A diversity of sources

To understand the present biology of Latin American populations it is important at the outset to emphasize the large diversity of their founding stocks. The earliest migrants to the continent were those now called Amerindians. The end of the fifteenth century witnessed the so-called European discoveries, which set in motion a mass movement of people not only from that continent, but also from Africa and Asia. In this chapter we will present some background material for the characterization of these migrants, needed for the evaluation of what occurred in the past 500 years.

Amerindians

Confusion at the first encounter

The denomination of ‘Indian’ to the people Christopher Columbus found when he landed in America was due to a mistake, since he and his companions imagined that they had arrived in India. This did not preclude the quick dissemination of this generic designation, although some restrictions have been raised in relation to it (Maestri-Filho, 1994; Field, 1994). America was named to honour Americus Vespucius, the Florentine navigator, who, differently from Columbus, conceived the new lands as a New World (Vespucio, 1951).

Controversies

There is much discussion about almost all aspects related to the arrival of the earliest Americans. (Table 1.1 summarizes some of the questions, and the evidence used to answer them.) In relation to their previous homeland several options could be considered, but there is an almost unanimous consensus that they probably entered the American continent from Asia through the Bering Strait.