Chapter 21: The Rise of the Far West
The Mulagi horsemen were wreaking havoc on lower Kutsan and the Kumeyai Coast. The Mulagi had succeeded to cross the Haquat River to raid the Kutsan port of Erkachit on the eastern bank of the river where it met the sea, and had even managed to seize Patai for about a week before Dinei forces arrived to push them back into the desert. In the south, the Mulagi adopted a strategy of simply withdrawing from a rebellious settlement and returning to raiding until they agreed once again to submit.
Meanwhile, from the west coast of Franco-Inca Mouisca, the French set out on an expedition in late 1600 led by Samuel de Champlain to travel up the West Coast of the North American continent. Central America was already held by the Spanish, who also wielded significant control by this point over the west coast of Meshica. As they stopped in these ports, Champlain’s expedition picked up several translators who knew both Spanish as well as several local dialects, the most famous of which being a Michwakeh man by the name of Tangachuri. From Tangachuri, the French learned of a tribe of wealthy seafarers who came bearing wool, plums, cherries, wine, bay leaves, salt, glass, and more from the northern lands, a people known as the Pericu. Under Tangachuri’s direction, Champlain’s expedition would set out to the northwest.
In 1601, Champlain arrived in Yenecami. Nearing the city, he noticed a number of small boats with colorful sails and of various sizes, casting nets out into the water to scoop up fish before returning to the harbor. Contrary to the cities of the Inca or the Meshica, he noticed that this port was more of a large town of rather simple sandstone and mudbrick architecture. It was surrounded by walls, walls which could still easily contain more people, but he could tell that the walls seemed to be crumbling in some parts with several bricks out of place. In the center was a rather tall conical structure that defined the skyline, but it did not impress Champlain as much as the types of structures he had seen in other cities. Still, disproportionate to the seeming lack of grandeur, the dock he stepped onto was rather lively. Some boats seemed to have fallen into disrepair, while others seemed ready to set sail. As he walked through the town, he noticed the buildings and streets were painted with colorful murals and writing in a language that was alien to him. As he made his way through, he was approached by two men with spears, who exchanged several words with Tangachuri. The men were then guided into a small inner set of walls, inside which was a large house and a man in a blue linen robe and a purple headwrap held in place by a black band with a small green jewel and several feathers sticking out.
Tangachuri spoke to the man and then turned back towards Champlain.
“This is King Pamil. He has heard of the legends of pale men from the east across a great ocean who were the ones to bring horses to the world. He also heard that they brought the fire bows that the Meshica used to build their empire. He asks you if you are one of the pale men.”
Champlain responded.
“We are not the same men who gave guns and horses to the Meshica, but we too come from the east from a land not too far away from them. Those were Spaniards. We are French.”
Tangachuri translated Champlain’s words to the king. The king responded.
“What is your purpose in coming to our city?”
“Our purpose is simply to trade.”
“I’m afraid we do not have much to offer to you. Our trade routes have been disrupted by the Cochimi. They control the entire peninsula, and they’ve been conquering and taxing and raiding the other Pericu cities. The Dinei to the north has been sending us support to rebel that we may come under their protection. It’s allowed us to fight back so far, but the Cochimi are still a threat.”
“The Dinei you speak of, what are they like?”
“I’ve never been there myself. They’re a great kingdom quite far to the north, but they are a holy people who accept the word of Tuparan just like us and live in his peaceful ways. They rule over the lands of the Kutsan and others with mines full of jewels and lush fields where they grow plenty of grain.”
“Are they rich and powerful like the Meshica?”
“They are indeed.”
Champlain thought for a moment.
“Let us then make a deal. We will provide you and your Dinei allies with weapons and aid in your fight against the Cochimi. In exchange, we would like to establish ourselves at the ports on your land and receive an alliance as well as favorable trade deals.”
