Origins of Syphilis [It was waiting for Columbus and his crew~~~NEW WORLD]

Archaeology.org ^ | January/February 1997 | Mark Rose

[infidel29]

I believe you are correct. I know the reference has a movie at it's crux, but now that my local affiliate has format changed back to a urban contemporary/ hip-hop line-up, I'm left without Mr. Miller:(

I wanted to send him this as an idea for a t-shirt. This... is Starship.

[DavemeisterP]

This news is outdated by around 15 years.

Around 15 years ago scientists discovered several different instances of scarring on the bones of Native Americans by syphilis that dated to way before the genocidal maniac Columbus got his sorry ass here. There were around 100 skeletons found in FL around that time that, if I remember correctly, many of them had scarring created by syphilis, too.

[ReignOfError]

That article is a decade old. Since then, excavations of Italian graveyards have turned up evidence of syphillis prior to contact with the New World.

One hypothesis is that there was a New-World strain of syphilis less dangerous than the one that spread throughout the Old World, and the Indians had some immunity to the deadly strain from exposure to the weaker one. The Europeans lacked that immunity, in the same way that the Indians lacked immunity to smallpox.

[ReignOfError]

Reparations?

I think we can mark that bill paid. Price: One continent.

[anton]

Long before the fist Europeans went to John Wayne territory, the Iriquois of upstate NY (one of the so called civilized tribes), were known for their raiding party techniques.

They would raid an enemy’s camp when the men were away hunting, kill all young men capable of fighting, blind the elders so they became a burden on the enemy tribe, rape and/or kidnap women for slaves, and gather up the infants who they ATE on the way back home. They would place the heads of the eaten children on stakes facing backward toward the enemy in order to unnerve any following enemy from retribution.

That’s why they are called savages.

[djf]

IIRC, if a child got yaws in his youth, it was much like chicken pox and he soon got over it - but had lifetime immunity from the deadlier genetic forms.

There’s another viral disease in like the Dominican Republic that has much the same effect.

[bert]

Think Africa, think sickle cell resistance

[ThanhPhero]

Yaws also existed in the Gold Coast part of Africa and was encountered by European mariners around the same time as they encountered America.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

***The term “savage” is derived from the Spanish “salvaje” meaning “one who needs salvation.”***

Woah. I thought it came from the word “Selvedge” meaning “dweller of the green forest”.

After witnessing the shear brutality and sadism of Indian torture the word soon took on the term brutal barbarian or ‘salvage” as in our Declaration of Independence, then “Savage”.

[ReignOfError]

As far as burning villages and lkillinginnocentss goes, the Jamestown colonists gave as good as they got. On the claimms of cannibalism, I’m gonna have to see a credible source for that.

[ReignOfError]

IIRC, if a child got yaws in his youth, it was much like chicken pox and he soon got over it - but had lifetime immunity from the deadlier genetic forms.

There’s another viral disease in like the Dominican Republic that has much the same effect.

The classic example, of course, is the vaccinia virius, also known as cowpox. Louis Pasteuur discovered that milkmaids exposed to cowpox were immune to smallpox. So copwpox gave us the first vaccine -- and vaccinius gave us the word vaccine.

[SteamShovel]

speaks volumes as to their intellectual dishonesty

They do this all the time. The rush to say man causes global warming is the latest example. It's usually just some attempt to coerce the rich to pay the poor.

[curmudgeonII]

BONE changes in Neanderthal remains which, it has been suggested1, might be caused by rickets are not unlike those seen in certain treponemal diseases, notably congenital syphilis. Examining the Neanderthal collection at the British Museum (Natural History), I noted several features compatible with treponemal disease.

I've known a number of pathologists who believe that syphilis is the leprosy referred to in the bible.

[anton]

“As far as burning villages and lkillinginnocentss goes, the Jamestown colonists gave as good as they got. On the claimms of cannibalism, I’m gonna have to see a credible source for that.”

I really shouldn’t even have to defend this historical fact, but the two terms Google 67,100 pages, the highest page ranking all in suppoort of the cannibalism of Iroquis.

The reason that most Native American tribes were extinct when the first Europeans arrived here is that they were mostly violent savages who murdered and cannibalized each other. The myth of the peaceful “Indians” at one with each other and nature, is a recent creation.

[Smokin' Joe]

Well said, and a billion more people died from tobacco than from the so called “infected smallpox blankets”.

LOLOL! No one forced Europeans or others to use tobacco any more than Columbus' Crew was forced to have the sort of relations with the natives which might lead to contracting Syphilis.

Put the blame where it belongs, willya?

[Argus]

Does any one know what Dennis Miller means when he says “touch Indians “?

I believe he's quoting from the movie LOST IN AMERICA, in which Albert Brooks impulsively quits his job, sells his house and buys a motor home so he can roam around America like those guys in EASY RIDER, and, as he puts it, "touch Indians". It's a very funny movie that gets even funnier after Albert's wife played by Julie Haggerty loses all the money in their nest egg playing one number over and over at the roulette table when they stop in Vegas to renew their vows.

[kbennkc]

That was a great movie . I had forgotten about it and will see it again . I have touched Indians and never contracted anything .

[ReignOfError]

The reason that most Native American tribes were extinct when the first Europeans arrived here is that they were mostly violent savages who murdered and cannibalized each other. The myth of the peaceful “Indians” at one with each other and nature, is a recent creation.

No doubt, the Indians engaged in the most brutal warfare imaginable, including massacres of innocents. I wasn't contesting that at all.

My question was specific to the claim of cannibalism. It wasn't uncommon for one tribe to accuse another of cannibalism; it was the most reliable way to get the white folks to help you take out a rival. The Europeans tended to believe the claims without investigation, and they went into the explorers' journals.

Anthropologists, most notably William Arens, started questioning accounts of cannibalism, and found that most were not corroborated by first-person eyewitness accounts or anthropological evidence. So for the last few decades, most historians and anthropologists have treated cannibalism claims skeptically, until supported by objective (or relatively so) evidence.

So that's the spirit in which I asked the question. And after checking a few of the articles Google turned up, it appeats that the Iroquois are one of the well-supported cases.

[anton]

Thanks for the historical perspective. I agree with all you said. I was out in Santa Fe a number of years ago on the very week that anthropologists confirmed cannibalism among the Anasazi who are regarded by the locals as something above the Catholic Saints and just below Bill Clinton.

You’d think that they found the skeleton and remains of Jesus who had not risen from the dead. First there was disbelief then anger.

Back to your point, it is certainly understandable that claims of cannibalism got the white Europeans excited, since civilized persons had already rejected cannibalism for quite some time. Remember Idi Amin? Heh heh heh! That got em going.

[mamelukesabre]

The California missions and Spanish pueblos, for example, led to a death rate in the coastal areas where they were founded—just during the mission area—of about 90%.
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Amazing! 10% of them were immortal??