The Toyeri were originally the largest Harakmbut group however most of them died during the
rubber boom from disease, murder, slavery, and other factors. Slave raids into the Madre de Dios and Harakmbut territory from Peruvians began with the development of the
Isthmus of Fitzcarrald in 1894. The Toyeri were the first indigenous group that rubber baron
Carlos Fitzcarrald encountered on the Manu River. Around two thousand Toyeri natives were massacred by Fitzcarrald's enterprise around 1895 at a location known as El Mirador Grande. Andrew Gray stated that "the use of machine guns caused death on a scale never witnessed in the Peruvian Amazon before." Gray estimated that between 1894 and 1914 the Araseri and Toyeri populations were reduced by 95 percent. Some of the surviving Araseri and Toyeri fled towards the headwaters of the Madre de Dios: this led to a shortage of resources in the headwaters and a great conflict between the Arakmbut and the new migrants. When the Harakmbut were first contacted by members of the
Dominican Order in 1940, they numbered 30,000. The development of a road from Cusco into the Madre de Dios coincided with a smallpox epidemic in 1948 which decimated the Huachipaeri population. Andrew Gray stated that the Sapiteri demographic became
endangered due to smallpox and influenza outbreaks that occurred post contact with the Dominican missionaries. ==Notable Harakmbut people==