After making a deal with the people of Yelamu and several other Pericu settlements, Champlain ventured north through the Aztlan Sea. He soon landed at Erkachit, a city significantly larger than those of the Pericu. He would also sail up the Haquat River through the land of Kutsan, passing the pyramids of Yuum and Paruk on the way. He would meet with the emperor at his palace in Natani Nez, agreeing to a weapons deal. By early 1602, the Pericu and Dinei, with French assistance, had already begun to push back significantly against the Mulagi kingdom. At the Battle of Cadacamme in Kadakaaman towards the end of the year, a combined Dinei, French, and Pericu force besieged the oasis, during which the king surrendered. The Dinei installed their own governor over the oasis, and the Mulagi kingdom was no more.
Compared to the Kilsu and the Meshica who ruled over vast fertile lands, the Dinei land was much more sparse. Although its population regrew, without the introduction of Old World crops, technology, and animals, this growth was not as fast as that in the east or in Mesoamerica, and it was a much emptier landscape to begin with. Large populations existed around rivers oases and in the montane forests, but between them was empty desert roamed by nomadic or semi-nomadic tribes. However, they still had plenty to offer in the form of minerals, with copper, gold, silver, and jewels scattered across its vast mountains, which filled the French coffers in exchange for weapons. Some of the land was also ideal for growing more of the rare Pericu pepper, allowing the formation of a Franco-Dinei trade partnership and alliance. France would also introduce a number of crops into the region, such as he potato and several Old World crops like wheat and chickpeas that thrived in more arid climates, and would even come up with the idea to introduce camels, which arrived in the region in 1617.
Throughout the early 1600s, the Dinei pushed north in a campaign of conquest, seeking out new lands in which to construct mines. To the north of the Oasis lands lay an even harsher landscape– similar to the one that existed to its south, but colder. The northern regions were dominated primarily by hunter gatherers such as the Nuchus and Sosonis, who had also since adopted the horse. During a particularly bad winter in 1605, a Nuchu army attacked south, raiding the Dinei’s native land directly. In the ensuing Nuchu Wars, the Dinei pushed north along the Upper Haquat and Sidskidiagi Rivers and into the mountains.
One of the most important of these conquests was that of the Piapa basin. Historically, the fertile lands surrounding the salty Lake Piapa served as an oasis for the Nuchus and Sosonis. Around the late 10th or early 11th Century, a group of missionaries made their way north and settled in the basin. Although this group was likely of mixed-origin, they likely originated somewhere around the Hopi lands, since the religious practices in the region are most similar to those in Hopi country. Introducing agriculture, they turned the oasis into farmland alongside the locals, most of whom were Sosoni with a significant Nuchu majority, although over time the people would come to simply refer to themselves as the Newe Piapa, meaning the “People of Piapa”, more commonly referred to as Piapans. The most important of these agriculture settlements coexisting peacefully in the region was Masohna at the southern end of the lake, meaning “Place of Maasaw”. The region also became important for its mines in the surrounding mountains, trading their minerals to become wealthy. When the Papians came under attack from surrounding Sosoni and Nuchu tribes, Dinei Emperor Dighin rode with his armies into the city of Masohna in 1611, seizing the nearby mines as part of his empire.
To the east, the Upper Haquat and Sidskidiagi and the Upper Kotsui had a similar history of initially being entirely nomadic until Maasawists migrated into the land bringing their religion and agriculture, although the migrations occurred more naturally and the farming would occur on a much smaller scale, with the locals still relying in large part on shepherding. Conquering this vast mountainous region, the Dinei established the settlement of Dzilola to the east of the mountains as a mining colony in 1625. In much of the land that was taken, the Dinei enslaved some of the conquered nomadic peoples to work the mines, but would also end up buying African slaves to work the mines, leading to the presence of a significant black population in the Assinwatis.
Meanwhile in the west, Champlain had also made contact with the Dadacians to the north in 1606. After arriving at Yelapu, he turned south towards Socoisuka and met King Arkeh. By this time, the Dadacians had experienced a long period of peace, expanding throughout the entire valley since the days of Daraten I. The French were pleased to find out that the region possessed even more mountains with gold to mine, and they would bring the Dadacians gold, slaves, and a number of Old World goods.
