Steel, germs, guns, and mtDNA
I am in Puerto Rico this week, and this brings to mind Diamond's steel, germs, and guns. The story so far: all of the local (warm, wonderful, virtuous) Taino Indians perished in an apocalyptic genocide, being brutally persecuted by the (cold, greedy, murderous) Spaniards and further decimated by the combined forces of pox and measles.
The last part is certainly true; the attrition rate could've been as high as 80-90%. This leaves 10-20%, which is still a lot of people. According to the Spanish reports, the original populations of the islands were in the millions. The immigrant population was in the thousands.
The main problem with this particular narrative of white guilt is that it can be tested it in a lab. Two years after the book became a best seller, it was discovered that 62% of non-emigrant Puerto Ricans have Amerindian (maternal, mitochondrial) DNA (30% have African and 8% Caucasian). The Y chromosome shows the opposite in the paternal line: 70% of the islanders trace their ancestry to male Europeans, 20% could trace it to male African ancestors, and less than 10% could trace it to male Native American ancestors. The mtDNA makeup matched the characteristic patterns found in the archeological samples from pre-Columbian Taino Indians. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11427174
The Tainos originated from South America and replaced another group of Indians. By the time of their discovery by the Spanish, the Tainos were in the process of being replaced by the Carib cannibals, who started their epic expansion from the mainland around 1200 AD. The Indians were not warm, wonderful people. Genocide was business as usual in these parts long before the arrival of the Europeans, proceeding in one wave of replacements after another. And then it stopped. The modern Puerto Ricans are the direct descendants of the indigenous Indians that were said to be decimated by the pale skin devils.
... the findings cast doubt on the notion that the Tainos disappeared from Puerto Rico by the end of the 16th century... Similar studies in other countries have yielded similar results. In Belen, Brazil, for example, mtDNA analysis identifies 59% of the contemporary population as Amerindian, while Y-chromosome analysis identifies less than 5% as Amerindian. This indicates that 59% of the population of Belen has an Amerindian mother somewhere down the ancestral line, while less than 5% of them have a male Amerindian ancestor. Our findings also indicate that the conventional wisdom that Amerindians would be concentrated in the mountains while African blacks would be concentrated in the coasts, is not accurate. A strong Amerindian presence has been found in the southern coastal city of Ponce, for example, while African black mtDNA is present in the central mountains of Puerto Rico. http://www.familytreedna.com/pdf/martinezcruzado.pdf
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/41/306.html
http://www.udel.edu/LASP/Vol1-2MartinezC.html
The archeological studies are inconsistent with the pre-Columbian millions given in some of the contemporary reports. The original population was < 500,000, the losses of this population were much overreported, and the huge number of the surviving Indians was (mysteriously) off the books. How was that possible? The problem is that the Spanish were not only fooling themselves but also systematically misinforming their superiors to get assistance.
The original population was overestimated by unrealistic, optimistic sampling and further inflated in order to impress the rulers and the clergy with the prospects of the multitudes of future subjects and converts (the same distortions routinely occurred in North America). The losses by the disease were staggering, but these were still more exaggregated in order to convince the crown to organize lucrative slave trade from Africa. The population immediately started to mix and was not properly categorized ethnically, resulting in later confusion. The sympathetic clergy overreported the losses of the Tainos in order to stop the abusive enslavement system introduced by the colonists. It is impossible that these reports were correct, because one cannot have half of the island maternally related to people that disappeared by the early 16th century when the immigrant population was microscopic. The Spanish of the old times were not much different from the Spanish of the more recent times, covering their administrative failures with make-belief stories.
...A re-examination of the documents of the era reveals the origins of the myth of Taíno extinction:
When the chroniclers wrote that all of the Indians of Hispaniola were gone, they were, in fact, following the lead of Las Casas, who exaggerated the Taíno population decline in order to convince the emperor to abolish the encomienda system and, instead, establish missionary villages for the Indians’ conversion.
The chroniclers also wrote about the Taínos in comparison to the denser populations of Native Indians later discovered on the Mainland; this is especially true about Oviedo, who spent his early years in today’s Panama.
The chroniclers were also repeating what was written in letter after letter to the Royal Court by encomenderos on Hispaniola who exaggerated their losses in order to gain sympathy and royal permission to import more African slaves, who were believed to be “stronger” than the Taínos because they did not fall prey to the diseases that decimated the Indians.
Historians and demographers generally use the censuses of the era, such as the census that accompanied the 1514 Repartimiento, to confirm that which the chroniclers wrote about the drastic decline of the Taíno population. They forget that the Taínos fled from the Spaniards many years before the famous episode concerning Enriquillo and his people. Many maroons hid from the Spaniards in the mountains of Bahoruco and in other peripheral regions of the island. Governor Nicolás de Ovando himself wrote in 1502 that the Tainos and Africans frequently ran away together, using the Indians’ knowledge of the countryside to evade the Spaniards.
http://roppskyline.pbworks.com/w/page/6550515/CnP-of-Documenting-the-Myth-of-Ta%C3%ADno-Extinction1
The losses to infections were a tragic yet unavoidable event. But there were many survivors and these survivors left progeny. If the "genocide" results in a new nation that mainly consists of the descendants of the allegedly "eradicated" ancestors - is it proper to call such a situation genocide?
