There is no evidence of any permanent settlements i.e. cities in North America like that in central America under the Aztecs. Leftist historians dispense with the truth in order to support their twisted vision that the Indians of the Americas all lived in perfect harmony with nature until the evil Europeans came along. The truth was the opposite: the Indians of the Americas had segments of their populations who just as cruel, warlike, and rapacious as Europeans or other peoples of the world.
Look at the Mongols. American Indians are descendants of the Mongols who invaded Europe and southern Asia (not the other way around)slaughtering millions and leaving no cultural improvements in their wake...just death and misery. At least the Indians of the Americas contributed some wonderful vegetables to the world. But they also contributed tobacco which has killed multi-millions.
Again, the hard truth is that the Indians above the Rio Grande were small in number. Not more than a few million. If there were numbers substantially larger than that, unbiased historians would have published that fact. Every time I read stories purporting to show the populations above the Rio Grande around ten-twenty million, they're based on sheer speculation and not anything resembling hard data i.e. facts. The simple facts are: no large cities and settlements; no large Indian populations.
The Indians left significant constructions in the four corners area, structures which abased on sophisticated astronomical knowledge. Theer were about a thousand years ago, a large concentration of people in the vicintiy of St.Louis based on agriculture. Such things did not last ,but they existed at one time or another. Most of the Indian nations east of the Mississippi depended on the cultivation of corn, and the white found huge fields on either side the the Ohio. This was supplemented by hunting, and it is speculated that the reason why the population did not grow was a lack of meat animals and a subsequent lack of protein, so that when an area did grow, it soon reached a limit. The English found a significant population in the Chesapeake area, and organized un the Powhatten into a confederacy.
The first settlers existed by trading with the Indians for their corn surplus, but as John Smith tells us, because the Stllers ran out of food, they had to resort to raiding the indians for what they would not trade.