I’m referring specifically to the Maryland groups. I know they were part of the Woodlands tradition, which in general would mean wood-fired, fairly brittle pottery with sand or limestone temper - no kiln, not what I would call a “strong pottery tradition” - but I don’t know the Maryland specifics, which was why I asked tonyfop for detail.
I’m sure they did not use what would be recognized as a pottery kiln. Like many North Americans they would have fired pottery in a hole in the ground or in a ring of rocks, using wood coals, not pre-made charcoal. That area is so rich in iron the streams run red when it rains, but there’s no way their pottery making would have led to smelting iron or even copper.
ETA: Here is a websitesaying the Lenape did not bake pottery even in a hole in the ground, just covering it with burning wood and corncobs.
See: Guns, Germs, and Steel…
The North American Indians never had any suitable draft animals to amplify their physical endeavors (or even any domesticated animals probably) so they never got beyond hunter-gathering-gardening. They couldn’t support specialists that could develop higher technology.
It may be of interest that Kentucky - Indian central - was a leading iron producer up until the Civil War! There are areas of free iron ore similar to those decribed in Maryland.
The overwhelming majority of North Americans were farmers in 1491. It’s simply false to suggest they were mostly hunter-gatherers with some gardening thrown in. The whole Mississippi basin was covered in farming villages and towns. How do you think Squanto could have taught the Pilgrims how to grow maize if he wasn’t from a farming culture?
Huh? Struck a nerve somehow I guess…
Squanto could help the Pilgrims because he had already spent YEARS learning English on trips to London. He was born ~100 years after your 1491 date BTW.
Daniel Boone might disagree with you.
Oh, I am not at all versed on the local Native cultures. I am originally from New York, I just live in Maryland. The first thing I noticed at the beach was iron laying around everywhere, and I noticed a layer of it in the Clay Cliffs. I never did any research into it, but I am finding the info given by the other dopers really interesting. Sorry for the hijack, on the OP’s point, we have tons of iron here on the Western Shore of the Chesapeake Bay, just waiting for the Apocalypse.
Native Americans were agricultural. They planted corn and other crops. Even as hunters they had thinned forests to attract game and make hunting easier. There were many permanent settlements as well. What they lacked was any advanced technology, particular to this discussion they lacked hard metal.
Yes, Squanto had crossed the Atlantic both ways a couple of times. My point is, his home village was at Plymouth Rock, but everyone in his farming village had died of disease. Leaving a convenient place for the Pilgrims to set up a farming village. Remember how the Pilgrims dug up stored maize? Where do you think that came from? It came from farmers who farmed there before they all died.
And yes, by Daniel Boone’s time the agricultural people that occupied the Mississippi Valley had been devastated by multiple waves of pandemic diseases. But look at the cite you sent me. What was the ascribed name of the Indian Chief that Boone fought against? Cornstalk. Even by the 1600s the densely packed farming villages described by the early Spanish explorers were gone.
The reason I brought up the Pilgrims is that every kindergartner in America knows the stories of how the Pilgrims were saved from starvation by learning native American farming techniques, yet at the same time most American adults somehow believe that Indians were nomadic hunter-gatherers.