AIS 120: INDIANS OF THE AMERICAS

II. Traditional Cultures of the Americas

    5. Eastern

American Indian cultures of the Eastern Woodlands were village farmers with powerful confederations based on military and trade alliances. In the Northeast the Iroquois Confederacy (Hodenosaunee) was formed before contact and created a powerful 'Covenant Chain' that created trade alliances throughout the Northeast to the Great lakes and into the Southeast. Other confederacies such as the Illini, Shawnee Cherokee, Choctaw and Creek maintain similar trade and military alliances.

 These cultures farmed the bottomland with its rich soil, used the waterways for resources and travel and maintained deer parks in the upper woodland regions. Those along the Atlantic Seaboard fished the ocean and bays but lived up the river valleys beyond the coastal barrens. In the Eastern Woodlands there were two major language groups the Macro-Siouan and the Macro-Algonkian and people from both groups moved west before and after contact into the Plains. In kinship patterns the Siouan groups tended to be matrilineal and the Algonkian groups tended to be patrilineal. This simply made a difference in the lines of inheritance, but the division of labor was consistent in terms of the women being in charge of the farming and men focused on activities in the forest including hunting and war. Certain cooperative activities were the initial  clearing of land for farming and special communal activities like fishing or harvesting of special resources like maple tree sap. Eastern Woodland cultures also practiced controlled burning that increased deer populations. Also, management of bison herds and hunts in the Plains were controlled and conducted by powerful Eastern Woodland groups like the Choctaw, Illini, and Natchez.

B. Meso America

    1. Central Mexico

 Northern Mexico has the Sierra Madre Occidental (West) and the Sierra Madre Oriental (East) surrounding a huge wedge shaped plateau in the middle. Much of the northern areas are very arid and were culturally part of the American Southwest with Yaqui, Huichol and Tarahumara people of the Aztec-Tanoan language phyla.. The Mesa Central and both coastal areas are part of Meso America. The Valley of Mexico or Mesa Central was the center of the Aztec Empire founded by the Mexica with today's Nahua, Purepecha (Tarascan) and Mixtec people. This was one of the most densely populated areas of the Americas. The intensive agricultural practices in this area changed the landscape greatly to include deforestation in the mountains and scrub in the lower elevations. In most areas irrigation CBS agriculture was practiced, but in swampy lake areas a system of raised floating bogs (called chinampas) were used and provided a great surplus of crops. A network of canals were used to maintain these.

Today, the Lake Xochimilco district has some remaining gardens and it has been found that a bacterium acts a composter for waste water and converts it to a safe fertilizer.

original Aztec chinampas

Lake Xochimilco

Lake Xochmilco flower boats

 Certain resources like agaves (Agave americana made into mescal or Agave tequilana made into tequila) were extensively grown in the area and further displaced native plants. The Mesa Central was a major trade hub north to Chaco Canyon in New Mexico and south to Costa Rica. Obsidian, copal( tree sap incense), gold, silver, turquoise, bird feathers, shell, coral, cacao beans, cotton textile and copper axes were major items traded. Professional Aztec traders, pochteca, regulated the trade and  reported to 12 specific centers in the empire. Another culture center was Oaxaca on the Pacific Coast and the Isthmus of Tehuantepec with the Zapotec and later Mixtec empires. On the Vera Cruz and Tabasco Coast on the Gulf of Mexico were Huastec and Totonac and Otomi centers.

   2. Southern Mexico and Central America

Yucatan, Southern Mexico (Chiapas) and much of Central America (Guatamala, El Salvador and Honduras) were the center of the Maya Empire. In 1492 the Mayans were  in a state of decline with the Lowland areas abandoned and remnants in the highland areas and the Yucatan Peninsula. The Aztec Empires forced tribute from these areas as far as Costa Rica.

   3. Caribbean

Often referred to as the West Indies the Caribbean consists of a mostly volcanic island chain from the Bahamas off the Florida coast to Trinidad above South America. Often, the Caribbean is more connected to South America since its pre- Columbian American Indians were seafaring Arawakan people from South America that arrived 2- 4,000 years ago. In the Greater Antilles: Cuba, Hispaniola (today's Haiti and Dominican Republic), Jamaica and Puerto Rico lived various groups of people referred to as Ciboney, Taino and Sub-Taino. At the time of Columbus' arrival in 1492, Western Hispaniola, Cuba and Florida was occupied by people called Ciboney who may have migrated to the Caribbean earliest. There were 29 principal cacique (Chiefdoms) territories on Cuba with the largest at 'Habana'. The Taino were on Jamaica, Hispaniola, Puerto Rico and some of the Lesser Antilles, including the Bahamas where Columbus first landed. Eastern Hispaniola had five cacique led 'kingdoms' when Columbus visited. The Taino were sedentary farmers with nobles and commoners. In their larger villages they had a central plaza with an enclosed ball court (batey), where a ball game was played with a solid rubber ball similar to Meso America's game. As in most of tropical America CBS was augmented with root crops such as cassava and sweet potato. In the Lesser Antilles from Trinidad and Tobago, a few hundred years before Columbus, a new group of people had displaced the Taino and were called the Carib. The Caribs were often portrayed as cannibals (the word comes from their language), even in the latest Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, but they were not and simply preserved  bones of their ancestors. The European label of cannibalism was often a convenient justification for slavery.

