Big Country Outdoors

History of the Indian Race

INTRODUCTION

Traditionally, the start of United "History of the States is considered from the time of European exploration and settlement, from 16th century to the present. But people had been living in the U.S. for more than 30,000 years before the arrival of the first European settlers.

When Columbus landed on the island of San Salvador in 1492 was received by a dark-skinned people whose physical appearance confirmed him in his view that he had finally reached India, and which, therefore, called on Indians Indians, a name that, however mistaken in its first application continued to remain firm, and has long gained general acceptance, except in scientific writing strict, where the more accurate term is commonly used Latin. In the exploration was extended north and south was found that the same race spread across the continent from the shores of the Arctic to Cape Horn, everywhere alike in the main physical characteristics, with the exception of the Eskimos in the far north (whose characteristics suggest Mongolia).

OVERVIEW

Origin and Antiquity

Several origins have been assigned to the Indian race. The explanation is more or less following Believe. At the height of the Ice Age, between 34,000 and 30,000 a. C., much of the world's water was contained in the vast continental glaciers. As a result, the Bering Sea was hundreds of meters below its current level, and a land bridge, known as Beringia, emerged between Asia and North America. At its peak, Beringia is thought to have been some 1,500 kilometers wide. A moist and treeless tundra, was covered with grasses and plants which attracts large animals that early humans hunted for their survival. First to reach North America almost certainly did not know who had entered a new continent. They have been following the game, as their ancestors had thousands of years, along the Siberian coast and then across the land bridge.

Race type

The most notable physical characteristics of the type of Indian race are brown skin, dark brown eyes, high cheekbones, straight black hair, and lack of beard. The color is not red, as popularly supposed, but varies from very light in some tribes, like the Cheyenne, to almost black in others, such as Caddo and Tarimari. In some tribes, such as Flatheads, the skin has a distinct yellowish hue. The hair is brown in childhood, but always black in the adult until it turns gray with age. Baldness is almost unknown. The eye is not kept as open as in the Caucasus and would be better suited to the distance finish the work. The nose is straight and usually as well, and in some tribes very hooked. Their hands and feet are comparatively small. Height and weight vary among Europeans, the average of Peoples, but just over five feet, while the Cheyenne and Arapaho are exceptionally high, and the Patagonia tehuelches almost massive construction. In general, the desert Indians, as the Apache, are spare and muscular in construction, while the regions of wood are heavier, although not proportionately stronger. The beard is always scanty, but increases with the mixture of white blood. The misconception that the Indian has naturally no beard is due to the fact that in most tribes is started as quickly as it grows, the eyebrows being treated in the same way. There is no tribe of "white Indians, but they are albinos with blond skin, weak pink eyes and almost white hair are occasionally found, especially among peoples.

Main areas of Culture

From prehistory to recent historical times there were roughly six major cultural areas excluding the Arctic (see Eskimo), ie, Northwest Coast, Plains, Plateau, Eastern Woodlands, North and Southwest.

• The Area Northwest Coast

The Northwest Coast area extended along the Pacific coast, from Southern Alaska to Northern California. The main language families in this area were the Nadene in the north and the Wakashan (a subdivision of the population Algonquian-Wakashan linguistic) and the Tsimshian (a subdivision of the Penutian linguistic stock) in the central zone. Typical tribes were the Kwakiutl Haida, Tsimshian, and the Nootka. Wooded, with a temperate climate and heavy rainfall, the area had long supported a large indigenous population. Salmon was the staple food, supplemented by marine mammals (seals and sea lions) and land mammals (deer, moose and bears) as well as berries and wild fruits. The Indians of this area used wood to build houses and canoes were carved cedar boards and canoes. In their permanent winter villages some groups had totems, which were carefully carved and covered with symbolic animal decoration. Her artwork, for those who are famous, they also include the realization ceremonial items, such as rattles and masks, weaving, and basketry. They had a highly stratified society with chiefs, nobles, commoners and slaves. Exposure Public and disposal of wealth were basic features of society. They had woven robes, furs, and basket hats as well as wooden armor and helmets for battle. This distinctive culture, which included cannibalistic rituals, was not much affected by European influences until after the late 18th cent., When white fur traders and hunters came to the area.

