Death by Migration
Europe's Encounter with the Tropical World in the Nineteenth Century

This book is a quantitative study of relocation costs among European soldiers in the tropics from 1815 to 1914.

Philip D. Curtin (Author)

9780521389228, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 24 November 1989

272 pages
22.9 x 15.2 x 1.6 cm, 0.36 kg

"Philip D. Curtin's book makes important contributions to at least three fields: the history of medicine and public health, historical demography, and the history of European colonialism." American Historical Review

This book is a quantitative study of relocation costs among European soldiers in the tropics between about 1815 and 1914. This study, however, has broader implications. For Europe itself, this was the crucial century of the 'mortality revolution', with its profound influence on European and world demographic history. For the history of medicine, this was the transitional century between the kind of medicine that had been practiced in Europe since classical times and the kind of scientific medicine that would be spawned by the germ theory of disease. For Europe's global, political and military relations, this was the final period for the European conquest. For all these reasons, the relocation costs of this period have great bearing on human history.

List of tables, figures, and maps
Preface
List of abbreviations
1. The mortality revolution and the tropical world: relocation costs in the early nineteenth century
2. Sanitation and tropical hygiene at mid-century
3. Killing diseases of the tropical world
4. Relocation costs in the late nineteenth century
5. The revolution in hygiene and tropical medicine
6. The pursuit of disease, 1870–1914
Conclusion
Appendix
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Modern history to 20th century: c 1700 to c 1900 [HBLL], General & world history [HBG]