WI: No Long Pause

[Mort the Reaper]

The Polynesians stopped expanding for around 2,000 years, in a period known as the Long Pause. According to this article, it was because they didn't have the technology to sail against the wind, but I'm not sure how true that is.

Assuming the inadequate technology theory is true, there's a relatively simple fix: the necessary technology gets developed earlier. But I'm not particularly interested in how the Long Pause gets averted right now. What I'm interested in are the consequences of it not happening, or at least not being nearly as long.

 

[Richard V]

The Polynesians stopped expanding for around 2,000 years, in a period known as the Long Pause. According to this article, it was because they didn't have the technology to sail against the wind, but I'm not sure how true that is.

Assuming the inadequate technology theory is true, there's a relatively simple fix: the necessary technology gets developed earlier. But I'm not particularly interested in how the Long Pause gets averted right now. What I'm interested in are the consequences of it not happening, or at least not being nearly as long.

They could have reached the Americas several centuries BC. A short pause of hundreds of years would still allow them to arrive by year zero, with pigs and chicken, and their maritime package. Potentially this allows North and South Americans to be much more closely linked by trade. Andean bronze, potatoes, llama and alpaca, Central American sweet potato, cassava, muscovy duck, writing and mathematics, Mexican turkey, tomato, chili peppers, peanuts, cotton - imagine them everywhere, including throughout the Caribbean.