4 ms·
I wonder if they had a high mortality rate like a lot of modern cities before the sanitary movement.
by downrightmike 9y ago
I wonder if they had a high mortality rate like a lot of modern cities before the sanitary movement.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- tzahola 9y agoNot until the conquistadors brought the necessary bugs.
- ceejayoz 9y agoI'm fairly certain human waste had pathogens in it in the Americas even before 1492.
- tzahola 9y agoMaybe, but human waste is not intrinsically pathogenic. Unlike in Europe and Asia, American natives rarely had any livestock, so they didn’t have pathogens jumping from animals to humans.
- lostlogin 9y agoIf other Aztec cities are anything to go by, no. They separated clean/dirty water and made use of waste for fertiliser and dye. http://ws.iwaponline.com/content/7/1/147 http://ws.iwaponline.com/content/7/1/147
- jcranmer 9y agoGiven that Mesoamerica lacked draft animals, tropical soils tend to be poor quality, and the various cultures were probably at or around the carrying capacity of the environment, human poop was likely too valuable as fertilizer to be wasted on your drinking supply.