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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Thornir Alekeg" data-source="post: 1618668" data-attributes="member: 15651">Well, I think we are looking at different points.  What I got from the theory you posted was that the diseases that decimated the Americas and made it possible for them to conquer were zoonotic infections that were a result of the European's close contact with domesticated animals.  What Voadam and I were arguing, was that the European domesticated animal had little to do with the spread of disease.  The diseases mostly started in other parts of the world and became epidemics in Europe because of urbanization, a tremendous factor, but not because of the proximity to their animals, but instead because of the issues of unsanitary water and sewage (admittedly the animals contributed to this), and the close proximity of people for transmitting disease from one to another.  It's well known that smallpox was a factor in the colonization of the Americas, but I'm not making the domesticated animal connection to all this.  Yes, Jenner's milkmaids usually got a lesser form of the disease because of their exposure to cowpox, but that was not a widespread immunity across Europe, smallpox was still a deadly disease to the majority of Europeans as well.And I would contend disease had nothing to do with the European Imperialism of Asia.</blockquote>