Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900-1900

“Where conditions were particularly suitable - where, for instance, wild wheat grew in solid stands and included strains with ears that did not shatter and scatter wastefully when harvested with flint sticks - the jigsaw pieces of domestication camp together, and gatherers became farmers.”

This passage highlights the randomness involved in the Neolithic Revolution. Agriculture was not predestined to exist and is not inherently a better system than hunting and foraging. Humans developed agriculture for myriad reasons and on different timelines across the globe.

“Norse sailors minimized their risks, and so made few voyages of discovery. Only a fool with a new theory would sail off into an ocean without a very specific idea of where he was going; the Norse always had a specific idea.”

The stereotype of Vikings sailing the Atlantic to find new land is inaccurate. Iceland, their only successful colony outside of Europe, was first discovered by Irish monks, who gave the Norse detailed information about the island and how to reach it.

“In the East, the Europeans tried to plant colonies among dense populations of high culture.”

When Europeans first attempted to colonize the Middle East during the Crusades, they were faced with densely settled land full of unfamiliar diseases. Many Muslim countries also had well developed societal systems and technology, which allowed them to successfully fight the Europeans. For these reasons, early European colonialism in the Middle East was not particularly successful, and European culture continues to have less of an influence there than in the Neo-Europes.

“We have to realize that although the Guanches were numerous, they were never united.”

This quote paints the Indigenous population of the Canary Islands in contrast to populations in the Middle East, Asia, and other places where European colonialism was attempted but never fully succeeded. Although the 14th century Canary Islands had a large population, they were spread across seven islands each with different languages and cultures. They had no known seafaring abilities. Therefore, they were unable to form a united front to defeat the highly organized Spanish naval forces.

“The source of weakness for almost all other peoples usurped or replaced by Europeans in the next four centuries (Amerindians, Aborigines, etc.) was the enormous distance their ancestors had put between themselves and the hearthlands of the Old World civilizations. The penchant of their ancestors for migration, along with the melting of the Pleistocene glaciers and the rising level of the oceans, left them, as their sad histories in the last few centuries testify, on the losing side of the seams of Pangaea.

Crosby explains that the migrating peoples who ended up in distant lands with expansive areas to explore left the populations vulnerable to a number of factors that resulted in them growing into smaller populations that were distanced from one another. This contrasts with the densely populated areas of the Old World, where larger, closely located populations were able to share knowledge, technological innovations, culture, and skills as well as disease, which helped them build stronger immune systems. Without the size and geographic closeness, the populations in the New World were at a decisive disadvantage.

“The explorer who puts to sea in the faith that there will always be wind to carry him where he listeth will find that the winds will carry his where it listeth.”

Crosby reverses a classic aphorism to highlight that sea navigation did not only depend on boat technology but also on a detailed understanding of wind patterns around the world. Although boats capable of crossing any body of water were available by the early 15th century, it took decades of trial and error for advanced seafaring societies to understand major wind routes enough for trans-oceanic travel to become common.

“The seams of Pangaea were closing, drawn together by the sailmaker’s needle. Chickens met kiwis, cattle met kangaroos, Irish met potatoes, Comanches met horses, Incas met smallpox - all for the first time.”

Here, Crosby revisits his previously established metaphor of continental divisions as “the seams of Pangaea,” adding the detail that improved seafaring technology allowed these seams to close back up. As the Spanish and other advanced naval countries began to cross huge distances of water more and more regularly, the ecosystems that had long been divided by natural forces were again intimately connected.

“European quarters in such ports as Macao, Nagasaki, and Shanghai were only spigots tapped into the flank of Asia to draw off some of its wealth.”

While Europe established zones of population in many Asian countries, they never achieved dominant colonial status in the same way as other parts of the world. Crosby uses the metaphor of a tap to make an important distinction: Unlike the Neo-Europes, medieval Asia as a whole was at least as heavily populated as Europe and had well established societal structures and technology. They were able to contain the European settlers in ways that many other native populations couple not. Europeans saw Asia as a source of resources but never seriously sought to take them over. 

“Disease was the most important factor dictating that hot, wet America would be a land of racial mixture.”

The Americas have a huge range of different climate zones, and Europeans easily adapted to the temperate Northern areas most similar to their homeland. In southern latitudes, such as the Caribbean and much of South America, white settlers struggled to survive in the face of unfamiliar biodiversity and diseases to which they had no immunity. Indigenous Americans, the first group enslaved by Europeans in the Americas, succumbed to smallpox and other European pathogens while Europeans died from tropical illnesses at similar rates. This was a major factor in the choice to enslave West Africans for transport to the wet, hot parts of the Americas; colonizers correctly believed that people from the African tropics would have relatively high immunity to both European and tropical diseases.

”Weeds were crucially important to the prosperity of the advancing Europeans and Neo-Europes.”

Although weeds are viewed negatively, as plants that outcompete crops and make farming more difficult the proliferative, hardy nature of weeds made them a crucial component for the Europeanization of the New World. When vast tracts of land were disturbed by colony building, European weeds grew in the land vacated by native plants. This aided in regenerating the soil, protecting it from the sun, and combatting erosion. They also became important food for European farm animals.

“The prospective European colonists were livestock people, as their ancestors had been for millennia.”

A large array of domestic animals was possibly the most important advantage Europeans had over residents of other land masses. Animals had been domesticated in other areas, such as the dingo in Australia and the llama in South America, but during the Neolithic period, Europeans tamed a range of versatile animals that could be transported across the sea and provide food and other resources in nearly any climate.