TRIBES: Abenaki, Algonquin, Beothuk, Delaware, Erie, Fox, Huron, Illinois, Iroquois, Kickapoo, Mohicans, Mascouten, Mass., Mattabesic, Menominee, Metoac, Miami, Micmac, Mohegan, Montagnais, Narragansett, Nauset, Neutrals, Niantic, Nipissing, Nipmuc, Ojibwe, Ottawa, Pennacook, Pequot, Pocumtuck, Potawatomi, Sauk, Shawnee, Susquehannock, Tionontati, Wampanoag, Wappinger, Wenran, Winnebago.

• The Plains Area

The vast plains area from the north of the border with Canada, south Texas and included the grasslands area between the Mississippi River and the foothills of the Rocky Mts. The main language families in this area were the Algonquian-Wakashan, the Aztec-Tanoan, and the Sioux Hokan. In pre-Columbian times there were two distinct types of Native Americans there: sedentary and nomadic. The sedentary tribes, who had migrated from neighboring regions and had Eng settled along the great river valleys initally, were peasants and lived in permanent villages of dome-shaped earth home surrounded by mud walls. They grew corn, squash and beans. The foot nomads, however, moved with his property in the dog pulled by stretcher and had a precarious existence by hunting and large cattle buffalo (bison) – usually by taking them to enclosures or rounding up through the establishment of grass fires. It supplements its diet with meat and exchange fur for maize native American agriculture.

The horse, introduced by the Spanish in the Southwest, appeared in the Plains on the beginning of the 18th cent. and revolutionized the lives of the Plains Indians. Many Native Americans left their villages and joined the nomads. Mounted and armed with bow and arrow, ranged the grasslands hunting buffalo. The other Native Americans remained farmers (eg, the Arikara, Hidatsa, and Mandan). Native Americans of the areas entered the surrounding plains (eg, the Sioux of the Great Lakes, the Comanche and Kiowa in the west and northwest, and the Navajos and Apaches of the Southwest). A sign language developed universal among the perpetually wandering and often warring Native Americans. Living on horseback and in the portable tepee, they preserved food by beating and drying lean meat and made their clothes from buffalo hides and deer. The system of coup was a characteristic feature of their society. Other features were rites of fasting in the search a vision, warrior clans, bead and feather art and skins decorated. These Plains Indians were among the last to participate in a serious struggle with white settlers in the United States.

TRIBES: Arapaho, Arikara, Assiniboine, Bidai, Blackfoot, Caddo, Cheyenne, Comanche, Cree, Crow, Dakota (Sioux), Gros Ventre, Hidatsa, Iowa, Kansa, Kiowa, Kiowa-Apache, Kitsai, Lakota (Sioux), Mandan, Metis, Missouri, Nakota (Sioux), Omaha, Osage, Otoe, Pawnee, Ponca, Sarsi, Sutai, Tonkawa, Wichita.

• The plateau area

The Plateau area extended from above the border with Canada across the plateau and mountain area of the Rocky Mts. southwest and includes much of California. tribes were typical Spoke, the Paiute, the Nez Perce, and Shoshone. This was an area of great linguistic diversity. Due to the inhospitable environment the cultural development was generally low. Native Americans in California's Central Valley and the California coast, including the Pomo, were sedentary peoples who gathered edible plants, roots and fruit and also hunted small animals. His bread acorn, made by pounding acorns into meal and then washed with hot water, was different, and cooked in baskets filled with water and heated with hot stones. Living in brush shelters or more importantly sheds, which had partly buried earth lodges for ceremonies and ritual sweat baths. Basketry, coiled and twisted, was highly developed. To the north, between the Cascade Range and the Rocky Mts., Social, political, and religious systems were simple, and art did not exist. Native Americans who underwent (Since 1730) a great cultural change when they obtained of the Plains Indians the horse, the tepee, a form of the sun dance, and deerskin clothes. They continued, however, fishing for salmon with nets and spears and to collect the bulbs beds. They also gathered ants and other insects and small game and game, in recent times, the buffalo. Their permanent winter villages on waterways had semi-subterranean lodges with conical roofs, a few Native Americans lived in bark-covered long houses.

