Peopling the Americas

Beringia - Land Bridge revealed by an Ice Age- Asian Hunters cross from Siberia (Asia) into Alaska (North America)- from 40,000 until about 10,000 years ago

Kennewick Man – Recently discovered fossil evidence suggests that Europeans may have also crossed into and settled North America

End of the Ice Age - People moved south and about between 10,000 and 5,000 years ago an agricultural revolution (farming) began

- Civilizations begin to form in agricultural areas about 3,000 years ago

Mexico, Central and South America

Olmecs – about 1200 BCE (Before Common Era)- first identifiable American culture- on the Mexican Gulf Coast

Mayans – 250 until 900 C.E.- Yucatan Peninsula & Guatemala- An advanced civilization that fell apart – Why?

Mexico, Central and South America (cont’d)

Aztecs -1200’s until 1500’s- Central Mexican Empire - violent, powerful society that dominated the region and nearby tribes

Incas - 1400’s until 1530’s- South American Indian Empire - in Peru & Chile along the Pacific Coast of South America

Northern American (U.S.) Indians

Desert SouthwestAnasazi and Hohokam - 300 BCE to 1400 CE- Anasazi – cliff dwellers (Four Corners)

- including the Mesa Verde Cliff Dwelling- Hohokam – Farming through irrigation

Northern America - Midwest

Adena & Hopewell -800 BCE until 600 CE- Mound builders in the Ohio River Valley

Mississippians - (600 CE until 1400 CE)- Mound builders in the Mississippi River Valley- Cahokia (Illinois) - An enormous mound city about 1150 CE (20,000 people)- Moundville (Alabama) - One of the most well-preserved Mississippian sites

By the 1400’s

Eastern Woodlands (Northeast/Midwest)- Algonquin-speaking people - many of the tribes first encountered by English colonists were Algonquin speakers- These include the Powhaton Confederacy in Virginia, the Wampanoag, Narragansett and Pequot in New England

Eastern Woodlands (Northeast/Midwest) (cont’d)

- Iroquois-speaking people – occupied lands of upstate New York and across the Great Lakes into what is now Canada- The most powerful tribe was the Huron- Other smaller tribes formed the Iroquois League to make peace among them and allow them to oppose the more powerful Huron

- Both of these groups practiced Slash-and-Burn Agriculture in which they burned a section of woods and then used the fertile ground for farming

Southeastern

- SE tribes were heavily influenced by the Mississippian culture- By the 1500’s the Cherokee had 60 towns and over 20,000 people in what is now North Carolina & Tennessee- There were several other southern tribes, the Creek had over 50 villages in Alabama & Georgia. - These groups practiced 'three-sister' farming, in which fields of maize also included beans growing on the cornstalks, and squash growing beneath them on the ground.

Across the Continent

- Other large cultural groups in North America included the tribes of the Plains, the Southwest, the Great Basin, California and the Pacific Northwest.-The tribes of Mexico and Central America (led by the Aztecs) are known as Mesoamericans- The tribes on the Caribbean Islands, those first encountered by Columbus, are known as the Taino

Shared Cultural Patterns of Pre-Columbian American Indians

The American Indian groups of the 1400’s that were first encountered by the Europeans shared certain cultural patterns:1) Extensive Trading Networks - stretched across the continent2) Land Use - tribes claimed certain lands and used them collectively among themselves3) Religious Beliefs - the world is filled with spiritual presences4) System of Social Organization - kinship groups & a division of labor