WI: The Americas were uninhabited pre-1492

Looking at it from another angle:

Next to all the Inka gold, the one thing Columbus really discovered were maize (corn), potatoes and tobacco. Of course he didn't just stumble upon them. He either observed the natives or was thought by them. Without natives, how long would it take for a fortunate settler to think: Hey, funny leaves. I wonder if I roll them up, light them and suck in the smoke.... Will it kill me or just get me high?

So assuming the European settlers and explorers have to find out for themselves what corn, tomatoes, potatoes, cotton and tobacco are good for? How long until fries and ketchup become a standard staple?

And would corn be such a big crop it is today, even in Russia, or would it play second fiddle behind quinoa?
Why would they ever exist at all? Eurasian farmers would have perfectly acceptable crops available, even if they were less ideal than the package they encountered in OTL. Would you rather grow your grain now, or some stupid plant that your grandchildren's grandchildren's grandchildren could enjoy?

It may happen eventually, but it's not going to be high priority.
 
Alright, that is a fair point. It really isn't impossible for no migration, it just seems unlikely. I guess what I was trying to say is using a ASB would allow you to still have Europe is as the same as Columbus time if you wanted to see specifically how he and the Europe of that time would react to an empty America.

Wrong. Enough with the "possible event is ASB" The people crossing the straits were in isolated communicates and only went over in 3 "bursts" of migration. We could have a disease kill each of the three off before they cross the strait and since there were no cities, a disease outbreak would be self limiting and probably have no butterflies on Europe. I mean, you can have isolated hunter-gather society that in OTL left Eurasia anyways dies have a butterfly on Europe, but it's easy to imagine that having no effect either. The problem is the Polynesians and Vinelanders might end up colonizing the Americas anyways. At least the Vinelanders are unlikely to reach the Caribbean, assuming they keep with historical birth rates the expansion will be somewhat limited.
 
Talk about massacring butterflies. All it would take is one person or even one animal to do something different to cause changes that would spread out across Asia, leading to butterflies into Europe. To have nothing change in Asia, which would lead to nothing changing elsewhere is simply ASB.
 
Fine, I'll accept that butterflies are probable, but by no means guaranteed or ASB if they didn't happen. What's the difference between a society dying and same society going away and not interacting with Europe for over a millennia? The answer is very little by the society. I'll accept that a society killed off might have done something different with animals that ends up causing butterflies, but the humans that would have never interacted directly won't.
 
What's the difference between a society dying and same society going away and not interacting with Europe for over a millennia? The answer is very little by the society.
The difference in time between their migration and them dying of disease earlier leading to butterflies as other tribes react differently too it. Couldn't the difference be in years considering how far back the POD is?
 
Then there's the Polynesians. We may be pretty sure that Polynesians reached the Americas. But did they make it back? Were these not, in all likelihood, a bunxh of all-male sailors who got blown off course and were then stranded in a place they did not know? It's been argued that such 'castaways' were from time to time adopted into the Native American peoples of the new lands they had unintentianally reached... but in this ATL, there is no native population. So if we're talking about a bunch of all-male sailors blown off course... they will last for exactly one generation. Or they build a new vessel and try to get back home. They may succeed. hey may not. But if OTL Polynesians made it to America and back in this fashion, there is nothing to indicate that this led to any significant Polynesian migration to the Americas. Far more likely, the only Polynesians to reach the New World were stranded there, and their unintended trip was one-way.
We know the Polynesians reached the Americas and came back because of the sweet potato, an American crop, which Polynesians refer to as kumara (in Andean languages the crop is often called kumar or some variant thereof). Furthermore, Polynesians always voyaged with the chief (ariki) and about fifty of the most healthy men and women. All Polynesian voyages were intended to create a viable colony, and that means having both men and women.
 
It's quite likely in this scenario that there would be Polynesians scattered along the Pacific coast of South America, and quite possibly a denser population of Vinlandic Norse in northeasternmost North America. I do not think we would necessarily have many, since Vinland was found only a half-millennium before Columbus and Polynesians just couldn't have gotten to South America before they got to Easter Island (700-1100 CE is the common time frame), but we would have some.

