Native Americans : History?

Question

I've been reading alot about ancient history this past year and I have a question regarding the people of North and South America. I've tried to do research on this, but with no luck.
Everytime I read about Rome, Persia, ect I wonder what was going on on the other continent.
I want to know why the people of North and South America didn't "progress" like the people in Eurpoe and Asia did.
I don't mean any offense to anyone, because I am 1/2 native american myself, BUT
What were these people doing? What was holding them back?
They were advanced in some ways, but nothing like Rome.

I'm sure there is a simple answer to this, but I can't figure it out.

Answer 1

I believe it is because they were isolated from other people and cultures. The people of Austrailia didn't advance the same either or a lot of other isolated peoples. The people of Asia and Europe had contact with each other. New ideas and inventions flowed back and forth between the peoples of these areas.

The people of the Americas developed advanced civilizations in Meso America. Also the Pueblo peoples had farming communities with established communities. There were others. All of these people walked. The American people had copper, gold, and silver but the idea of bronze was never discovered, nor was iron.

These discoveries and others such as gun powder and ship building/sailing slowly developed in other civilizations as they all learned from one another. They learned or died as wars and invasions repeatedly befell different peoples of the world for centuries. It did not happen over night. They had the horse and camels upon which they could travel and carry goods over long distances. The developed world had advanced civilizations that thrived on trade and acqusition through war. This led the ship building for moving warriors and for trading ventures with cargo. Which in turn led to exploration and the discovery of the Americas ( The Americans didn't know they were lost).

The people of the so call civilized world were not so advanced as you might think. Euopeans of the 13th and early 14th century thought you would fall off the earth if you went too far. But one day a man with the fortitude and imagination to look beyond the known decided to send a ship down the western coast of Africa where it was said the world ended to try and reach India which was blocked to him over land by his rivals. They found out it could be done and when one finally made it around the African coast they found men riding on camels and large rich Musilm cities on the eastern coast of Africa.

War and trade were not a foriegn concept in the Americas either but it had not grown to the scale of the civilzed world. Goods from Mexico have been found where the mound builders of the middle U. S. lived. In historic times Kiowas ranged as far south as the Central American jungles on raiding trips.

Answer 2

The simple answer is that you have a lot to learn about the new world peoples' accomplishments. The first thing you'll need to know is that while there were some cities larger than perhaps any in Europe, overall population density was far lower, so the concept of individual real property was far less developed because it wasn't needed to the same extent.

Geographical scope: look at a map of Europe and contiguous land around the Mediterranean - then compare that the size of modern France and Spain - each are similar in size to Texas. Now look at what you're talking about in terms of all of North and South America. Compare/contrast.

Realize they hadn't opportunity of interaction with peoples outside the new world with whom to share technology. All they accomplished was independent: architecture, government, writing, numbers and the concept of zero, astronomy, agriculture, art - these things were present also. Cotton was a crop from about the same time as old world cotton. Corn is a cross of two unrelated grasses. Ceramics and roads were well-developed. Animals were domesticated.

Answer 3

One very important factor was that, because of geographical limitations, innovations couldn't spread fast between different parts of the American continent.

For example, Native Americans in the South East developed an advanced form of agriculture, and had cities greater then London at the time of Columbus. But that innovation couldn't spread to the West because of the desert, nor the South because of the jungle and the Panama isthmus.

Inca's developed sophisticated irrigation systems, built more hardened road then the Romans, grew potatoes in the mountains, and domesticated lama's and alpaca's. That innovation too, didn't filter to others.

Ditto for the Maya's in Yucatan or the Aztec in Tenochtitlan.

Corn as a crop took thousands of years to filter from the central Mexican highlands to the Southwest, the Northeast, and southeastern Canada.

They were geographically handicapped compared to the Europeans, who were a product of centuries of rapid innovation that passed unhindered between Europe and Asia.

Answer 4

They were progressing just fine, just in a different way. Their history was just completely and totally annihilated when they were killed off. They did not have formal physical record keeping, as oral traditions held up well enough, there was no need for writing.

Read up on the nations (or 6 nations) of the Iroquois. It was a government as advanced as the Romans. Don't forget about the Mayans, the Aztecs in South America.

Civilization as we know it (starting with agriculture) usually only occurred with limited resources. People in power (who have access to resources, most often water for irrigation) direct "civilization" to organize in order to meet the needs of a growing population. This was not necessary in most of North America as resources were plentiful.

They were not advanced in the way that is familiar to us (technology). Tribes in North America in general seemed to be more socially advanced than we are today. Even the Mayans 5,000 years ago were way ahead of the game when it came to astronomy and math.

There is a notion in the Western world that we have to "overcome" our natural environment. We have to harness it, posess it, own it and systemize it. This ideology didn't really exist in the new world. They saw themselves as humans as just being part of a greater system.

Answer 5

Ahhh, so you see one culture as better than the other based on material possessions. Are you by chance American....

The Native people of North and South America had governments, religions, languages. What they didn't have was land acquisition and material 'stuff.'


.

Answer 6

I am full blooded Ojibwe I live in Minnesota. I guess the reason why Native Americans weren't as advanced is because we were all too busy running from white people and cooking and hunting and raising our children building and tearing down teepees and wigwams, moving because of the weather (winter) you know trying to keep warm. Umm lets see hear what else did Native Americans do ohh yea my people did the tapping from maple trees. Got anymore questions ask me anytime. just look for my sn it's chaotichellraiser

Answer 7

I think geographic distances in the Americas between major warring tribes and the abundance of natural resources in relation to tribal populations kept the necessity of agricultural and industrial progression at bay. That being said, the Mayan and Aztec civilizations rivalled in many ways the earlier "eastern" civs.

Answer 8

Read "A Peoples History of the United States" by Howard Zinn it'll convince you otherwise!

Answer 9

I've read several papers and articles about this subject, mostly by molecular biologists and DNA researchers. The populations of hunters-gatherers of Africa, aboriginals of Oceania and American Indians do not have “DNA-signals” of quantity growth. Indeed, these groups of people remained at the level of previous primitive technologies and due to that they can only support their quantity at the minimum level, which, as thousands of years ago, varies significantly from generation to generation, depending on weather conditions, successful hunting and other “favors of gods”.

What interested me in their research was that all people on the Earth had originated from a small group of ancestors – their quantity not exceeding 2 thousand people. This did not preclude the possibility that other groups of people existed at that time, but all of us are descendants of those two thousand people, and all our genes originate from that population.

"Approximately 70-140 thousand years ago a small group of founders of mankind started to divide into individual branches giving rise to future races and populations...." quoting from one article.

Answer 10

Didn't progress? WTF! The Native Americans from the US didn't progress but the Aztecs, the Mayans and the Incas reached a very high degree of civilization. And how did Northern Europeans progressed? They simply copied all the innovations made by the Romans. Before that they were savages.