ABSTRACT
Archaeologists have reported a paucity of protohistoric sites and components in many areas of northwest Mexico and the American Southwest. This chapter outlines an alternative view of the collapse that is based on recent evidence of Old World diseases and their consequences during the Protohistoric period. Historical documents from the 16th and 17th centuries suggest that many villages and towns that are thought to have been abandoned prior to A.D. 1450 actually persisted into the historic period, when they were abandoned in the wake of introduced diseases. Cross cultural studies of virgin populations exposed to diseases such as smallpox suggest that pre-Jesuit epidemics could have destroyed upwards of 50% of the population of native communities. Historians and anthropologists working in the Greater Southwest have commented on or alluded to a lack of historical data to assess the importance of introduced disease.
