SEMIPLAUSIBLE THEORY 1

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SEMI-PLAUSIBLE THEORY 1

• Human beings traveled into South America from
  Africa when the two continents were attached and
  became stuck there when they drifted apart
• Problems
• Indians dont look like Africans
• Separation of the two continents occurred
  millions of years before human beings appeared on
  earth

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SEMI-PLAUSIBLE THEORY 2
Problems Closest Polynesian island is still over
2000 miles from coast of North America Prevailing
winds in South Pacific blow away from America
and towards Asia In order to get here,
Polynesians would have had to sail over 2000
miles against the windpossible but very unlikely
POLYNESIA
Catamaran
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SEMI-PLAUSIBLE THEORY 3
PROBLEMS Distance Prevailing winds Flimsy ships
Lack of physical evidence
Chinese or Japanese might have sailed across
Pacific and established settlements in Pacific
Northwest
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MOST LIKELY THEORY 1

• First Americans originated in Gobi Desert
• Some migrated to Siberia around 15,000 years ago
• Crossed Bering Strait in Alaska
• Land bridge probably existed at the time
• Gradually dispersed throughout North and South
  America

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BRAND NEW THEORY

• Ancestors of modern Native Americans originated
  in Europe
• Ice Age extended shorelines of North America,
  Europe, and Greenland far into the Atlantic
• Prehistoric people traveled along shoreline
  hunting and crossed over
• Exterminated by Central Asian immigrants who
  already lived in North America

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EVOLVING INDIAN CULTURE

• Lived same way as other primitive people
  elsewhere on earth
• Hunted mammoths and other now extinct animals
  with ivory-tipped spears
• Often lived in caves and decorated them with
  paintings
• Made beads
• Used copper

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INDIAN CIVILIZATION

• Indian culture evolved very rapidly between 500
  BC and 500 AD in parts of Central and South
  America

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MAYANS

• Established an empire in southern Mexico and
  northern Central America
• Peaked around 1100 AD
• Also developed advanced civilization
• Based on agriculture and trade
• Invented accurate calendar
• Predicted eclipses of moon and sun
• Built magnificent cities
• Built pyramids out of precision-cut stone

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TOLTECS

• Around 1200 AD, the Toltecs took over most of
  former Mayan territory
• Absorbed and expanded on Mayan culture
• Similar to the way the Romans had absorbed and
  expanded upon Greek culture when they conquered
  ancient Europe

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AZTECS

• Originally a brutal and nomadic tribe from
  northern Mexico who over-ran Toltecs
• Practiced human sacrifice
• Worshipped gods that resembled monsters
• Absorbed Mayan/Toltec culture and established
  magnificent civilization
• Centered near what is today Mexico City
• Dominated all of Mexico and northern Central
  America until the arrival of the Spanish in the
  early 1500s

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PUEBLOS

• Lived in what is now Arizona and New Mexico
• Constructed small cities on sides of cliffs
• Made up of adobe structures
• Developed complex irrigation system
• Produced beautiful art
• Turquoise necklaces and pottery
• Had centralized government
• Water supplies began to run out around 1300 AD,
  forcing them to concentrate around remaining
  sources of water
• Made them more vulnerable and they were
  eventually over-run by nomadic tribes
• Navajos and Apaches

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Most North American Indians tribes were nomadic
and did not evolve advanced civilizations Thousan
ds of tribes, possessing a variety of different
cultures and customs largely determined by the
environment and climate of where they lived
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GREAT PLAINS INDIANS

• Included such tribes as the Pawnee, Dakota,
  Shoshone, Crow, Comanche, Ute, Cheyenne, and
  various branches of the Sioux
• Originally a timid, aboriginal group who hid in
  foothills of Rocky Mountains from the Blackfeet,
  who controlled the Great Plains
• Only ventured on to the plains in small groups,
  hunting on foot, picking off weak or sick
  buffalos who had fallen behind main herds
• A small, poor, and unimportant people

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THE HORSE

• Introduced to the Western Hemisphere by the
  Spanish in the 1500s
• Great Plains Indians began to use them
• Stealing them from the Spanish or breaking wild
  ones
• Came down from mountains, defeated the Blackfeet,
  and began to hunt buffalo on horseback
• Allowing them to follow herds wherever they went
  and kill them in huge numbers

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RISE TO DOMINANCE

• Established trade links with white settlements to
  the east
• Trading buffalo products for guns, utensils,
  leather products, cloth, and trinkets
• Transformed from a weak, exploited, and destitute
  collection of small tribes into a powerful and
  wealthy people who dominated the West until after
  the Civil War

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WEAKNESSES I

• Never discovered critical innovations that
  Europeans had used for a long time
• Never discovered multiple uses of iron
• Never built boats from timber planks
• Never used wheel for transportation
• Lacked draft animals for agriculture
• Operated at low technological level

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WEAKNESSES II

• Tribes lived in more-or-less isolation from each
  other
• Did not know anything about tribes that only
  lived 100 miles away
• No trace of solidarity, no concept of brotherhood
  or nation
• Tribes viewed each other as enemies and
  competitors for hunting grounds
• Most contact between them was violent and hostile

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A FATAL WEAKNESS

• Whites would exploit fundamental weaknesses of
  Indians
• Took advantage of divisions among tribes and
  picked them off one by one
• Usually with active help of other tribes
• Inability to unite was primary reason for white
  conquest of the Indian
• Although other factors also played a role
• Disease, greed, racism