With a POD of 1000 AD what would could the natives of the americas do to best prepare themselves for the arrivals of European at the end of the 15th century?
Best prepare the natives of the Americas for the arrival of Europeans
- Thread starter Mitchell Hundred
- Start date
Miochigan has plenty of iron and wood. Perhaps the discovery of iron would help.
Also, despite how odd it might sound, smallpox could show up early. That might help a little in the long run. Maybe. Definitely a smaller percentage would die the second time.
Also, despite how odd it might sound, smallpox could show up early. That might help a little in the long run. Maybe. Definitely a smaller percentage would die the second time.
Small pox comes earlier with some way that natives could get better immunity when real European wave arrive. And perhaps some cultures might learn using of iron and might be possible that some native cultures invent gunpowder. And one important thing is that natives don't kill horses of New World and perhaps invent that with these can ride.
The aboriginals learn variolation (early smallpox inoculation) from Zheng He's treasure fleet when it reaches California. Population pressures and tribal warfare drive indigenous peoples into large organized political entitles that are better able to marshal the resources needed to defeat the Europeans or at least keep them out of Mesoamerica and the Canada/US littoral.
tenthring
Banned
The Aztec empire was a pretty large empire. Unfortunately they were about as bad as the Europeans (excluding smallpox, which was nobodies fault). Many of these groups fell because they all hated each other, and they all hated each other because most states and people's before the modern age all worked on some version of the rule of the stronger. Europeans had no trouble finding allied natives under the yoke of the native empire run by another tribe.
jahenders
Banned
A few very different things:
1) Some immunity to European disease -- perhaps some exposure to Vikings or lost wanderers.
2) More unified front. The Europeans faced a few sizable native empires, but most natives they faced were either from isolated tribes or tribes that were part of very loosely knit "nations." There were few instances of native tribes presenting a consistent unified front. This would necessitate some form of standing "territorial guard" and some system of couriers.
3) More fixed territoriality. Related to #2, it would have made a difference if the natives had a more fixed notion of territory such that they claimed specific land with specific borders and guarded against encroachment. They did definitely have territorial ideas, but in some cases this was very loose and in others was nomadic. They either claimed an impossibly large area, which they then wandered through, or a very vague area.
4) Widespread writing. More written histories, treaties, and explorations would have helped to cement that unified front and territoriality and enable much better communications.
5) Technology. Obviously, it would have helped if the natives had some level of iron weapons or armor, a domesticated horse, and some form of fast communication (pony express, canoe express, etc). Obviously, gunpowder would have made a HUGE difference (mainly because it wouldn't shock them).
1) Some immunity to European disease -- perhaps some exposure to Vikings or lost wanderers.
2) More unified front. The Europeans faced a few sizable native empires, but most natives they faced were either from isolated tribes or tribes that were part of very loosely knit "nations." There were few instances of native tribes presenting a consistent unified front. This would necessitate some form of standing "territorial guard" and some system of couriers.
3) More fixed territoriality. Related to #2, it would have made a difference if the natives had a more fixed notion of territory such that they claimed specific land with specific borders and guarded against encroachment. They did definitely have territorial ideas, but in some cases this was very loose and in others was nomadic. They either claimed an impossibly large area, which they then wandered through, or a very vague area.
4) Widespread writing. More written histories, treaties, and explorations would have helped to cement that unified front and territoriality and enable much better communications.
5) Technology. Obviously, it would have helped if the natives had some level of iron weapons or armor, a domesticated horse, and some form of fast communication (pony express, canoe express, etc). Obviously, gunpowder would have made a HUGE difference (mainly because it wouldn't shock them).
I know this is off topic but can anyone explain why pre-Columbian America never got out of the stone age? It sure was not for lack of resources.
GeographyDude
Gone Fishin'
I'd like to build on this and take it a step further.
Around 1100, the Native Americans start to develop microbiology. And I'm serious. All this is, is grinding lenses and growing things in petri dishes. And along the way, they start thinking that this nuisance mold which inhibits bacteria growth and often louses up experiments might potentially be highly useful.
And what might motivate people to start this in the first place? Well, even using broken obsidian as a magnifying glass is interesting and as you intentionally make better lenses, it's interesting stuff all the way down. And native beliefs that the world is alive might play to strength, and in some ways, even much more alive than Indian societies suspected. And once any kind of medical technology takes off, I mean people are hugely motivated to save the lives of their children, this technology can keep just rolling forward.
Why must the physical sciences always come before the biological sciences?
