Posted on 08/04/2014 9:45:52 AM PDT by fishtank
When the Spanish brought horses to their rancheros in what is now Mexico, the natives learned how to wrangle and raise horses. The spread of the horse culture in the Southwest started about 1750 or so and finally reached the Sioux in Minnesota about 1830.
The natives then created the idea that stealing horses was a sign of strength and war prowess, akin to the theft of cars today by gangs.
For more info, search ‘when did Indians get horses?’ or read contemporary accounts of native life in books on Washakie, Geronimo, Red Cloud, Black Elk.
Iroquois legend has it the the Canadian Iroquois went south & wiped out a southern tribe who invaded NY State around 708 B.C years before Columbus, because the southern Tribe killed an emissary, a prince who came to them for peace terms..
Got lots and lots of BS about how the cliff dwellings were sited for solar energy, not defense. Riigghhtt.
The Mesa Verdeans had lived in pueblos on the mesa tops for many centuries. Quite suddenly they abandoned their homes and built new ones in the cliffs.
Recently they have found definitive evidence of cannibalism in the area. If the neighbors suddenly became cannibals, I'd want to live at the top of a cliff myself.
I've often wondered if the decline and fall of the Chaco and Mesa Verde civilizations were related to cultural influences or even migrations from Central Mexico, where people were so heavily into sacrificing and eating people.
BTW, highly recommend this book.
http://www.amazon.com/War-Before-Civilization-Peaceful-Savage/dp/0195119126
Just think, if the gun control folks win out we’ll
have to go back to blunt trauma again...
It was given that name because the first white settlers to the area found the valley covered with the bleached bones if Indians who had been massacred.....
by other Indians.
Went to Mesa Verde last year but thankfully was not bombarded by too much eco-babble.
The cliffside structures would have been inconvenient for day to day living so there being located as a defensive decision makes sense.
As a WAT-—wild ass theory—— I wondered that since this forting-up in the Southwest occurred congruent with the Mongol era if maybe some North Asians had crossed over and ended up attacking our earlier residents.
I see violent era in the near future
I suppose it’s possible. The Mongols made two attempts on Japan, both driven off by tyhoons, and some of the damaged ships could have drifted a long way.
But Mesa Verde is a loonng way from the coast and it’s hard to see why they’d hike all that way to attack people who just didn’t have that much to steal.
Also, nobody’s ever found any evidence of metals, recurved bows or other technologies the Mongols were perfectly familiar with.
Ever heard of the famous Navajo raid on the Mesas? It took place in either 1825 or 1835.
Hundreds of Hopis slain, women carried off sheep stolen. It was a all happiness and rainbows at that time. (snark)
I’ve read how the Iroquois left the New York area, went on a war raid and attacked a band of Pawnees on the High plains, all because the Pawnees had insulted or whipped some tribe friendly to the Iroquois.
“Hundreds of Hopis slain, women carried off sheep stolen. It was a all happiness and rainbows at that time.”
There’s a common liberal fantasy that all pre-American (USA) cultures and all pre-Christian (native, as in non-white) were all peaceful, full of rainbows and respect for women. But you look at their bones and their weapons and they tell a different story. I suspect that Christian civilization and later western civilization were the relative watersheds of peace and tranquility as far as man living with his fellow man. And, yes, I know all about the many wars. But they became less frequent over time. Interestingly, since the US became the single super power and before Obama I think the world was relatively peaceful. (Remember, in pre-Christian civilizations, much more so than later, it was common to kill all the men who were not enslaved and the women they didn’t take as concubines when they captured an area.)
Archaeological evidence has come out in the past few years to indicate that the cannibalism and violent deaths could be sourced from what is now Mexico. I have sources at home. Can’t get to them now.
Back around 1980, OETA TV in Oklahoma had a LIB program on called IMAGES OF INDIANS in which it debunked much of the movie views of Indians.
One of the Indians said the Indians NEVER tortured or scalped or did anything like that. No one challenged him on anything he said. Remember, that was just after the Wounded Knee problems back in 1974 and the American Indian Movement troublemakers.
Like I said a. WAT. Still, I was thinking also of maybe non-Mongols who were driven out of or left North Asia because of them.
I also definitely think that Chinese explorers were among the ancient seafarers who reached the Americas.
One of the white captives kidnapped as a kid by Comanches in Texas and held for years told of the amazing distances that his band ranged over during his time with them.
BTW, Indian Depredations in Texas by Josiah Wilbarger written in the 1870s is a fascination 600 page account of the majority of attacks from the late colonial era up to his time.
I should say the majority of the KNOWN Indian atacks.
1535-1541? 8,000 Iroquois warriors attack Hochelaga [Montreal] and try to exterminate the Algonkins and other tribes along the St. Lawrence River
Hakluyt, “Principal Navigations”, 1589, iii,235
Referring to VIOLENCE amongst engines is now a HATE CRIME, isn’t it? Or, if not, it soon will be.
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