Indian Population Patterns in Colonial Spanish America

Abstract

Spanish colonialism was disastrous for the Indian population of America. By the end of the colonial period, all Indian groups who had come into contact with Europeans were less than half of the size they had been on the eve of Spanish conquest, and some had become extinct. Although the Indian population was reduced in size between 1492 and 1821, the demographic changes experienced by different Indian groups varied considerably. Some groups became extinct at an early date, others experienced a sharp decline followed by a slow recovery, and others continued to decline slowly into the nineteenth century. The uneven distribution of Indians in Latin America today clearly reflects not only their distribution at the time of the Spanish conquest, but also their subsequent demographic histories. It is the aim of this article to identify regional variations in population trends during the colonial period and to suggest factors that may have been responsible for differences in the level of survival of Indian populations.