In some ways I think the Mesoamericans would have stood a better chance against the Spanish if they weren't unified under the Aztecs. As I understand it, the Aztecs went out of their way to encourage their subjects to revolt in order to conquer them again and sacrifice the captives. When Cortez and his crew show up, huge numbers of tribes that were subjugated by the Aztecs rose up and supported them. If Mexico is divided into numerous petty kingdoms they might actually have a better chance, because whilst some of the local powers probably would side with the Spanish, you wouldn't have Aztec tyranny as a factor driving so many to unite behind the Spanish.
Yep, as others have written, let the native Americans be more in contact with the Vikings. They will then get European diseases. A lot of them will die as a result, like they did when the Spanish arrived, but the population will recover by the time the Europeans return and now the native population will be more immune, so fewer will die. Of course they still will have disadvantages due to lower level of technological developments, but at least large parts of the population will not be wiped out by diseases.
Because of the way their culture developed and for most regions they never needed a technological edge over their rivals. They had plenty of space and a fairly small population for the amount of land that they had. Basically lack of competition.
Compared to where Modern Western Culture traces back its roots(The Middle East/North Africa/Mediterranean Europe) where livable land is rare and there are dozens of cultures are cramed into the few ariable lands they have access to.
jahenders
Banned
I think there were several contributing factors, among them:
- They simply didn't need to because their enemies at the time (each other) were generally at the same tech level.
-- This argument has (to some degree) been applied to ancient Egypt. They went through several long periods where their military development stagnated relative to most of the rest of the "known world." The argument goes that this is because their main enemies at those times (Libyans, Nubians, etc.) were at the same or lower tech level, so their wasn't a strong drive for them to advance. This stagnation has been cited as a reason why they fell so quickly to the Hyksos, bringing more advanced technology.
- The limited spread of rich, written languages made it hard for technology to advance and even harder to spread and be built upon. An innovator in Rome could look at writings of Greeks, Egyptians, etc., write his progress down, and then distribute it to people in multiple neighboring lands who could then build upon it. In many cases, a Native American innovator would only have insights from a few people in his immediate tribe and would only share with a few people, while most other native innovators would be "reinventing the wheel" that he just invented.
- They simply didn't need to because their enemies at the time (each other) were generally at the same tech level.
-- This argument has (to some degree) been applied to ancient Egypt. They went through several long periods where their military development stagnated relative to most of the rest of the "known world." The argument goes that this is because their main enemies at those times (Libyans, Nubians, etc.) were at the same or lower tech level, so their wasn't a strong drive for them to advance. This stagnation has been cited as a reason why they fell so quickly to the Hyksos, bringing more advanced technology.
- The limited spread of rich, written languages made it hard for technology to advance and even harder to spread and be built upon. An innovator in Rome could look at writings of Greeks, Egyptians, etc., write his progress down, and then distribute it to people in multiple neighboring lands who could then build upon it. In many cases, a Native American innovator would only have insights from a few people in his immediate tribe and would only share with a few people, while most other native innovators would be "reinventing the wheel" that he just invented.
The Americas DID suffer from a lack of resources
There are far fewer cereal crops native tot he Americas than native to Europe, and those that do exist are low in protein and/or cultivation cost vs. caloric beneift. In addition there were few native tameable beasts of burden in the Americas leads to a stagnation in the development of agriculture, which eventually retards growth in other advances such as writing. Check out "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond for an excellent (if a little dry) breakdown of the many causes of Eurasian dominance in the last half millenium.
There are far fewer cereal crops native tot he Americas than native to Europe, and those that do exist are low in protein and/or cultivation cost vs. caloric beneift. In addition there were few native tameable beasts of burden in the Americas leads to a stagnation in the development of agriculture, which eventually retards growth in other advances such as writing. Check out "Guns, Germs and Steel" by Jared Diamond for an excellent (if a little dry) breakdown of the many causes of Eurasian dominance in the last half millenium.
GeographyDude
Gone Fishin'
I'm remembering where Jared does this riff: All domesticable animals are alike, but all undomesticable animals are undomesticable for their own reasons. And then he says, if you think you've read something like that before, you have. And he gives the Tolstoy quote from Anna Karenina that, All happy families are alike, but every unhappy family is different in its unhappiness.
And what I take from Jared Diamond, instead of the complex psychological explanations, go with the simpler baseline explanations first and see how far they'll take you.
And what I take from Jared Diamond, instead of the complex psychological explanations, go with the simpler baseline explanations first and see how far they'll take you.
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