Native Americans

Theodore de Bry engraving

• Migration from Asia• 15,000-10,000 B.C.-

8,000 B.C.• Bering Strait: land

bridge is impassable, which results in Native Americans isolation

New World Beginnings

Nomadic, Semi-nomadic lifestyles

Mammoths and Other Animals of the New World:

• Waco Mammoth Site:– http://www.wacomammoth.com/

• Fish

• Birds

• Reptiles

• Other winged creatures

• 7,000 B.C.—advent of farming in Mesoamerica

• Olmecs, Mayans, Aztecs (Mesoamerica)

• Incas (South America)

Farming and Crop Cultivation

Complex societies in North America:

• The Anasazi (cultural height: 900-1200 a.d.)

Cliff Palace,Mesa Verde National Park

Mississippian Tradition

• Settled along rivers such as the Mississippi, Ohio, etc.

• 700 A.D.—European settlement

• Main food crops: eastern flint maize and pole beans

• Importance of the sun, corn, and temple mounds in religion

• Women’s roles

•Located in what is now Southern Illinois, just outside of downtown St.Louis, MO•The Mississippi, Missouri, and Illinois Rivers intersect forming a fertile landscape •Existed at the center of the Mississippian civilization•Largest city built before Europeans arrived in America (20,000-30,000 people in the 1100s)•At least 109 mounds

Earthen Mounds

Monks Mound

• 100-feet high

• Named in 1700’s by French Monks

• Most likely the mound where the principal ruler built his house or where a temple existed

• Contains 14 million baskets of soil and its base stretches 14 acres long

Birdman Tablet

• Birdman Tablet symbolized the union between heaven and earth

• Birdman symbolism figured prominently in Cahokian religion.

• Found during excavation of Monks Mound

• Has become logo of Cahokia Mounds

• Actual use of tablet is still a mystery

• The birdman was represented by the king, who could have been believed to be the incarnation or earthly representative of the Birdman

Diversity of Native American Culture

Farming, fishing, hunter-gatherers, nomadic, semi-nomadic, sedentary

Up to 1,000 different languages among Native Americans in North America by 1492

Native Americans v. Europeans: A Clash of Ideas

• 1. Attitudes toward the natural world

• 2. Attitudes toward land ownership

• 3. Attitudes about women

• 4. Attitudes about religion

The “Columbian Exchange”

Disease