Many common terms in English come from the Caribbean Arawak language, including barbecue, hammock, canoe, tobacco, yucca, hurricane, and tattoo. Unfortunately, the population of Caribbean American Indians was decimated so quickly that most people only perceived the islands of being inhabited by European, African and Asian peoples.

C. South America

      1. Lowlands

As CBS farming spread into these tropical rainforests around 4-5,000 years the original hunters combined cultivated plants that had developed into a productive horticulture lifestyle. Many of these indigenous plants included root crops such as manioc (cassava) and sweet potato in addition to pineapple, plantain, tomato, sugarcane and tobacco. As populations grew these cultures became more competitive and warfare increased. Cultures in the Amazon like the Bora, Jivaro, Kayapo, and Sirono developed a sophisticated poison (curare) that used with blowguns could take game high up in triple canopy forest. It also contributed to the fact that the Andean cultures could never conquer the people of the Amazon. Recent studies of the Amazonian rainforest indicate that Native Americans managed or altered the tropical rainforest to a much greater degree that once was. many, still perceive these people only nomadic hunters. The rainforest is fragile and slash and burn management requires one to shift crops from one area to another every 2-3 years and to move to a new area every 5-7 years. Once people moved they would often return to old areas to harvest fruit, etc. Villages were made of wood and thatch shaped like a large communal shelter with a huge dance arena in the center. The Orinoco Basin had similar cultures too include the Ye'kuana, Yanomami, Warekena, Hoti,  and Tsase. The Paraguay and Parana  Basin had the Guarani and Tupi cultures.

     2. Highlands

These areas were seen to be along the 'margins' of the lowlands on the Atlantic Coast. Their environmnets varied with altitude and proximity to the coast. In Columbia's Northern Coast the variation between ecosystems was tropical, desert and alpine. People like the Tairona (Kogi), Chibca, and Yaruro used terrace CBS farming in the highlands. The Guiana (Guayana) Highlands was more tropical and had greater river floodplains. The Arawak, Warao, Galibi and Tirio developed hug kingdoms and were part of the people that expanded to the Caribbean. The Brazilian Highlands were an expansive older mountain range along the Brazilian coast and was occupied by the Tupi and Tupinamba. The very rich soils and sub tropical climate produce a great variety of plants.

   3. Andes

The Andean area is 4,000 miles of the highest mountains in the Western hemisphere (Mt. Aconcagua 22,800') along the Pacific coast of  S. America. The coastal and highland areas start out as tropical and as one goes south changes to a cold desert in Patagonia. In the middle is a high plateau in Peru and Bolivia, called the Altiplano at 12-13,000' with Lake Titicaca (highest freshwater lake). The Native Americans, like the Quechua (Inca), Aymara, Atacama, Mapuche and Chincha developed unique culture based on farming CBS in the coastal highlands; and potato and peanut (groundnut) in the puna (high altitude). At the time of Columbus one group, the Inca, had established an empire with 8,000 miles of roads. They used llamas as a pack animal and produced elaborate weaving from alpaca wool.

   4.Southern

Traveling south in South America mirrors going north in North America. The Gran Chaco and Pampas tend to get drier. The Indians were primarily hunting and gathering wild plants with some modest CBS farming in the northern areas of the Gran Chaco. Native Americans like the Lengua, Chiriguano, Zamuco hunted peccary, deer, rodents and tapir. Further south, the Pampas turns into a cooler semi arid grassland and people like the Tehuelche, Puelche, Charrua and Chana-Mbegua hunted only to include the flightless rhea (like an ostrich). The horse was also introduced to this area and the Native Americans became great horsemen and tough military foe. The people developed a weapon called the bola and this was used instead of the lariat for bring down cattle for branding. Most of the early gauchos (cowboys) were Indians, but they eventually were wiped out by disease and ruthless military campaigns.

Tierra del Fuego is similar to the Aleutians and the Native Americans developed a similar culture. The Ona, Yahgan and Alacaluf are practically extinct. They were H&G and depended on shellfish, fish, sea birds and sea mammals. They were sometimes referred to as the 'canoe people' and their small campfires in the Straits of Magellan were a guide to sailors in those treacherous waters. So the name of the coastal area and its islands became Tierra del Fuego,Land of Fire.

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