What would civilization in the New World look like with 500 extra years?

Criminals were usually never sacrificed. If they did something bad enough to warrant death, they'd be garrotted. Otherwise they'd be enslaved until they've worked off their debt to society, as the Aztecs didn't have jails either. And yeah, there weren't exactly any records that we know of. If there were some they must've gone up in smoke.

Hrm. Really? http://tarlton.law.utexas.edu/exhibits/aztec/aztec_criminal.html

This made me think there was a pretty good amount of knowledge.
 
That's weird, I've never heard of prisons in Mesoamerica before. Or of criminals being sacrificed. Sacrifice guaranteed a place in paradise, not something you'd want to offer a criminal.
 
That's weird, I've never heard of prisons in Mesoamerica before. Or of criminals being sacrificed. Sacrifice guaranteed a place in paradise, not something you'd want to offer a criminal.

I have no idea if this is right, I just thought it was interesting and UT is a pretty good university.
 
I have no idea if this is right, I just thought it was interesting and UT is a pretty good university.
They are a pretty trustworthy university I guess, the most famous current Mayanist is from there. I could be wrong and the Aztecs were just the first people in Mesoamerica to create jails, after all the Aztecs aren't my specialty here.
 
Woule the Missisipian civilization become the centre of the new world?

When trade with Mesoamerica flourishes, would the Caribbean islands take a role similar to the Italian states with merchant republics and such?
 
The Incas would likely have expanded further north and south, and would have grown as a civilization and Empire.

Thats true, there would be no major power to be able to stop them until they reached Central America. It all depends if the Empire is able to have continous period of relative internal stability.
 
Woule the Missisipian civilization become the centre of the new world?

When trade with Mesoamerica flourishes, would the Caribbean islands take a role similar to the Italian states with merchant republics and such?
Why would they? They are on the frontier of the large urban civilizations and nowhere near as rich or populous as them. Mesoamerica would be a more likely center. They are at the crossroads of North and South America, have the largest trading networks, largest cities and populations, and most advanced society.
 
The Incas would likely have expanded further north and south, and would have grown as a civilization and Empire.

I don't know about North, but South I disagree. Without an advanced navy or horses, projecting power south of the Atacama is very difficult. The Mapuche had successfully resisted invading Incan armies, and I don't see this changing.

If the Empire did grow in size, it would become an administrative nightmare. The Incas would have to develop writing, perhaps developing their Quipu system from a memnonic device to an actual alphabet.
 
I don't know about North, but South I disagree. Without an advanced navy or horses, projecting power south of the Atacama is very difficult. The Mapuche had successfully resisted invading Incan armies, and I don't see this changing.

If the Empire did grow in size, it would become an administrative nightmare. The Incas would have to develop writing, perhaps developing their Quipu system from a memnonic device to an actual alphabet.
yeah, the problem is writing; but with 500 extra years; it could be possible to develop that kind of system;
about the advance, maybe the pauches coudl resist; but ty could cross the andes and get in contact with Teh Atlantic, and with those large territories they could have increase their agrycole production
 
The Incas would likely have expanded further north and south, and would have grown as a civilization and Empire.

The problem here is that they're moving way out of their climatic zone. They're going to run into serious problems expanding into the tropical lowlands.
 
Wouldn't it make the eventual plagues all the more devestatinh with a larger population?

In what way? In terms of survival rate, the areas of the New World with large, urban civilizations fared much better - Hence, 90% of Mexico's population has some degree of indigenous blood in their veins, compared to 1-3% of the United States population.
 
The Incas would probably collapse at some point, but of course it wouldn't be the end of Andean civilization. There might be another period of dual giant Andean powers, like Huari and Tiahuanaco in the first millenium, Chimor and Cuzco before the rise of the Incas, and the realms of Huascar and Atahualpa during the Inca civil war.

What I'd be interested in is the further developments along the fringes of the Inca territory - The Incas brought their high level of Andean civilization to many areas which hadn't yet achieved such progress, like northwestern Argentina, northern Chile, and southern Colombia. Chiefdom-level societies such as the Diaguitas in Chile and the Chibchas in Colombia were on the verge of evolving into state-level polities.

As for the areas to the north, I'd like to think that within such a time span, the Taino in the Caribbean would start to build Mesoamerican-style city-states with growing influence from the mainland. The Taino could play a key role in spreading new ideas and technologies throughout the Gulf of Mexico.
 
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