I really do think that there would be knock-on consequences on world history. One explanation I have heard of the Little Ice Age of the 17th century is that, at least in part, it was precipitated by forests regrowing in the ruins of indigenous American civilizations devastated by diseases, trees sucking up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. If there is no human presence in the Americas, or no substantial one until a late date, then world climate will evolve in very different directions.
 
The Polynesians will definitely start laying down colonies when they get there; they colonized New Zealand, which was significantly less attractive for their crop package (to the point that most of their traditional crops couldn't grow at all, and none of their crops could grow anywhere south of essentially Canterbury); South America is a paradise in comparison.

You'd also have Inuit (who migrated in a separate wave, long after the land bridge was gone).

I'm much less sure about the Norse sticking around; while the natives were part of the reason Vinland was abandoned, they likely were only part of it; the end of the Medieval Warm Period also played a major role.

Regardless, European colonization will be much slower. Leaving aside the roles that natives (both free and slaves) played in establishing and maintaining the various European colonies, they also played a major role in making the colonies seem worthwhile. Columbus would have had a lot more problems getting funding for further expeditions and colonization if he hadn't come across natives with gold trinkets, and it's hard to overstate how much reports of the wealth of the Aztecs played a role in encouraging future conquistadors. Without natives, you have some empty land, prone to disease, and full of strange plants and animals. Not only is colonization difficult (and self-supporting colonies would be made even more so by the typical gender imbalance in Spanish colonization efforts; there's a reason there were so many mestizos running around), it's much less profitable.
 
What about the Malians? They might have reached the Americas. It would be interesting to see a timeline whereby the Polynesians spread through South America, the Vikings through North America and the two meet up somewhere in Mexico or something.
 

Skallagrim

Banned
We know the Polynesians reached the Americas and came back because of the sweet potato, an American crop, which Polynesians refer to as kumara (in Andean languages the crop is often called kumar or some variant thereof).

That 'knowledge' remains pretty shaky. There are multiple competing theories on the subject. It is in fact possible that the sweet potato floated across the ocean, so to speak. Then there's the whole theory of Native American canoe-farers reaching Polynesia, rather than the other way around. I'm not saying that's the truth, but I think you're pretty hasty in calling something 'knowledge' when it's in truth one expanation out of several possibilities.

That said, this information below would certainly be relevant to the question, which is why I specifically asked about it:

Furthermore, Polynesians always voyaged with the chief (ariki) and about fifty of the most healthy men and women. All Polynesian voyages were intended to create a viable colony, and that means having both men and women.

So if we assume that such a Polynesian voyage reached the Americas, that lends serious credence to the notion of a colony being founded. Still, I'd like some actual evidence of it happening in OTL before just assuming that it happened. And if it happened, we still have figure out how often it happened. Is one such vessel reaching the Americas truly enough for a viable colony? One nasty disease and it can be all over. (I mean, look at early European settler colonies. Some of them were just completely wiped out by disease. If your starting population for settling an entire continent is c. 50 people - assuming they all survived the journey - that leaves you unusually vulnerable.)

Without concrete indications of any kind of repeated Polynesian landings, I'm not ready to say that a whole Polynesian-settled America would somehow be a given. (And don't get me wrong: I think the idea is really cool. But just assuming it's going to happen is way too hasty for my tastes.)
 
Looking at it from another angle:

Next to all the Inka gold, the one thing Columbus really discovered were maize (corn), potatoes and tobacco. Of course he didn't just stumble upon them. He either observed the natives or was thought by them. Without natives, how long would it take for a fortunate settler to think: Hey, funny leaves. I wonder if I roll them up, light them and suck in the smoke.... Will it kill me or just get me high?

So assuming the European settlers and explorers have to find out for themselves what corn, tomatoes, potatoes, cotton and tobacco are good for? How long until fries and ketchup become a standard staple?

And would corn be such a big crop it is today, even in Russia, or would it play second fiddle behind quinoa?
I don't think corn would ever be a domesticated crop... it started out from a rather tiny grain plant that took a looooooong time to get up to a decent size. The native Americans did it in OTL because they didn't have anything better to work with. Without natives to do that, I can't imagine why European settlers would bother with it, when they already have wheat, barley, and oats. As for potatoes... it might be used, people seem to have a natural inclination to try out tubers. But even if it does happen, the Europeans will be starting from scratch with it...
 