PS. I have to add that Puerto Ricans do not trouble themselves about the guilt of their forefathers and the agonies of their foremothers. Unlike our public intellectuals, they are quite happy to be what they are.
The last part is certainly true; the attrition rate could've been as high as 80-90%. This leaves 10-20%, which is still a lot of people. According to the Spanish reports, the original populations of the islands were in the millions. The immigrant population was in the thousands.
The main problem with this particular narrative of white guilt is that it can be tested it in a lab. Two years after the book became a best seller, it was discovered that 62% of non-emigrant Puerto Ricans have Amerindian (maternal, mitochondrial) DNA (30% have African and 8% Caucasian). The Y chromosome shows the opposite in the paternal line: 70% of the islanders trace their ancestry to male Europeans, 20% could trace it to male African ancestors, and less than 10% could trace it to male Native American ancestors. The mtDNA makeup matched the characteristic patterns found in the archeological samples from pre-Columbian Taino Indians. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11427174
The Tainos originated from South America and replaced another group of Indians. By the time of their discovery by the Spanish, the Tainos were in the process of being replaced by the Carib cannibals, who started their epic expansion from the mainland around 1200 AD. The Indians were not warm, wonderful people. Genocide was business as usual in these parts long before the arrival of the Europeans, proceeding in one wave of replacements after another. And then it stopped. The modern Puerto Ricans are the direct descendants of the indigenous Indians that were said to be decimated by the pale skin devils.
... the findings cast doubt on the notion that the Tainos disappeared from Puerto Rico by the end of the 16th century... Similar studies in other countries have yielded similar results. In Belen, Brazil, for example, mtDNA analysis identifies 59% of the contemporary population as Amerindian, while Y-chromosome analysis identifies less than 5% as Amerindian. This indicates that 59% of the population of Belen has an Amerindian mother somewhere down the ancestral line, while less than 5% of them have a male Amerindian ancestor. Our findings also indicate that the conventional wisdom that Amerindians would be concentrated in the mountains while African blacks would be concentrated in the coasts, is not accurate. A strong Amerindian presence has been found in the southern coastal city of Ponce, for example, while African black mtDNA is present in the central mountains of Puerto Rico. http://www.familytreedna.com/pdf/martinezcruzado.pdf
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/41/306.html
http://www.udel.edu/LASP/Vol1-2MartinezC.html
The archeological studies are inconsistent with the pre-Columbian millions given in some of the contemporary reports. The original population was < 500,000, the losses of this population were much overreported, and the huge number of the surviving Indians was (mysteriously) off the books. How was that possible? The problem is that the Spanish were not only fooling themselves but also systematically misinforming their superiors to get assistance.
The original population was overestimated by unrealistic, optimistic sampling and further inflated in order to impress the rulers and the clergy with the prospects of the multitudes of future subjects and converts (the same distortions routinely occurred in North America). The losses by the disease were staggering, but these were still more exaggregated in order to convince the crown to organize lucrative slave trade from Africa. The population immediately started to mix and was not properly categorized ethnically, resulting in later confusion. The sympathetic clergy overreported the losses of the Tainos in order to stop the abusive enslavement system introduced by the colonists. It is impossible that these reports were correct, because one cannot have half of the island maternally related to people that disappeared by the early 16th century when the immigrant population was microscopic. The Spanish of the old times were not much different from the Spanish of the more recent times, covering their administrative failures with make-belief stories.
...A re-examination of the documents of the era reveals the origins of the myth of Taíno extinction:
When the chroniclers wrote that all of the Indians of Hispaniola were gone, they were, in fact, following the lead of Las Casas, who exaggerated the Taíno population decline in order to convince the emperor to abolish the encomienda system and, instead, establish missionary villages for the Indians’ conversion.
The chroniclers also wrote about the Taínos in comparison to the denser populations of Native Indians later discovered on the Mainland; this is especially true about Oviedo, who spent his early years in today’s Panama.
The chroniclers were also repeating what was written in letter after letter to the Royal Court by encomenderos on Hispaniola who exaggerated their losses in order to gain sympathy and royal permission to import more African slaves, who were believed to be “stronger” than the Taínos because they did not fall prey to the diseases that decimated the Indians.
Historians and demographers generally use the censuses of the era, such as the census that accompanied the 1514 Repartimiento, to confirm that which the chroniclers wrote about the drastic decline of the Taíno population. They forget that the Taínos fled from the Spaniards many years before the famous episode concerning Enriquillo and his people. Many maroons hid from the Spaniards in the mountains of Bahoruco and in other peripheral regions of the island. Governor Nicolás de Ovando himself wrote in 1502 that the Tainos and Africans frequently ran away together, using the Indians’ knowledge of the countryside to evade the Spaniards.
http://roppskyline.pbworks.com/w/page/6550515/CnP-of-Documenting-the-Myth-of-Ta%C3%ADno-Extinction1
The losses to infections were a tragic yet unavoidable event. But there were many survivors and these survivors left progeny. If the "genocide" results in a new nation that mainly consists of the descendants of the allegedly "eradicated" ancestors - is it proper to call such a situation genocide?
PS. I have to add that Puerto Ricans do not trouble themselves about the guilt of their forefathers and the agonies of their foremothers. Unlike our public intellectuals, they are quite happy to be what they are.