WI: Native Americans discover Antarctica
- Thread starter Ellie
- Start date
It's grass. So it's better than lichen and shown as example
I happen to personally know a biologist who spent two Antarctic summers there, but he's an ornithologist (studies Emperor penguins), and he obviously can't comment on the taste of the thing (and he never was in the region of Antarctic peninsula where it grows). The fact is that Antarctic peninsula in its northernmost areas can sustain more than lichens.
I happen to personally know a biologist who spent two Antarctic summers there, but he's an ornithologist (studies Emperor penguins), and he obviously can't comment on the taste of the thing (and he never was in the region of Antarctic peninsula where it grows). The fact is that Antarctic peninsula in its northernmost areas can sustain more than lichens.
I didn't mean if they knew how to start fires (AFAIK everyone but Tasmanians and Andaman Islanders did). I meant without access to brush would they know how to start them/keep them going.
The Inuit used oil lamps, but they had vegetable matter for the wick. I presume lichen and/or native grass could be used in Antarctica when dried out, but it might be a big technological leap depending upon what the Fuegan's fire-starting technology was to begin with.
Tierra del Fuego has wood. Antarctica does not.
The grassy plant mentioned is rare and only lately spreading due to recent climate change. Fat chance there would be anything growing or could be grown to sustain a human population, particularly given the POD.
At best, you might get castaways (who don't live or return to tell the tale) or a lucky event by seafaring Patagonians who are blown by winds or storms to the Continent, remark upon its remoteness and difficulties of getting there and somehow make it back home. These considerations trump all others no matter how rich the fisheries or how many sea mammals are sunning themselves on its Coastline.
Perhaps an Inuit toolkit and culture could theoretically survive in certain parts of Antarctica but to arrive at that culture and toolkit is the product of many many generations of trial and error. The forebears of the Inuit had centuries of practice migrating through Siberia to develop. Even the Tierra del Fuegan cultures had no analogous experience. The gulf between their culture and long-term survival on even the Antarctic peninsula is too great.
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The tricky part would be the returning trip. For all we know, the bottom of the Pacific might contain the remains of some Polynesian ships stranded to Anctarctica. The areas south of New Zealand are far more inhospitable than even the Anctarctic Peninsula.
It's likely that if some Polynesian (they made it to the Auckland islands IOTL after all) ends up on Anctarctic shores, they'd just die there.
Dorozhand
Banned
This has got me thinking. During the medieval warm period, might the Antarctic Peninsula's climate have been a bit milder?
If this is the case, the perhaps a seafaring alt-Yahgan culture, which has colonized the Malvinas, South Georgia, and South Sandwich islands, could have stumbled on a slightly milder Antarctic coast.
It still would have been extremely tough, but a group that manages to get there just might be able to make it by building warm shelters (which the Yahgan already had been doing) and making oil lamps out of blubber like the Inuit, which is a skill that they could have picked up living in the South Sandwich Islands.
Like the Inuit, they need experience living in cold environments for long periods of time, while progressively colonizing colder areas slowly. It seems to me that by, one by one, hopping the increasingly harsh islands of the Scotia Plate, they could have gotten to the South Orkneys with enough know-how to survive there. A group from the south Orkneys stranded on the Peninsula would have a decent shot at forming the nucleus of a stable population for the vital first few years, during which they can learn whatever they can about living in their new home.
Once things start to cool down during the Little Ice Age, they may well be wiped out, however it's also possible that they would be able to tough it out like the Inuit of Greenland did.
If this is the case, the perhaps a seafaring alt-Yahgan culture, which has colonized the Malvinas, South Georgia, and South Sandwich islands, could have stumbled on a slightly milder Antarctic coast.
It still would have been extremely tough, but a group that manages to get there just might be able to make it by building warm shelters (which the Yahgan already had been doing) and making oil lamps out of blubber like the Inuit, which is a skill that they could have picked up living in the South Sandwich Islands.
Like the Inuit, they need experience living in cold environments for long periods of time, while progressively colonizing colder areas slowly. It seems to me that by, one by one, hopping the increasingly harsh islands of the Scotia Plate, they could have gotten to the South Orkneys with enough know-how to survive there. A group from the south Orkneys stranded on the Peninsula would have a decent shot at forming the nucleus of a stable population for the vital first few years, during which they can learn whatever they can about living in their new home.
Once things start to cool down during the Little Ice Age, they may well be wiped out, however it's also possible that they would be able to tough it out like the Inuit of Greenland did.
Dorozhand
Banned
Who says they need to come back? I think the point is that they manage to survive and eke out something from the coastland. The Polynesians, who barely made it even on New Zealand, are bad candidates. For this, I think, the peoples of Cape Horn are most suited of anyone, with some alterations.
Also, now that I think about it, proper clothing is crucial for survival. Given that there weren't many big animals on New Zealand by even 1600, thick fur coats are nonexistent.
However, here is a scenario that may lead, in a very roundabout way, to an earlier discovery and peoplement of Anctarctica by Austronesian-influenced Native Americans:
- Australia develops an agricultural civilization on the model of Jared's LoRaG.
- Thanks to butterflies, the "ceremonial" replanting of roots customary among Alaskan Dene peoples is picked up by the early ceramic Proto-Eskimo cultures around the Bering Strait at the time of their first appearance around 2800 BC. They expand relatively fast across the Arctic creating an agricultural package very similar to the ones outlined in DValdron's "Land of Ice and Mice" by the early second millennium. Secondary Boreal wet agriculture develops in Canada after that.