There are multiple competing theories on the subject. It is in fact possible that the sweet potato floated across the ocean, so to speak.
The Polynesians sailing to South America is by far the most plausible one. So we have a fairly clear linguistic connection between Polynesian and Andean languages with regards to this one crop, which also happens to be native to the Andes. Clearly, the word kumara could not have floated across the ocean. So we have three options:
  • the connection is a coincidence, which does happen, see e.g. English and Mbabaram "dog." But there's no real reason to think it's a coincidence when there are much more plausible options, i.e. contact between Polynesians and South Americans.
  • The South Americans sailed to Polynesia. But despite Heyerdahl's stunt, South American rafts were much less seaworthy than Polynesian canoes, and more importantly, South Americans did not have a cultural imperative that encouraged sailing into the unknown. The Polynesians had something which we can best describe as wanderlust.
  • The Polynesians sailed to South America. This is, as we can see, the most plausible option.
A fair number of Polynesian scholars (including Patrick V. Kirch, probably the most acknowledged Oceanic archaeologist in the world) just regard Polynesians sailing to the Americas as fact, with just the smoking gun (direct evidence of a Polynesian camp or such) not being found yet.

Is one such vessel reaching the Americas truly enough for a viable colony? One nasty disease and it can be all over.
Hawaii maintained contact with Tahiti and other southern islands for centuries after contact despite the distance being more than 4000 kilometers, so it is fully possible more canoes would follow. Also, consider that both New Zealand and Easter Island were settled by multiple canoes--which could add up to a settling population in the hundreds.

Native New World diseases were not nearly as serious as the ones faced by European settlers in the 17th and 18th centuries, many of which were diseases they themselves had brought to the Americas (one thinks of malaria).
 
I think the best you could for is the lack of major civilizations like the Mayan, Inca, Aztec, and Mississippi Valley Civilizations. There would be always natives.

How would that happen? Unlike Aboriginal Australia, the Americas had a lot more to work with in terms of crops and even domesticates, as well as more connection between cultures to "exchange ideas", so to speak, since it's better land for humans than Australia and a much larger land at that.

American Indians not developing agriculture seems about as probable as the Old World not developing agriculture. There's just too much there for something not to be domesticated. And once enough of it is, at some point a civilisation will form.

Looking at it from another angle:

Next to all the Inka gold, the one thing Columbus really discovered were maize (corn), potatoes and tobacco. Of course he didn't just stumble upon them. He either observed the natives or was thought by them. Without natives, how long would it take for a fortunate settler to think: Hey, funny leaves. I wonder if I roll them up, light them and suck in the smoke.... Will it kill me or just get me high?

So assuming the European settlers and explorers have to find out for themselves what corn, tomatoes, potatoes, cotton and tobacco are good for? How long until fries and ketchup become a standard staple?

And would corn be such a big crop it is today, even in Russia, or would it play second fiddle behind quinoa?

None of it will be domesticated, so no one will really bother experimenting with it aside from agronomists in the 20th century onwards looking for interesting crops. And unlike many crops experimented with by agronomists and others (like many Australian and non-domesticated American crops), there will be no lengthy tradition of use aside from "some settler was once stranded in the wilderness and used this plant", which seems less convincing than entire cultures using the plants for thousands of years. They would be little different from the potentially domesticated Australian crops, aside from possibly being more conducive to domestication. Europeans will continue to plant their own crops and generally ignore what they find.

Tobacco would (thankfully) never be used, since modern tobacco is a combination of Nicotiana species. There's also no one to instruct people in their use. Since tobacco use is very unpleasant for first-time smokers--especially wild tobacco, completely undomesticated, I doubt anyone is going to feel like trying to market that anymore than Europeans might want to market the many psychotropic plants found in Europe or America.

Chilis and other New World spices might be used, although the fact they aren't in domesticated form could mean that Australian spices might be able to compete with them. In addition to spices like grains of paradise maintaining popularity.
 
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