Native Americans Before The Arrival Of Europeans

The Native American’s were the first known settlers in North America, ten thousand years before Columbus came to the continent. Their origins completely unclear, anthropologists believe there were three to five million Native Americans in North America in the year 1492 (Hoxie and Iverson, 1997). As early as the Revolutionary War in 1775, European settlers started taking note of the Native Americans. Unfortunately, the Native American population plunged significantly in the first decades after their first contact with Europeans. Native Americans were now unprotected and exposed to deadly diseases like smallpox, influenza, and measles which did not previously exist in their society (North American Natives, 2016).

Comparing the two populations at 1800, it is shown that Native American numbers have sharply declined while European numbers have exploded since the landing of Columbus. Still to this day, Native Americans represent a very small percentage of the diversity in America.

By the 1500s, when Europeans first began arriving in North America, as many as 10 million Indians lived on a continent mapped by trails and rivers, many of which, were used as an extensive trading network by the, then,

During the end of the nineteenth century, the United States had formed policies which reduced land allotted to Native Americans. By enforcing these laws as well as Anglo-American ideals, the United States compromised indigenous people’s culture and ability to thrive in its society.

The history of corn can be dated back to the beginning of time, but the use and value of corn had been unnoticed until it was introduce by the Native Americans. Where corn had seemed to be a big part of their everyday life from, being in myths, legends, and for a huge portion of their diet corn was an essential component. "when the Europeans had touched base to the New World during the late fifteenth century, the Native Americans had introduced corn what they had called maize to the Europeans .This crop was then later on grown and adapted from Canada to southern South America very quickly, which then began to form the new basis of the New World civilization" (Leventin & McManhon, 2012). The way corn has been changing and revolutionizing throughout time has been both fascinating and drastic. Rather than conventional corn being grown, it is genetically modified corn that have been dominating today 's crop industry and farming but the question remains as to how the various types of GMO corn has influenced the way it is grown and used and what its ramification are.

Imagine a person bought something that the person valued. The person was the owner of the product and took good care of it.Then, all of a sudden, a stranger comes and takes that product and declares it “discovered”. Now since the stranger “discovered” it, the product now has to be shared among them. This is similar to what happened to Native Americans in North America. Native Americans owned and lived in North America for several thousand years. Then, all of a sudden, European explorers came to North America and claimed the land “discovered”. Europeans started moving into the land and later, started sharing the land. Encounters between Europeans and Native Americans in the colonial era led to the exchange of diseases with Native Americans,

Native Americans during 1785-1829 were affected by western expansion because of the removal of Native Americans from the land, white settlers attempting to assimilate Native Americans to their culture, and were involved in battles between the a Native Americans and white setters which led to the depleting number of Native Americans.

When Europeans came to the American continent, contact with the Native Americans who were already living there was inevitable. In the colonization of early America, the various groups of European settlers: the Spanish, French, English, and Dutch each had unique experiences with, and therefore individual opinions of the Native Americans whom they interacted. Each of these nations also shared commonalties in their colonization processes and in how they viewed Native Americans. Furthermore, the Native Americans held differing opinions of each group of Europeans whom they encountered while some features of their relationships with Europeans were consistent despite the tribe or nation involved.

The colonists were not allowed to send products to other countries or had to pay large tariffs to send them there so that England profited

It has been thought for many years that the Americas were a vastly unpopulated land until Columbus came. However new evidence disputes this previously thought notion. Archeologist, who have been studying the remains of Native American culture, have found evidence suggesting that the Indians were in the Americas for much longer and in greater numbers than what was believed. This new evidence shows us the impact the Europeans had on the New World and gives us insight into what the Americas were like before the Europeans and what they may have been had the Europeans never settled here.

“The history of American Indians before European contact is broadly divided into three major periods: the Paleo-Indian period, the Archaic period (8000–1000 b.c.), and the Woodland period (1000 b.c.–1600 a.d.).”(DiNome) There is little known information about the Paleo-Indian period; however, the Paleo Indians are believed to be some of the first American Indians, not only in Florida, but in all of America. The Paleo Indians were believed to be nomads who fought and hunted with stone tools and clubs. During the Archaic period American Indians began to become more civilized. It was in the Archaic period that the American Indians began to establish a system of trading among their people. During this time the Indians also started developing migration routes to bring other Indians down to Florida from the Carolinas. Similarly to the Indians in the Paleo time period, the Indians in the Archaic period used stone tools for hunting and fighting, but they also began to utilize the use of bone tools during this time period. Another skill that the Indians started becoming more familiar with during this time period was basketry. The last period that we see in pre-contact Native American life is the Woodland period. It is called the Woodland period because during this time is when the Native Americans began farming. We see during this time the Indian settlements had begun moving closer to streams of water and rivers, because that is where the soil was good for successful

European colonizers had many effects, mostly negative, on the Native Americans they encountered when they came to the New World. Two of the specific effects that they had on Native American people were acculturation, also known as ethnocide, and genocide. The European settlers came into America claiming it as their own and used the Native Americans until they were no longer useful for their survival in the New World. Once they deemed the Native Americans to be savages, they forced them to assimilate into European cultural ideals and if they refused, they were ultimately killed. Ethnocide is defined as “the violent eradication of an entire group’s collective cultural identity as a distinctive people” (Newlander 2018).

According to Nieto as an agent in the category of indigenous heritage I’m condition to believe that Indigenous people no longer exist in North America. From the beginning children and young adults are taught of the discovery of America by Christopher Columbus. According to Loewen the problem with talking about the “discovery of America” imply there weren’t people on the land before the “discovery”. In the contrary to what was taught Native American has been living on the land for thousand of years. The use of the word “discovery” implied that Christopher Columbus was curious and set out to find new land but instead the European government needed to increase their slaves and land.

Maize also known as corn was most likely originated in the West Indies and South America approximately 6000 years ago. Scientists believe that maize is derived from an earlier ancestral plant called teosinte. Maize is a fast growing crop which grows in diverse conditions and produces up to two harvest per season. This coupled with the fact that it is nutritious, easy to store and easy to carry made it a staple food for most American and Caribbean cultures. Maize was a treasured and worshipped crop by the Mayans, Incas, Aztecs and Anasazi as it was domesticated over the centuries to nourished their civilizations. The Europeans found out about maize on their arrival to the Americas, they took the crop home with them and subsequently spread it

Native American tribes started selectively breeding maize more than 10,000 years ago. Certain seeds were easier to grind, tasted better, and produced bigger plants. Ancient farmers planted the more desirable seeds for the next year’s harvest. The versatile seeds developed the ability to grow in poor conditions which proved convenient. Other benefits included increased starch production, shorter