The Anasazi culture of prehistoric American Indians developed
and flourished, ca. 800–1100, in the Southwest near the present-
day borders of Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah. Pueblo
tribes later developed from the Anasazi. Native American
populations in New England, with no immunity to European
diseases, were nearly eradicated by a mysterious epidemic—likely
smallpox. Between 1616 and 1619, the population of the
Massachusett and other Algonquin tribes was reduced by as much
as 90 percent by disease. Mississippian culture grew in the
southern Mississippi River Valley. The Mississippian American
Indians were farmers and mound builders, and the culture spread
along rivers through modern-day central and eastern North
America. Some aspects of Mississippian life grew out of earlier
regional cultures, but the Mississippians were also largely
influenced by contact with Mayan and Zapotec traders. Hohokam
culture of prehistoric American Indians developed in the
Southwest, ca. 600. Hohokam culture grew along the