True but what they had they obtained from Europeans. They could make little aside from metal projectile tips and edged weapons, the metal itself obtained from Europeans. I think the Iroquois figured out how to make blackpowder but that was about the extent of it. To my knowledge none ever figured out that with wagons, they could load them with provisions and strike deep into the white mans territory just like the white men struck deep into their territory.
Years later Sitting Bull lead a hunting expedition and killed thousands of buffalo.
So much for living in harmony with the land, taking only what they needed and wasting nothing.
Well, I doubt that Buffalo Bill made he gun he used. I didn’t say the Sioux started manufacturing plants. I am saying they radically changed their life style, as many peoples do when they encounter superior technology. In any case, stone age technology was not necessarily primitive. An indian living in South Carolina, a west African, and a French peasant who were contemporaries in the 16th Century lived on pretty much the same comfort level, even with the superior technology available to the last. Which is why, by the way, that a French peasant could immigrate to Canada and endure the hardships of a savage New Land, whereas you or I probably would not survive for more than a few months under those conditions.