Using their new weaponry, the Dadacians began to expand deeper into the mountains that surrounded their territory. The subdued smaller tribes and establishing mining colonies in the Wappin Mountains to the east, bringing slaves with them to work the mines. Soon after, the Dadacians turned their attention south, pushing south along the coastal range, down into the Chumash territory south of the Valley of Dadacia, and further south into the land of the Kish, seizing the shipping village of Yanga.
In 1632, a Dinei expeditionary force from the Kumeyai coast set out north unknowingly into Dadacian Kish country, leading them to be attacked by the Dadacian force. Angered, the Kumeyai governor ordered more troops be sent north, resulting in a conflict over the border region. Both Emperor Dighin II of the Dinei and King Heyeshmin of Dadacia sent extra troops to the Kish and Kumeyai lands to defend their territory. In the battle of Cabazon pass in 1633, the Dadacians won a pyrrhic victory over the Dinei, losing far more men, but were now able to push east through the mountains towards the Kamya Sea and the Haquat delta to the south. The Dadacian army successfully torched much of the city of Ahawitk at the south end of the lake, but were quickly surrounded by the Dinei force and destroyed. In the battle of Yanga in 1634, the Dinei attacked the important Kish coastal town, but were ultimately pushed back south. As the war was beginning to arrive at a stalemate that autumn, France ordered the fighting to stop and called on the two sides to hold peace talks or else it would intervene on whichever side transgressed. Dighin II invited Heyeshmin to come to Orayvi for peace talks overseen by the French, which he accepted. In the end, the two sides formalized their borders to where they had previously been.
The winter of 1641-2 was one of the most brutal in North American history. That spring, the waters frozen in the montane glaciers melted much later into the season, delaying the flooding of the Haquat and Kotsui Rivers and resulting in excessive flooding once they did melt, causing damage especially to Kutsan. The excessive flooding led to more available farmland afterward, but in a shorter growing season. Similar flooding also occurred in Dadacia. Meanwhile in the north, large numbers of people starved in the mountain settlements, which were being even more frequently attacked by nomads. In an offensive that began that spring, Dighin II led another push north, this time taking the Yampapa River Plain. Similar to the Piapa Basin, the river plain was home to a diverse Maasawist population of mostly Sosoni practicing small-scale agriculture, seizing the region. Up until this point, Kutsan had remained the primary breadbasket of the empire, with other significant agricultural areas along the upper Kotsui and in the Piapa basin. With the seizure of the Yampapa, a new area ideal for the cultivation of potatoes had opened up, allowing the Dinei to feed more people more easily from a greater variety of sources.
That same winter, Dadacian King Daraten III fought off a number of invaders as well, and soon after received a letter from a Maasawist Kalapuya chieftain from Chifin asking for support in a war that had broken out among the peoples of the Wilamut Valley to the north as a result of the poor winter conditions. The Kalapuya and other less populous related peoples of the Wilamut were a relatively primitive farming people, not unlike the Celts who lived on Rome’s northern frontiers, and had populations that were both Maasawist and non-Maasawist. Daraten marched with his army through the redwood forests and mountains to the north, seizing control of the region in a five-year campaign. During that time, Daraten united the entire valley under his rule, and would spend the next several years establishing garrisons to force the people of the surrounding mountains into submission. Daraten declared that all political decisions in the valley would have to be made in Chifin, due to its proximity to the lands of Dadacia that would allow them to maintain a degree of control, and mandated that all residents must convert to Maasawism. Having brought peace to the valley, Daraten III declared himself King of Dadacia and of the Kalapuya.
The French presence was to the benefit of the major powers on the west of the continent. Yenecami became a thriving port, and the Pericu were even integrated into the French system, being able to operate as merchants. Despite hardships here and there, the population of West America was able to grow quickly with the introduction of new crops, and previously underdeveloped areas like the Wilamut Valley, the Yampapa Plain, and the Piapa Basin also saw particularly rapid growth. Of course, the 17th Century and the worst years of the Little Ice Age would also have a profound impact on the Great Kingdom to the east.
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