Alaskans to cook smelt had to be postponed due to the floods and then they lost touch with each other gradually and stopped trying to visit each other & eventually may have had some corrupt leaders who discouraged freethinkers to believing the oral legends about having relatives on the other side & all written records, whatever they had, were purged?
I’m just speculating, with a little satire.
But in all seriousness I think a lot of land bridges may have come and gone since Yellowstone’s last major eruption around 640,000 years ago until the land bridge formed over 35000 years ago. However, just like the Biden administration, there was lots of censorship that happened in human history so much was lost.
I tend to give James Michener’s sources some credit.
Your last paragraph makes no sense.
Read it again and rewrite what you hope to be sense.
Yes, Tierra del Fuego is at the Southern tip of South America.
Karankawa and Comanche and Kiowa would have scared my dinner straight out of me.
Tell that to your dog ... if you want to break its heart! :D
I noticed they didn’t answer the question either.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.