Disclaimer: I am not a racist, just uninformed in this situation. Please do not take offense to any of this. My question is is there any direct relation between the American indians and the people of India. I'm just curious since the native Americans were the first in the US...did they descend from India?
2007-04-16 08:30:45 · 6 answers · asked by Anonymous in Arts & Humanities ➔ History
Nope, they have no relation whatsoever. Columbus made a huge mistake, that's all.
2007-04-20 02:06:24 · answer #1 · answered by acidten 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
No, they're not from India. The ancestors of the Native Americans came to the North American continent tens of thousands of years ago during the last Ice Age, when the land of the Bering Strait was exposed, which is the closest point between Asia and North America. Once the glaciers melted at the end of the last Ice Age, the sea levels rose, and the land was covered with water.
Don't listen to the idiot that said that they come from the Mongolian Empire. That didn't exist until about the 1100s, which was thousands of years after the migration.
2007-04-16 16:54:35 · answer #2 · answered by alimagmel 5 · 1⤊ 1⤋
They were called "Indians" because Columbus, upon arriving in the West Indies, thought he had sailed through to India. He didn't know there was a whole continent there. Therefore, he mistakenly named the natives "Indians", and I guess it must have stuck.
My belief is that the native Americans may be descended from Tibetan peoples who crossed the Bering Strait. If you observe the Tibetans, their faces, dress and customs are very much like Native Americans, and less like Chinese.
2007-04-16 15:38:35 · answer #3 · answered by FUNdie 7 · 1⤊ 1⤋
The term Indian probably comes from the Spanish term for native Americans. They referred to them as being of god or en dios. It's akin to the English phrase "noble savage". Even Columbus was smart enough to know he hadn't reached India.
2007-04-16 15:51:15 · answer #4 · answered by the_meadowlander 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Answer from a skin.
NOPE no relation, infact the ones i know call themselves HINDI, as in HINDUSTAN.
There was no INDIA when columbus sailed, there was HINDUSTAN. when he hit puerto rico he thought he was in eden. Everything was green, people with no clothes on,etc.
He called them "los gentes en dios" the people of god. Later "en dios" later yet indio.
My people have artifact that puts us here BEFORE the last ice age. It's MYTH that we came across the bering straight, because it allows the dominate culture to say "they had to take it from somebody else so we're not so bad" It's an excuse.
2007-04-20 00:27:21 · answer #5 · answered by Mr.TwoCrows 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
nope, it is a misnomer given to american natives....when early explorers set off to find a "passage to india" they thought they had found india, when in fact they had landed in america, no connection, just a mistake that has stuck in the name of native americans or "indians" as some call them.
2007-04-16 15:37:52 · answer #6 · answered by CBJ 4 · 1⤊ 0⤋