Assignment 9

Assignment 9

The paleo-indians were dependent on hunting megafauna along with gathering from local plant sources. It was around the time of the paleo-indians that more sophisticated arts were being taken up such as making grinding stones and bowls, simple pottery, stone and wood pipes, and fishing hooks. Their way of life was evolving and would soon transition. As new developments and innovations took place their way of life was changing. They began to cultivate food and plants by using simple tools and were more or less semi-nomadic and didn’t pick up and move as much. These evolving Native Americans were known as Archaic Indians “the three sisters.” With the simple tools they developed they were able to create a sense of horticulture. This new identity or cultivation of the land was spreading across the Americas from around 4,000 BC to AD1. Communities were taking shape around rivers and bodies of water. One of the most important advances these early Native Americans made was in producing corn “maize.” Corn was originally a wild grass that was cross-pollinated with other grasses /grains and evolved into what it is today. The Archaic Indians used maize as their main food source along with hunting buffalo and other game and still gathering local plant life.

When Christopher Columbus landed in San Salvador in 1492 he called the natives the name Indios. There were several different pronunciations that later became Indian or redskin. He wrote in letters to the King and Queen of Spain that the natives were so tractable and peaceful and there was not a better nation. However, because they were naked and so nice, they were thought to be weak and heathen. This ethnocentric view would be adhered about the Native Americans until their almost complete extermination. Over the next four centuries, Europeans took it upon themselves to enforce their ways and culture on the natives of the New World.
Beginning in San Salvador Columbus kidnapped ten of the friendly Taino people and sent them over to Spain, and the rest of the people were forced to give up their land and adopt the European’s religion as well as many villages being burned and looted. In 1607 the English came to Jamestown, VA. The English were a bit more civilized than the Spaniards, however, after Wahunsonacook of the Powhatans died, the Pothatans rose up in revenge and were reduced from 8,000 to 1,000 people. When the Pilgrims landed in Plymouth, the Wampnoags saw them as helpless children and brought them food and helped them through the first winter. Things continued for them fairly peacefully until more and more shiploads of white people began pouring on shore. Eventually the Indians were pushed farther into the wilderness by the encroachment of more invaders, and fought back only to be defeated in the long run by white man’s weapons.

The first 200 years of the Indian wars were fought in the eastern part of the United States. However, by 1840 all of the eastern Native American tribes were either wiped out by disease or forced to move westward by incoming settlers. These eastern and coastal tribes moved further inland at the expense of their westward neighboring tribes setting the scene for a whole series of conflicts. Tribes such as the Cherokee from North Carolina moved as far west as Oklahoma. Another example is the Delaware Indians who moved across the country as far as Minnesota. Many tribes were exterminated completely while others were displaced in order to provide more land for the whites.

The Great Plains Indians used the buffalo in every aspect of their lives. It was said that a buffalo could provide everything an Indian needed with the exceptions of drinking water and the poles for their tepees. A calf’s hide could be used as swaddling clothes for a baby, and the adults hides used for tepee covers, inner curtains, drums, rattles, and shields. Each buffalo would be harvested all the way down to the bone. Skins would make shirts, leggings, dresses, gloves, or moccasins. While the winter skins could be used as blankets, robes, and raw hide could be cut into pieces to make lassos. Buffalo hair could be woven for strong ropes, or it could be used loose as stuffing for cradleboards, gloves, moccasins, saddle bags, and pillows. Their horns were made into spoons or drinking containers and the small bones made for knives and awls. Even the ribs of the animal were put to use by tying them together and covering them raw hide to make a sled. On the other hand, the hooves, scrotum, and the skull were often used to religious ceremonies. The buffalo were greatly revered by the people and tribal leaders often took names associated with the buffalo to show honor and respect. When the Native Americans were later forced to live on reservations and when their lands were being taken by the whites it is easy to see why they could no longer feed their families and clothe them since they were no longer able to hunt the buffalo.

