Seventeenth-century Swiss mass graves expose systemic exploitation: labor precarity and early death as structural violence in early modern Europe

Indigenous European peasant knowledge systems, such as those of the Swiss *Bauern* (peasant) communities, framed labor as a communal duty but also recognized its limits—body sovereignty was tied to seasonal rhythms and subsistence cycles. These systems were systematically dismantled by enclosures and state taxation, replacing cyclical sustainability with extractive productivity. The graves thus reflect not just biological vulnerability but the erasure of Indigenous labor ethics that prioritized collective survival over elite accumulation.

The Swiss case mirrors broader early modern labor regimes, from English enclosure acts to the *Leibeigenschaft* (serfdom) in Central Europe, where state and elite interests codified human bodies as capital. Plague mortality was highest among the laboring poor because their living conditions—crowded tenements, malnutrition, and forced migration for work—created ideal vectors for disease. This pattern recurs in 19th-century industrializing cities, where factory labor and urban slums replicated the same structural violence.

Comparative analysis reveals that labor-driven mortality during pandemics is a cross-cultural constant: from the *mita* system in colonial Peru to the *coolies* of British Malaya, marginalized groups were consigned to high-risk work with minimal protections. In West Africa, the transatlantic slave trade’s labor camps (e.g., São Tomé’s sugar plantations) show identical patterns of premature death among the exploited. These parallels underscore how racialized and class-based labor hierarchies transcend time and geography.

Osteological analysis of the Swiss graves confirms high rates of skeletal stress markers (e.g., Schmorl’s nodes, enamel hypoplasia) indicative of chronic malnutrition and biomechanical trauma from repetitive labor. Stable isotope studies reveal diets dominated by cereals with minimal protein, aligning with historical records of tenant farmers’ subsistence. The plague’s disproportionate toll on the young laboring class is consistent with modern epidemiological models of syndemics, where socio-economic factors amplify biological vulnerability.

Folk ballads from the Swiss Alps, such as *Das Lied vom armen Bauern*, lament the exploitation of young laborers, framing their early deaths as a moral failing of the elite. In Andean *huayno* music, colonial labor songs (*canciones de mita*) encode resistance, portraying the body as a site of both suffering and defiance. These artistic traditions reveal how marginalized communities have historically articulated systemic violence through cultural memory, offering a counter-narrative to state-sanctioned histories.

Modeling future pandemics must incorporate labor precarity as a primary risk factor, using scenarios where gig economy conditions or climate-induced migration recreate 17th-century labor dynamics. Historical data suggests that societies with strong communal labor protections (e.g., Iceland’s *bændaskipan*) experience lower mortality during crises, highlighting policy levers for resilience. The Swiss case warns that without structural reforms, even advanced healthcare systems will fail to protect the most vulnerable under systemic stress.

The laborers buried in the Swiss graves left no written records, but their bodies—marked by repetitive stress injuries and stunted growth—testify to lives of coerced labor. Inquilinos (tenant farmers) in colonial Chile similarly left skeletal evidence of exploitation, their voices silenced by landowner records. Modern parallels include migrant workers in Qatar’s World Cup infrastructure or Amazon warehouse employees, whose deaths are often attributed to 'individual failings' rather than systemic design.