Hi there all. Long time on-again, off-again lurker, first time poster... And I have a bit of an odd one for my first timeline idea. It was inspired by a single, one-off concept introduced in DValdron's Lands of Ice and Mice, which led me to thinking about the possibility of domesticating sea life, and it made me think of one species that might potentially work...
The basic idea is that, around 0 CE, a small group of natives boating across the Caribbean exploring the Greater Antilles gets shipwrecked in the Everglades. In OTL, they either die or land somewhere else. Here, though, they decide to try and make a go of living there...
According to the myths of the Taino people who first encountered Europeans, among thus tribe, there was a young man who was born sickly, and thus wasn't as good at hunting or fishing as his peers. He thus went out among the mangroves a lot, until he came upon a sacred pool containing manatees. Rather than kill them as the tribe typically would, he spent time just observing them, finally working up the courage to swim among them. The docile creatures were unafraid, affectionately nuzzling him. He went there a second time, swimming for hours, scratching their bellies, and telling his troubles to these nonjudgmental creatures. He came back a third time, and as he was about to leave, the manatees stopped him. The largest manatee turned into a beautiful woman, the goddess of the water, known to the Taino as Atabey. She was impressed by the boy's curiosity and gentleness and moved by his unlucky situation. She gave him the name history remembers him by, Bomanati (Technically Bo'manati, meaning Great Lord of the Manatees) and chose to teach him the ways of these beasts. Bomanati did so in secret for the longest time, until one day, tragedy struck. The wife of the tribe's cacique (chief) died of a snakebite. The chief's infant son was too young to eat solid food, and no other women in the tribe were breastfeeding. It seemed like the child would die until Bomanati intervened, calling forth a mother manatee and her calf appeared at the waters near the village. Bomanati took the baby boy and held it to the manatee's breast, who let it suckle as if it were her own calf. Bomanati and his companion helped care for the baby until he could eat solid foods, and the cacique was so grateful that he declared that Bomanati was a powerful bohique (medicine man) and that their tribe would protect the manatees from this day forward, and, in return, the manatees would provide them with food and leather.
While obviously a myth, it's entirely possible that there really was an outcast young man among the tribe (or maybe a woman with some common sense about these creatures filling the role of Atabey and guiding a hapless bohique) who managed to convince his peers that raising manatees for food rather than just hunting them was a worthwhile endeavor. Whatever the cause, ATL archaeology does show that the first manatee herders came from the swamp that we of OTL call the Everglades. The area is, as we know, swampy, miserable, not very good for agriculture, and in general, not a good place for humans to live. Stuck here, they might experiment with domestication. Manatees are docile and nonviolent, large, with a vegetarian diet that don't, and largely can't, consume themselves. And, if you're living in a marshy environment to begin with, the fact that they're aquatic isn't necessarily a deal breaker. Then there's milk. Amerindian peoples are lactose intolerant, but lactose tolerance has an insanely high selection differential in human populations, not to mention that in a tropical environment, manatee milk would easily become manatee yogurt or cheese quickly. And even so, as the myth said, a lactating manatee might help stop infant mortality.
Over time, the herders would select manatees that were larger, more docile (if that's even possible), more gregarious, and, likely, those with faster breeding cycles. From this semi-domesticated form, manatee herding would spread to island and coastal tribes across the Caribbean Sea, changing the history of the area...
I have some ideas for how this might effect history of those places, as well as the challenges and benefits that manatee physiology might have to domestication. But I'm gonna leave this here for now.
P.S. - I'm trying to come up with a name for this timeline. So far, I have "Lands of Salt and Sargassum" (in the great LORAG tradition) and "Milking the Sea Cow"
The basic idea is that, around 0 CE, a small group of natives boating across the Caribbean exploring the Greater Antilles gets shipwrecked in the Everglades. In OTL, they either die or land somewhere else. Here, though, they decide to try and make a go of living there...
According to the myths of the Taino people who first encountered Europeans, among thus tribe, there was a young man who was born sickly, and thus wasn't as good at hunting or fishing as his peers. He thus went out among the mangroves a lot, until he came upon a sacred pool containing manatees. Rather than kill them as the tribe typically would, he spent time just observing them, finally working up the courage to swim among them. The docile creatures were unafraid, affectionately nuzzling him. He went there a second time, swimming for hours, scratching their bellies, and telling his troubles to these nonjudgmental creatures. He came back a third time, and as he was about to leave, the manatees stopped him. The largest manatee turned into a beautiful woman, the goddess of the water, known to the Taino as Atabey. She was impressed by the boy's curiosity and gentleness and moved by his unlucky situation. She gave him the name history remembers him by, Bomanati (Technically Bo'manati, meaning Great Lord of the Manatees) and chose to teach him the ways of these beasts. Bomanati did so in secret for the longest time, until one day, tragedy struck. The wife of the tribe's cacique (chief) died of a snakebite. The chief's infant son was too young to eat solid food, and no other women in the tribe were breastfeeding. It seemed like the child would die until Bomanati intervened, calling forth a mother manatee and her calf appeared at the waters near the village. Bomanati took the baby boy and held it to the manatee's breast, who let it suckle as if it were her own calf. Bomanati and his companion helped care for the baby until he could eat solid foods, and the cacique was so grateful that he declared that Bomanati was a powerful bohique (medicine man) and that their tribe would protect the manatees from this day forward, and, in return, the manatees would provide them with food and leather.
While obviously a myth, it's entirely possible that there really was an outcast young man among the tribe (or maybe a woman with some common sense about these creatures filling the role of Atabey and guiding a hapless bohique) who managed to convince his peers that raising manatees for food rather than just hunting them was a worthwhile endeavor. Whatever the cause, ATL archaeology does show that the first manatee herders came from the swamp that we of OTL call the Everglades. The area is, as we know, swampy, miserable, not very good for agriculture, and in general, not a good place for humans to live. Stuck here, they might experiment with domestication. Manatees are docile and nonviolent, large, with a vegetarian diet that don't, and largely can't, consume themselves. And, if you're living in a marshy environment to begin with, the fact that they're aquatic isn't necessarily a deal breaker. Then there's milk. Amerindian peoples are lactose intolerant, but lactose tolerance has an insanely high selection differential in human populations, not to mention that in a tropical environment, manatee milk would easily become manatee yogurt or cheese quickly. And even so, as the myth said, a lactating manatee might help stop infant mortality.
Over time, the herders would select manatees that were larger, more docile (if that's even possible), more gregarious, and, likely, those with faster breeding cycles. From this semi-domesticated form, manatee herding would spread to island and coastal tribes across the Caribbean Sea, changing the history of the area...
I have some ideas for how this might effect history of those places, as well as the challenges and benefits that manatee physiology might have to domestication. But I'm gonna leave this here for now.
P.S. - I'm trying to come up with a name for this timeline. So far, I have "Lands of Salt and Sargassum" (in the great LORAG tradition) and "Milking the Sea Cow"