Horses created a new way of life for the Plains Indians. Dogs had previously been the only domesticated animal; however, they were prone to fight and could not carry much on a travois. So when the Europeans introduced horses to the Indians, the horse replaced the dog in importance. They called the horse “spirit dog,” “holy dog”, and “medicine dog.” The southwest Indians were in constant contact with the Spaniards and were the first to own horses. By the early 17th century many Plains tribesmen were beginning to own their own herds. Their Indian bred horses tended to be smaller than European horses and therefore better for battle and buffalo hunts.

In 1829 Andrew Jackson, aka Sharp Knife to the Indians, was elected President of the United States. He had seen many battles throughout his frontier days and believed white people and Indians could not coexist in the same area. Again, this is another example of ethnocentrism through an authority figure. Thus, he stipulated a law that was later passed that guaranteed Indians land west of the Mississippi. With this new law there were to be no Indians east of the Mississippi so they had to be on reservation land or they had to be moved west of the Mississippi. However, before these new laws were put into effect, waves of white settlers moved westward and formed territories of Wisconsin and Iowa. Since the guidelines had changed, this forced lawmakers to change the “permanent Indian frontier” from the Mississippi River to the 95th meridian (Minnesota-Canada border going south through Minnesota and Iowa, and then along the western borders of Missouri, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Galveston Bay, Texas).

After the establishment of the “permanent Indian frontier” there were hard times for the eastern tribes, especially the Cherokee. Because their numbers were in the thousands, the idea was to move them westward gradually, unfortunately, that was quickly sped up because gold had been discovered in the Appalachian Mountains. From the prison camps, they were marched along the “trail of tears” where many died from the cold, hunger, and disease. Many other southern tribes also gave up their homelands and were forced west.

Early on in the western movement there was actually open trade between the whites and the Indians. The Mandan Indians were the first Plains Indians to be in frequent contact with French traders. They were also one of the tribes that got taken out by disease. By the 1830’s, they had all died of small pox. The book Fool’s Crow shows the struggle between the Napikwans (whites) and the Pikunis Indians when many perish because of the white scabs disease (small pox).

In 1847 the war between Mexico and the U.S. had ended and left the United States with possession of territory between Texas and California. All of this land was west of the Indian frontier, but in 1848 gold was discovered in California. Shortly thereafter, fortune seekers started making their way through Indian Territory which had once been reserved for only licensed traders, trappers, and missionaries. In order to justify this breach of treaty, lawmakers in Washington invented Manifest Destiny. After this, more territories were becoming states with Minnesota becoming a state in 1858. It wasn’t long after Sharp Knife Andrew Jackson’s Indian Trade and Intercourse Act that white settlers had driven north, south, and west of Indian Territory while miners and traders had entered directly into it. In the beginning of 1860 the Civil War began and there were still about 300,000 Indians living in the United States and its territories.

Manifest destiny became the common ethnocentric idea and Americans believed it was their duty to spread and populate the rest of the continent. Excitement and fantasies of fortune fueled the western movement for gold. By 1850 the whites moving west had created a crisis for Native Americans in the Great Plains. They brought diseases, scared the buffalo, and used up valuable resources. As tensions rose, attacks became more frequent. The Native Americans were being forced from their lands in order to provide trails for immigrants making their way west.

In 1851 the United States government called the tribes to a fort along the Oregon Trail for a treaty. For these Native Americans to give up their land meant they would have to break the balance between themselves and the Great Spirit. Native American culture was purely overlooked in order to satisfy the needs of the white Americans. No Indian chief could speak for all of his people and enforce all of the treaty’s laws, and therefore they knew it would be near impossible to uphold it. By the late 1850s Native Americans across the west could see the great change coming upon them and soon the whites would not just be passing through, but would be coming to settle their lands. As attacks grew, the whites were willing to use whatever means necessary to eradicate the Indians. Native Americans were being forced from their lands and onto reservations and many more were killed because of various disputes. Thousands were bullied from their land and forced onto reservations. In theory, reservations were supposed to keep Indians and whites safe by keeping them in a controlled environment. Instead, the Native Americans’ freedom was taken from them, their culture, and they lived in inhumane conditions and were brought rotten food. This in turn led to more attacks, massacres, famine, and the near extermination of the Native American race. Of the nearly ten million Native Americans living on the continent when the whites arrived, only 10% survived past the 19th century. Many of their ancestors have now been assimilated into the mainstream culture of the Americans.