As of the French and Indian War (1750’s), there were more English than French Canadians and Indians combined in the northeast. The native tribes had been devastated by disease and the French never colonised the new world even close to the level that England did. One of the reasons that Indian tribes were so keen to capture women and children from other tribes was to boost their own depleted numbers.
It was a sad tribe indeed that had no guns. It was a top prioty acquisition for a warrior and the whites were all too happy to supply allied tribes. Especially since the whites controlled the ammo supply.
There is a truly terrible joke, up to Doper standards, on this. A person of Native American descent was widely bruited to have eidetic memory – he could recall details from years before with crystal clarity.
Testing this allegation out, a university psychologist arrived one day with a list of 100 questions on day-to-day trivialities, intending to record the Indian’s answers and then return at a later date to see if he recalled what he had answered.
Unfortunately, he was interrupted by news of a family emergency, a severe car accident, just as he got to question #59, “What did you have for breakfast this morning?”, to which the eidetic-memory Indian answered “Eggs.”
The psychologist’s life was harried over the next few months, as he dealt with all the aftereffects of the car accident, his wife’s and son’s rehabilitation, etc. But six months later, he returned to finish the questions.
When Europeans arrived in the NE US, the Iroquois Federation had already been in place for a while, maybe several hundred years (tribal sources say it began in 1142). 5 tribes – Seneca, Onondaga, Oneida, Cayuga and Mohawks – used a federalist system with representative democracy to manage their friendly relations and common interests over an area that encompassed a large part of New York State. They were important in the Colonial era, and allied with the British. Some people think their system of government was very influential to the Founding Fathers. Just before the Declaration of Indepdenence the Continental Congress made friendly overtures to the Iroquois Chiefs.
Although I don’t think they ever tried to evict the white man – remember “Colonists” were actually themselves groups of various nationalities with competing interests and the Iroquois Nation backed the British against the French – they still live primarily in the same area they did when European colonists came to New England, which is more than you can say for a lot of native american groups. As these things go (incredibly badly), they did alright for themselves.
Whoosh, whoosh here. If it is not too much of a derailment of the thread, might I ask what is the connection between Tenniel and buffalo? Sorry, it’s just that the only Tenniel I have heard of is the one who did the illustrations for the Lewis Carroll books, but I’m sure I am missing something really obvious.
I am sure I will be smacking myself on the head once it is explained, but for now I feel really stupid.
Thanks in advance to Polycarp or any other ignorance-fighter who can help.
[edited for typo] And again, same reason. See what I mean about being stupid.
Perhaps the most well-developed were along the western slopes of the Andes in what is today Peru. Still some of it going on today, but no as sophisticated as before.
(Yes, that’s “America”.)
There is probably nothing that could have saved the pre-Colombian American civilizations; the vast majority of its people were killed by Eiropean infectious diseases.
The Indians actually didn’t outnumber the Europeans for long. By 1700 there were probably more whites than Indians living east of the Mississippi; by 1750, the Even prior to that, any effort to combine their forces (practically impossible anyway) would simply have elicited an enormous military response by the affected European powers.
In Montana, “Indian” is universal in everyday speech regardless of race. The only time you hear “Native American” is when someone is speaking in an official capacity.
Only by a strained nonce definition that ignores actual usage.
Well, why didn’t indians band together to evict the europeans?
Because there was no such thing as a shared “indian” identity that all indians could rally under in contrast to european identity. If you’ve got traditional enemies, and some new guys move nearby and offer you assistance in wiping out your traditional enemies, who cares that those new guys came from a different continent, or that you and your traditional enemies came from the same continent?
This is the same reason that the British were able to conquer India and is a classic feature of imperalism, that neighboring groups are willing to accept outside help against each other and don’t perceive that as neighbors they have a shared interest against the outsiders.
The other thing to consider is that by the 1700s, North America had suffered a tremendous demographic collapse due to disease. Before Columbus the vast majority of North Americans were farmers, not hunters. But the farming cultures and cities collapsed. To take the famous example of the pilgrims, they found the perfect site for their colony at Plymouth Rock. But only a few years before that perfect site was occupied by an Indian village, which was entirely wiped out by european diseases, with only one survivor, Squanto. Which is why he kind of adopted the Pilgrims…they were living in his home village!
They’re not. So you as a Brit don’t have to worry.
Two separate groups of plains Indians were called “Blackfeet” or “Blackfoot” by the whites. To add to the confusion, the terms were and sometimes still are used interchangeably.
The “Blackfoot,” or Sihasapa, were/are closely related to the Hunkpapas; both are divisions of the Lakota Sioux. The Sihasapa and Hunkpapas live on the Standing Rock reservation in North and South Dakota. As the location of the reservation reflects, the Lakota, including the Sihasapa, were/are in the Dakotas of the United States. The Sioux speak a native language called Siouan, which has many dialects. (Confusion alert! The Standing Rock website refers to the Sihasapa as “Blackfeet”.)
The “Blackfeet” were/are a division of the Blackfoot or Blackfeet Nation, which consists of the Siksika, the Northern Piegan, the Bloods, and the Blackfeet. The first three of these are First Nations tribes in Alberta, Canada. (Confusion alert! The Canadian tribes are generally known as “Blackfoots”). There are IIRC three small Blackfoot reservations in Alberta (called in Canadian English “reserves”). But the main reservation is the Blackfeet Nation in northwest Montana to the east of Glacier park. The Blackfeet live in Northwest Montana and Alberta, and speak an Algonquian dialect.
Today, “Blackfeet” almost always refers to the Blackfeet nation, which – obviously – still uses the term “Blackfeet.” AFAIK, the Sihasapa Lakota do not generally use the term “Blackfoot” to describe themselves.
It is unclear how either tribe got the Anglo name “Blackfoot/Blackfeet.” Completely speculative guesses include that they wore black moccassins; that their moccassins got dirty after a prairie fire; or that they had really dirty feet. :rolleyes: It is probable, though not proven, that whites, encountering the Lakota and then later the similarly warlike horse-culture Blackfeet, simply erroneously assumed they were members of the same tribe. They’re not. Here’s some links with more information on the Blackfoot Sihasapa Lakota and the Blackfeet, if anyone is interested:
This is not my experience. “Indian” is sort of a “whitey don’t know what Tribe he’s talking to” catch-all phrase. Since, unlike most whites, the Native Americans do distinguish on the basis of tribal affiliation, they generally self-identify and identify each other by tribe.
OTOH, at law at least, the legal term still used throughout the applicable federal laws is “Indian.” So terms like the “Indian Child Welfare Act,” “Indian Country,” and “Bureau of Indian Affairs” have very specific, official definitions. It is correct that someone speaking in an official capacity is likely to use the more PC “Native American,” but “Indian” is very much in use in documents and arguments.
If it is not too much of a derailment of the thread, might I ask what is the connection between Tenniel and buffalo? Sorry, it’s just that the only Tenniel I have heard of is the one who did the illustrations for the Lewis Carroll books, but I’m sure I am missing something really obvious.
