Quick question

Just how many people where in the Americas before Colombus came in 1492?

I had heard of estimates ranging from 100million to 300million for North America and 100 to 200million for South America. What is the more accurate number or are these way off?
 
It depends, based on who you ask, and what their agenda is. I'm sure 9 Fanged Hummingbird or someone like that has a better answer though.
 
Find yourself a copy of '1491' by Charles C Mann

http://www.bookbrowse.com/reviews/index.cfm/book_number/1649/1491

It is a culmation of 20th Century research & summarizes/examines several important schools of thought of critical questions about the people of America before the European invasion of the 16th Century. Mann suggests the best evidence supports the idea of a population of some 40 millions in North America in the 15th Century. The proponents of that number are drawing from latter 20th Century archeological evidence of villiage size & density, burial site density, the nominal ability of the agricultural techniques of the era to feed people, and eveidence from the very earliest Spanish exploration into the central Mississippi basin, such as the ill fated Navaro expedition.
 
Find yourself a copy of '1491' by Charles C Mann

http://www.bookbrowse.com/reviews/index.cfm/book_number/1649/1491

It is a culmation of 20th Century research & summarizes/examines several important schools of thought of critical questions about the people of America before the European invasion of the 16th Century. Mann suggests the best evidence supports the idea of a population of some 40 millions in North America in the 15th Century. The proponents of that number are drawing from latter 20th Century archeological evidence of villiage size & density, burial site density, the nominal ability of the agricultural techniques of the era to feed people, and eveidence from the very earliest Spanish exploration into the central Mississippi basin, such as the ill fated Navaro expedition.
Thanks, I will loook for it
 
http://books.google.com/books?id=5m4VQFRzh_gC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false


This book is interesting, and the google preview has some tables showing some 'consensus estimates'. These are important because, the truth is, no-one really knows the pre-Columbian population of the Western Hemisphere with any degree of certainty. One can figure that Mexico was more densely populated than New York State because the ancient Mexicans left more ruins than the Iroquois, but specific numbers are all guesswork, with some guesswork more educated than others.

I would also caution you against relying too much on Charles Mann. He has written a terrific book on the pre-Columbian Americas, but he peppers his books with some pretty outrageous claims: that the average early modern European never bathed at all, things like that. The guesses he chooses to project are good guesses, but the entire premise of his book is building up pre-Columbian civilization at the expense of European civilization (hence his 'no bathing' claim). As such, he does lean towards the 'high-counters' based more on book-selling than facts.
 
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