TRIBES: Carrier, Cayuse, Coeur D'Alene, Colville, Dock-Spus, Eneeshur, Flathead, Kalispel, Kawachkin, Kittitas, Klamath, Klickitat, Kosith, Kutenai, Lakes, Lillooet, Methow, MoDaCo, Nez Perce, Okanogan, Palouse, Sanpoil, Shushwap, Sinkiuse, Spokane, Tenino, Thompson, Tyigh, Umatilla, Wallawalla, Wasco, Wauyukma, Wenatchee, Wishram, Wyampum, Yakima. Californian: Achomawi, Atsugewi, Cahuilla, Chimariko, Chumash, Costanoan, Esselen, Hupa, Karuk, Kawaiisu, Maidu, Mission Indians, Miwok, Mono, Patwin, Pomo, Serrano, Shasta, Tolowa, Tubatulabal, Wailaki, Wintu, Wiyot, Yaha, Yokuts, Yuki, Yuman (California).

• The Eastern Woodlands Area

Montes eastern area covered the eastern United States, roughly from the Ocean Atlantic to the Mississippi River and included the Great Lakes. The Natchez, the Choctaw, Cherokee, and Creek were typical inhabitants. The northeastern part of this zone extended from Canada to Kentucky and Virginia. The people of the area (languages of the Algonquian-speaking population Wakashan) were largely hunters and farmers, the women tended small plots of corn, squash and beans. The birchbark canoe gained wide usage in this field. The general pattern of the existence of these Algonquian peoples and their neighbors, who spoke languages belonging to the Iroquoian branch of the Hokan-Siouan people (enemies who had probably invaded from the south), was quite complex. Their meat diet deer was complemented with another set (eg, bear), fish (caught with hook, spear, and net), and seafood. Cooking was done in vessels of wood and bark or simple black pottery. The dome-shaped hut and the longhouse of the Iroquois characterized their housing. The deerskin clothing, the face painting and (in the case of men) of body and the scalp lock of the men (left when hair shaved on both sides of the head), were typical. The myths of Manitou (often called Manibozho or Manabaus), the hero who remake the world of mud after a deluge, are also widely known.

The South Region of the Ohio River to the Gulf of Mexico, with its forests and fertile soil, was the heart of the southeastern part of the cultural district of Eastern Woodlands. There before c.500 the inhabitants were semi-nomads who hunted, fished and gathered roots and seeds. Between 500 and 900 they adopted agriculture, use of snuff, pottery, and burial mounds. By c.1300 the agricultural economy was well established, and artifacts found in the mounds show that trade was widespread. Long before the arrival of Europeans, the peoples of the Natchez and Muskogean branches of the Hokan-Siouan linguistic family were farmers who used hoes made of stone, bone, shell or blades. They hunted with bow and arrow and blowgun, caught fish by poisoning streams, and gathered berries, fruits and seafood. Ceramics had excellent, sometimes decorated with abstract figures animals or humans. Since warfare was frequent and intense, the villages were enclosed by wooden palisades reinforced with earth. Some of the larger towns, usually ceremonial centers, dominated the smaller settlements nearby. There were temples for sun worship, rites were elaborate and featured an altar with perpetual fire, extinguished and rekindled each year in a "new fire" ceremony. The society was divided into common classes, with a chief, his children, nobles and commoners making up the hierarchy. For a discussion of the first groups of forests, see the separate article Eastern Woodlands culture.

