Delta4Embassy
Gold Member
Love to read a well-done alternate history where Native Americans repelled early settlers and kept control of North America.
Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
Current history and fictional accounts gloss over the tremendous disparity between the resources and "technology" of the natives versus that of the oncoming Europeans.
The North American locals were basically stone-age "hunter/gatherers" with no resources other than their own hands, crude stone or bone tools, and what they could kill or pick up. Farming, where it did exist was rudimentary and unreliable. They had no metallurgy, did not have the wheel, no weapons that could kill at greater than 25 meters or so, no written language, and only a primitive understanding of architecture. They had no domesticated animals that could be used for work or bred for food. The average lifespan was less than 40 years. Their lives were nothing more than striving day after day to eke out a meager existence from what nature provided.
Making a dugout canoe was done with fire and seashells. Even the tree they used had to be either fallen through natural causes or felled using fire and ashes - a process that sometimes took weeks. Rivers were huge obstacles and could only be crossed if you walked to a spot where fording was possible, and even that was a dangerous prospect as they would not know the depth of the water until possibly too late.
Clearly, there were many things that the Europeans had difficulty dealing with, and many lessons were learned from the natives, but the idea that the natives could permanently repel Europeans whose resources were orders of magnitude greater, is simply not believable.
Maybe in Central America, where the Aztecs lived...
No matter where they met the white man, Meso-America or the fuckin' Arctic, the first thing they did was form alliances against other "Indians".Current history and fictional accounts gloss over the tremendous disparity between the resources and "technology" of the natives versus that of the oncoming Europeans.
The North American locals were basically stone-age "hunter/gatherers" with no resources other than their own hands, crude stone or bone tools, and what they could kill or pick up. Farming, where it did exist was rudimentary and unreliable. They had no metallurgy, did not have the wheel, no weapons that could kill at greater than 25 meters or so, no written language, and only a primitive understanding of architecture. They had no domesticated animals that could be used for work or bred for food. The average lifespan was less than 40 years. Their lives were nothing more than striving day after day to eke out a meager existence from what nature provided.
Making a dugout canoe was done with fire and seashells. Even the tree they used had to be either fallen through natural causes or felled using fire and ashes - a process that sometimes took weeks. Rivers were huge obstacles and could only be crossed if you walked to a spot where fording was possible, and even that was a dangerous prospect as they would not know the depth of the water until possibly too late.
Clearly, there were many things that the Europeans had difficulty dealing with, and many lessons were learned from the natives, but the idea that the natives could permanently repel Europeans whose resources were orders of magnitude greater, is simply not believable.
Maybe in Central America, where the Aztecs lived...
I think you've hit the nail on the head.
Love to read a well-done alternate history where Native Americans repelled early settlers and kept control of North America.
You evidently have never heard of the 5 civilized tribes..The Cherokees being one of them..The Cherokees had their own farming communities that had metal, wheels and yes an alphabet...Yet the whites wanted their land and they ripped these peaceful tribes from their land and sent them on a death march a 1000 miles away..Destroying the tribes and making them rebuild their communities...Current history and fictional accounts gloss over the tremendous disparity between the resources and "technology" of the natives versus that of the oncoming Europeans.
The North American locals were basically stone-age "hunter/gatherers" with no resources other than their own hands, crude stone or bone tools, and what they could kill or pick up. Farming, where it did exist was rudimentary and unreliable. They had no metallurgy, did not have the wheel, no weapons that could kill at greater than 25 meters or so, no written language, and only a primitive understanding of architecture. They had no domesticated animals that could be used for work or bred for food. The average lifespan was less than 40 years. Their lives were nothing more than striving day after day to eke out a meager existence from what nature provided.
Making a dugout canoe was done with fire and seashells. Even the tree they used had to be either fallen through natural causes or felled using fire and ashes - a process that sometimes took weeks. Rivers were huge obstacles and could only be crossed if you walked to a spot where fording was possible, and even that was a dangerous prospect as they would not know the depth of the water until possibly too late.
Clearly, there were many things that the Europeans had difficulty dealing with, and many lessons were learned from the natives, but the idea that the natives could permanently repel Europeans whose resources were orders of magnitude greater, is simply not believable.
Maybe in Central America, where the Aztecs lived...
Or if gore won 2000. Or if we never ended slavery.Love to read a well-done alternate history where Native Americans repelled early settlers and kept control of North America.
How Do You Change a Somali Into a Tamale?Love to read a well-done alternate history where Native Americans repelled early settlers and kept control of North America.