“We could go on at length about goats, dogs, cats, even camels, and go on further to point out that domesticated birds - chickens, for instance - prospered in the Neo-Europes, but the point has already been made: Old World livestock prospered in the Neo-Europes.”

The text focusses primarily on cattle, sheep, pigs, and rats as the primary livestock brought by Europeans to other countries. These animals were not the full extent of the Old World species that were introduced to colonial settlements though. Nearly every Old World domestic animal was able to establish itself in settlements around the world, especially in the Neo-Europes. To this day, animal farming around the world primarily focuses on animals first domesticated in Eurasia.

“Humans were seldom masters of the biological changes they triggered in the Neo-Europes.”

Although Europeans intentionally introduced many plants and animals to the Neo-Europes, they unintentionally brought an equal or greater number of weeds and pest animals. Almost immediately after colonialism began, European settlements were plagued by the same ecological issues they had faced in Europe. In some areas these problems were amplified due to a lack of natural competition from native species.

“The isolation of the indigenes of the Americas and Australia from Old World germs prior to the last few hundred years was nearly absolute.”

The influence of Eurasian micro-organisms on the rise of the Neo-Europes can be explained largely by their unfamiliarity to New World immune systems. Humans first travelled to Australia and the Americas thousands of years before European colonialism but for a variety of reasons had been cut off from other parts of the world after a short time. Like the plants and animals, Eurasian germs evolved divergently from those of the New World.

“Europe was magnanimous in the quantity and quality of torments it sent across the seams of Pangaea.”

This quote shows the parallels between invasive plants, animals, and disease as they functioned in the New World versus the Old World. In all cases, Old World organisms were much more successful in the New World than New World species were in Europe, Asia, or Africa. Diseases were no different. Nearly all the North American native population were eradicated within the first few years of exposure to European maladies, but only a handful of American diseases ever made it back to Europe. Those that did were not particularly devastating to European populations.

“New Zealand calved off Australia 80-100 million years ago and has been in splendid isolation ever since.”

The unique early history of the land that would become New Zealand is critical to understanding why it was so primed for colonization by many life forms. More than in any other place on Earth, New Zealand experienced divergent evolution from a very early time. Several ecological categories that are taken for granted all over the world are not native to New Zealand at all, such as grasses and mammals.

“ We must not ignore the probability that these first humans to reach the Americas and Oceania brought pathogens and parasites with them, but they could not have had too many deadly or debilitating passengers.”

The earliest residents of what is now North America travelled across vast, cold tundra to reach their new homeland and lived a nomadic lifestyle once they arrived. Both of these factors suggest that disease was not an issue to the degree that it was in more densely settled, hot locations. Many of the most virulent diseases on Earth thrive best in warm conditions, and dense populations allow disease to spread more quickly. Whatever pathogens the first Americans brought with them probably did not survive well, which contributed to their lack of immunity to the various illnesses they acquired from the Old World.

“The times and means of the extinctions of the giants are matters of great significance in the story of how the Neo-Europes became Neo-European.”

This book suggests that hunting was by far the most significant factor in the mass extinction of large animals in the New World. While Old World animals had evolved alongside humans and developed instinctual fears of them, those in the areas where humans were invasive had no such fear. Although Crosby suggests that other theories, such as climate change and disease, may have been contributing factors to the decline of the Pleistocene giants, hunting is the only plausible explanation that explains why so many species disappeared in a similar period in every part of the world.

“A contrasting case is that of the North American plains, where the Europeans had to disassemble and existing ecosystem before they could have one that accorded with their needs.”

In this quote, Crosby contrasts the plains with a similar ecosystem, the South American pampa. While the pampa had been recently disturbed by an influx of indigenous Americans shortly before the arrival of Europeans, the plains had experienced human habitation for thousands of years and had adapted to being inhabited by other Old World species, such as the buffalo. This likely made European colonization more difficult in the plains than the pampa.

“Many kinds of livestock pathogens have lagged far behind their usual hosts in transoceanic crossings.”

In livestock as well as humans, diseases that were rampant in the Old World did not take hold quickly in New World European populations. The lack of animal disease like rabies in the early stages of colonialism was an advantage as well, and, overall, European stock outside Europe was healthier and longer lived.

“The indigenes of the Americas and Australia were almost defenseless against the onslaught of Old World pathogens that the Europeans brought with them.”

Like in the case of livestock, human disease appears to have been uncommon among Europeans in the New World, but the locals were a different story. Even small amounts of introduced disease could kill entire Indigenous villages, as thousands of years of isolation had left them with no natural immunity or methods of treatment.

“For Europe’s peasantry, the image of lands beyond the oceans shimmered like steam rising from an ox spitted and roasting over hot embers.”

The greatest draw of the New World for Europeans was the promise of a better life. Good conditions for farming and large expanses of “empty” land proved attractive to people at the bottom of the social ladder in increasingly crowded Europe. Although this may have been accurate at first, soon the Neo-Europes filled with Europeans in similar numbers to their home countries.

“In Christ’s Palestine, the multiplication of loaves and fishes was a miracle; in the Neo-Europes it is expected.”

In the modern era, the Neo-Europes have become complex, globalized societies that lead the world in food exports. Many poor countries rely on them, causing wealth to grow in the Neo-Europes themselves. Residents of these countries now assume a life of plenty as the standard.