- Unlike LoRaG canon, very early Austronesians from the Lapita culture around 1000 BC establish contact with the *Gunnagal in Australia. A more refined and advanced East Austronesian starts *Polynesian expansion almost two millennia ahead of schedule and with temperate and subtropical crops at this disposal. The Pacific becomes a thriving network of trade eventually extending all the way to Andine South America by the first century AD.
- Meanwhile, North America as a whole has an incredible wealth of domesticates and crops, mainly adapted to harsh or extreme climate.
Incrementally refined semi-agricultural or musk-ox herding lifestyle, supplemented by sea resources, expands even in the northernmost reaches of the Arctic. The Austronesian seafareres and *Eskimo civilization put the Americas in at least intermittent contact with Eurasia and Australia.
- The refined Austronesian shipbuilding ability and temperate package of crops and domesticates is adopted by natives of Southern Chile and added to the local package (Llamas and Potatoes). Potatoes introduced in New Zealand allow agriculture in the Austral Islands such as Auckland, Antipodes, Bounty and Macquaire.
- Along all the Pacific coasts of America, a continous stretch of agricultural, metal-using cultures ranging from Patagonia to Alaska is engaged in seaborne long distance trade, as well indirect contact with Australia and the Old World. Shipbuilding by 500 AD is comparable to OTL's Age of Exploration.
- Alaskan *Eskimo traders visiting Patagonia gradually introduce their Arctic agricultural and herding package. Fuegians have access to agricultural techniques, metal tools, advanced ship-building, herd animals like Caribou and sheep. They are big on whaling, and the Arctic crops cause a population explosion. They colonize the Falklands by 800 AD, then South Georgia.
- About 1200, having island-hopped to and through the South Sandwich islands and settled them, *Fuegians whalers spot the South Shetlands. Further explorations lead to the Antarctic mainland.
- As the the South Sandwiches begin to overpopulate, the whaling and sealing camps on the South Shetlands become the centers of colonization. While far from prime land even by *Fuegian standards, parts of the area are sort of arable with their toolkit at this point.
Even later, parts of the Peninisula begin to host permanent population. Maybe mining provides trading goods that allow external contact. By 1600 AD, some non-glaciated parts of Antarctica are home to a permanent human population of *American Natives that lives of a little agriculture, some occasional trade, Caribou and Musk Ox herding, and a lot of fishing and whaling. Maybe they even domesticate some kind of penguin.
Mission accomplished. It took only five-odd millennia, the plunder of two of the best timelines on this site, and a megaton of handwavium.
- Australia develops an agricultural civilization on the model of Jared's LoRaG.
- Thanks to butterflies, the "ceremonial" replanting of roots customary among Alaskan Dene peoples is picked up by the early ceramic Proto-Eskimo cultures around the Bering Strait at the time of their first appearance around 2800 BC. They expand relatively fast across the Arctic creating an agricultural package very similar to the ones outlined in DValdron's "Land of Ice and Mice" by the early second millennium. Secondary Boreal wet agriculture develops in Canada after that.
- Unlike LoRaG canon, very early Austronesians from the Lapita culture around 1000 BC establish contact with the *Gunnagal in Australia. A more refined and advanced East Austronesian starts *Polynesian expansion almost two millennia ahead of schedule and with temperate and subtropical crops at this disposal. The Pacific becomes a thriving network of trade eventually extending all the way to Andine South America by the first century AD.
- Meanwhile, North America as a whole has an incredible wealth of domesticates and crops, mainly adapted to harsh or extreme climate.
Incrementally refined semi-agricultural or musk-ox herding lifestyle, supplemented by sea resources, expands even in the northernmost reaches of the Arctic. The Austronesian seafareres and *Eskimo civilization put the Americas in at least intermittent contact with Eurasia and Australia.
- The refined Austronesian shipbuilding ability and temperate package of crops and domesticates is adopted by natives of Southern Chile and added to the local package (Llamas and Potatoes). Potatoes introduced in New Zealand allow agriculture in the Austral Islands such as Auckland, Antipodes, Bounty and Macquaire.
- Along all the Pacific coasts of America, a continous stretch of agricultural, metal-using cultures ranging from Patagonia to Alaska is engaged in seaborne long distance trade, as well indirect contact with Australia and the Old World. Shipbuilding by 500 AD is comparable to OTL's Age of Exploration.
- Alaskan *Eskimo traders visiting Patagonia gradually introduce their Arctic agricultural and herding package. Fuegians have access to agricultural techniques, metal tools, advanced ship-building, herd animals like Caribou and sheep. They are big on whaling, and the Arctic crops cause a population explosion. They colonize the Falklands by 800 AD, then South Georgia.
- About 1200, having island-hopped to and through the South Sandwich islands and settled them, *Fuegians whalers spot the South Shetlands. Further explorations lead to the Antarctic mainland.
- As the the South Sandwiches begin to overpopulate, the whaling and sealing camps on the South Shetlands become the centers of colonization. While far from prime land even by *Fuegian standards, parts of the area are sort of arable with their toolkit at this point.
Even later, parts of the Peninisula begin to host permanent population. Maybe mining provides trading goods that allow external contact. By 1600 AD, some non-glaciated parts of Antarctica are home to a permanent human population of *American Natives that lives of a little agriculture, some occasional trade, Caribou and Musk Ox herding, and a lot of fishing and whaling. Maybe they even domesticate some kind of penguin.
Mission accomplished. It took only five-odd millennia, the plunder of two of the best timelines on this site, and a megaton of handwavium.