TRIBES: Acolapissa, Assisi Alibamu, Apalachee, Atakapa, Bayougoula, Biloxi, Calusa, Catawba, Chakchiuma, Cherokee, Chesapeake Algonquin, Chickasaw, Chitamacha, Choctaw, Coushatta, Creek, CUSAB, Gaucata, Guale, Hitchiti, Houma, Jeags, Karankawa, Lumbee, Miccosukee, Mobile, Napochi, Nappissa, Natchez, Ofo, Powhatan, Quapaw, Seminole, Sioux Southeast Tekeste, Tidewater Algonquin, Timucua, Tunica, Tuscarora, Yamasee, Yuchi. Bannock, Paiute (Northern), Paiute (Southern), Sheepeater, Shoshone (Northern), Shoshone (Western) Ute, Washo.

• The Northern Area

The northern area covered most of Canada, also known as the subarctic, belt land semiarctic of the Rocky Mts. to Hudson Bay. The main languages in this area were the Algonquian-Wakashan of and Nadene populations. Typical of people there were the Chipewyan. Limiting environmental conditions prevented farming, but hunting, gathering, and activities such as trapping and fishing were carried out. Nomadic hunters moved with the season of forest to tundra, killing the caribou in semiannual drives. Other food was provided by small game, berries and root vegetables. Not only food but clothing and even some shelter (tents of caribou-skin) came from the caribou, and caribou skin thongs the Indians tied their racquets and nets and bags. The snowshoe was one of the most important items of material culture. The shaman featured in the religion of many of these people.

TRIBES: Calapuya, Cathlamet, Chehalis, Chemakum, Chetco, Chilluckkittequaw, Chinook, Clackamas, Clatskanie, Clatsop, Cowichan, Cowlitz, Haida, Hoh, Klallam, Kwalhioqua, Lushootseed, Makah, Molala, Multomah, Oynut, Ozette, Queets, Quileute, Quinault, Rogue River, Siletz, Taidhapam, Tillamook Tutuni, Yakonan.

• The Southwest Area

The southwest area generally extended over Arizona, New Mexico and parts of Colorado and Utah. The Uto-Aztecan branch of the Tanoan linguistic stock Azteca was the main language groups in the area. Here a semi-nomadic people called the Basket Makers, who hunted with a pitcher throws, or atlatl, acquired (c.1000 BC) the art of cultivating beans and squash, probably from their southern neighbors. They also learned to make pottery and uncooked. It wove baskets, sandals and handbags. By c.700 BC they had initiated intensive agriculture, and made pottery and hunted with bow and arrow. They lived in pit houses, that were partly underground and lined with stone slabs – the so-called slab houses. A new people came into the area some two centuries later, who were the ancestors of Pueblo Indians. They lived in large townhouse community located on the ledges of cliffs or canyons for protection and developed a ceremonial chamber (the kiva) of what had been the living room pit houses. This period of development ended c.1300, after a severe drought and the start of invasions from the north by the Athabascan-speaking Navajo and Apache. The known historic Pueblo cultures of such sedentary farming peoples as the Hopi and Zuni then saw the light. Cultivated corn, beans, squash, cotton and snuff, rabbits killed with a wooden launch, and traded cotton textiles and corn for buffalo meat nomadic tribes. The men wove cotton textiles and cultivated the fields, while women did well polychrome pottery. The mythology and religious ceremonies were complex.

TRIBES: Apache (Eastern), Apache (Western), Chemehuevi, Coahuilteco, Hopi, Jano, Manso, Maricopa, Mohave, Navajo, Pai, Papago, Pima, Pueblo (breaking into: Acoma, Cochiti, Isleta, Jemez, Laguna, Nambe, Picuris, Pojoaque, Sandia, San Felipe, San Ildefonso, San Juan, Santa Ana, Santa Clara, Santo Domingo, Taos, Tesuque, Zia), Yaqui, Yavapai, Yuma, Zuni. I'm thinking strongly

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