1493_ Uncovering the New World Columbus Created - Charles C. Mann [238]
72 Fire maintains prairies: Anderson 1990; Stewart 2002:113–217; Clouser 1978. For the role of fire in worldwide grasslands, see Bond et al. 2005.
73 Indian fire and eastern forest: Johnson 2005:85 (“Parkes in England”); Stewart 2002:70–113; Williams 1989:chap. 2, esp. 43–48; Cronon 1983:48–52; Day 1953.
74 Thirty-one sites: Nevle and Bird 2008.
75 Change in landscape after epidemics: Dull et al. 2010 (“carbon budget,” 765); Denevan 2007, 1992:377–79; Wood 1977:38–39 (“travel through”).
76 Little Ice Age in North America: Parker 2008:1067; Pederson et al. 2005 (forest composition); Anderson 2004:100 (livestock); Kupperman 1982.
77 Climate, mosquito, disease, slavery: See Chap. 4. A. quadrimaculatus: Reinert et al. 1997; Freeborn 1923. Paradoxically, drought also favors the mosquito, because it kills off aquatic predators on its larvae (Chase and Knight 2003); the species thrives on climatic disturbance.
78 Introduction of horses: Hämäläinen 2008 passim; Calloway 2003:chap. 6; Holder 1974.
79 Mexico City and Acapulco: Chap. 8, Schurz 1939:371–84; Gemelli Careri 1699–1700:vol. 6, 5–16.
80 1637–41 volcanos, decline in silver: Garner 2007:esp. figs. 1–3 (silver); Atwell 2005 (silver); Atwell 2001:32, 36, 62–70 (volcanos).
81 Famine and unrest in China: Parker 2008:1058–60, 1063–65. See Chap. 5.
82 Greatest cities in 1500: Chandler 1987:478–79; see also, Eggiman 1999, De Vries 1984. The sole exception to the rough thirty-degree rule is Beijing, the northern capital of a country whose population was concentrated to the south. Note: I adjust Chandler’s list for sub-Saharan African and indigenous American cities, which he underestimates consistently. Explanations follow. Tenochtitlan: Typical estimates for the whole conurbation range from 1 to 1.5 million, with Tenochtitlan assigned, somewhat arbitrarily, a fifth to a quarter of the total (see, e.g., Smith 2002:57–59; Sanders 1992). Qosqo: Population numbers are even more uncertain, but recent estimates are between 100,000 and 200,000, based on Spanish colonial accounts (typically higher numbers) and archaeological surveys (typically somewhat lower). See, e.g., D’Altroy 2002:114 (100–150,000); Cook 1981:217–19 (150–200,000); Agurto Calvo 1980:122–28 (125,000). Gao: Data are poor, but a late-sixteenth-century census of compound houses in the central city came up with a population of forty to eighty thousand; presumably as many or more surrounded the central zone. “Such a size and population may sound exaggerated.… But we must remember that Gao was the epicenter of an empire that extended over 1,400,000 sq. km (500,000 square miles)” (Hunwick 1999:xlix). The nineteenth-century traveler Henry Barth, who saw the ruins in relatively undisturbed condition, estimated that Gao “had a circumference of about six miles” (Barth 1857–59:vol. 3, 482). Paris: Bairoch, Bateau, and Chévre estimate it at 225,000 in 1500 (cited in DeLong and Shliefer 1993:678). Chandler (1987:159) estimates Paris in 1500 at 185,000 by multiplying a 1467 estimate of the number of men who could bear arms (28–30,000) by 6 to obtain 174,000, which rises for unexplained reasons (migration?) to 185,000 in 1500. The factor of 6 seems high—indeed, Chandler uses 5 for Paris on a similar estimate a century before.
83 Change in cities: Acemoglu et al. 2002.
CHAPTER 2 / The Tobacco Coast
1 Introduced earthworms: Author’s interviews, Hale, Reynolds, Bohlen; Frelich et al. 2006; Hendrix and Bohlen 2002:esp. 805–06, table 4; Reynolds 1994; Lee 1985:156–59.
2 Rolfe: Price 2005:154–58; Townsend 2004:88–96; Haile ed. 1998:54–56; Robert 1949:6–9. Occasionally St. John’s, Newfoundland, is cited as the first long-lasting English colony, but most historians believe it had no permanent population before 1610.
3