Which year in history had the highest ratio of non-natural deaths?
score:48
The actual year would be in prehistory, when the human population were more concentrated.
In terms of recorded history, the initial outbreak of the Plague of Justinian in 541 had an estimated death toll of 25 million. Most estimates of world population gives about ~200 million for the 6th century. The plague thus killed roughly 10-13% of the global population.
For reference, the 1918 flu pandemic killed perhaps 50-100 million. The global population at the time was about 1,860 million, however, so the ratio works out to be 2.7-5.4% of the total population.
A.D. 541 also have additional "advantages" in terms of higher infant, maternal, and child mortality were far higher in some parts of the world, relative to the industrialised nations of 1918.
Upvote:27
A bit of quick research tells me the worst in absolute terms almost has to be 1918.
There was a worldwide influenza epidemic that killed about 40 million people that year. That's the single biggest recorded death toll for a global pandemic in a single year in human history1.
There also happened to be one of the bloodiest wars in human history (in terms of sheer number of combat deaths) going on at the time. For most years, roughly 3 million combat deaths would be a huge deal. That year it wasn't even 10% of what the flu did.
Barring some new fast-moving pandemic, or a disaster of extinction-event proportions, that is liable to be the worst the human race will see for quite some time2. The number of deaths due to war is actually decreasing globally.
1 - The Black Death probably killed more people; perhaps as many as 200 million in Eurasia. But it took 6 years to work its way around Europe.
2 - Everyone reading this please go find some wood to knock on.
Upvote:36
70,000 BC
Analysis of the human genome has suggested that there was a choke-point in human history where the number of humans was drastically reduced.
Some believe that this was due to a single volcanic eruption occurring 70,000 years ago give or take.
According to this theory human population may have been reduced to just a few thousand breeding pairs.
Not sure if this meets your definition of 'non-natural' or of 'history' but no other event will have made the same ratio.
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