Would Native American society have changed without European interference?

What different crops? From what I understand, you'd need a full Andean-Mesoamerican exchange to get quinoa, etc. in North America. Unfortunately for the North Americans, they mostly abandoned their native crops. Unless you have European crops, of course, which add another dimension but carry that whole destructive element with them.

Chenopodium (the genus which quinoa is part of) was one of the plants of the Eastern Agricultural Complex, so you don't really need to introduce quinoa, just have it returned to prominence.

I think that the introduction of the potato could actually result in a renassance of EAC agriculture. Plants like goosefoot, little barley, knotweed etc. could be planted in potato fields to serve as a cover crop, and prevent the spread of pests from potato to potato. This would prevent the scenario of the Irish potato blight playing out, and even if somehow the potato harvest failed the EAC plants would provide an emergency foodsource. To European eyes these fields would look overgrown by weeds, but to the Indians this would be a super-productive way to use the land.

Magical123 said:
I have heard about Inca socialism yes and no I don't think they'd ever reach Brave New World levels of planning.

Yeah, Charles Mann presents the conquistador's accounts of storehouses full of clothes as evidence of Inca productivity, but I do have to wonder if they were actually signs of Soviet-style inefficiency. I think that as noble families and their estates proliferated and sucked up productivity, the Inca would have moved towards an economic and political collapse like those seen at the end of Chinese dynasties, exacerbated by the long periods of climactic instability which have historically affected the Andes.
 
The Incan "Socialism" (not sure if this is the right term for their economy and societal organization) differed from later European concepts of Socialism in that it had a distinct class system of nobles and commoners.
In contrast to Soviet leaders, who lived like kings and had many privileges, but pretended to be just as working class as Pavel, the steel worker on the 9th floor, the Incas never done away with their class system formally, and believed that nobles had more rights and priviliges than a commoner.
Similar sentiments can be found among the Aztec, who while not having the Incas "socialist-like" organization, also believed that people of noble heritage should live a more comfortable lifestyle and have more influence.

However, the Incas societal organization, which believed in both Classism and a "standardized lifestyle" for every inhabitant of their empire might result in a kind of eusocial society, in which breeding humans for specific purposes would be no more controversial than breeding crops for specific purposes.
 
However, the Incas societal organization, which believed in both Classism and a "standardized lifestyle" for every inhabitant of their empire might result in a kind of eusocial society, in which breeding humans for specific purposes would be no more controversial than breeding crops for specific purposes.

That would be a quite interesting thing to explore in a TL... Any other societies which might breed humans for specific classes/castes/whatever do you call it?
 
That would be a quite interesting thing to explore in a TL... Any other societies which might breed humans for specific classes/castes/whatever do you call it?

I don't know which OTL society would be more like it. European stereotypes tend to portray East Asians, for example the Koreans and the Japanese as a very collectivist society, but I think the Native Americans of Meso- and South America, particularily the Incas, seem to be the ultimate collectivist human culture, while Western Europeans (and later, Americans) the most individualist.
 
I wonder how Plains Nations would develop without the Horse and the Eastern Migration of other Tribes?
 
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I wonder how Plains Nations would develop without the Horse and the Eatern Migration of other Tribes?

Not at all as we know them. Although Numic speaking peoples like the Shoshone (who spawned the famous Comanche) seem to have been expanding before European interference. But they'd amount to very little without the horse to revolutionise their lifestyle (as well as their reasons for warring with other peoples).

The powerbase in the Plains would remain in the hands of the more agricultural peoples like the Pawnee who lived in the river valleys. Nations like the Sioux and Cheyenne would stick to their original lifestyles and never become the horse nomads they are most famed of being.
 
Not at all as we know them. Although Numic speaking peoples like the Shoshone (who spawned the famous Comanche) seem to have been expanding before European interference. But they'd amount to very little without the horse to revolutionise their lifestyle (as well as their reasons for warring with other peoples).

The powerbase in the Plains would remain in the hands of the more agricultural peoples like the Pawnee who lived in the river valleys. Nations like the Sioux and Cheyenne would stick to their original lifestyles and never become the horse nomads they are most famed of being.
Is it not possible that they could have become somesort of nomadic traders, similiar to Berber tribesman in the Sahara? Especially the Southern Plains people? They had Dog Travois and Plains Sign Language was the Lingua Franca for trade from Southern Mexico to the St Lawrence. If Mississippian Cultures develop as people say they could in this thread, wouldn't they be the be the natural middlemen between Mississippi and MesoAmerica?
 
Is it not possible that they could have become somesort of nomadic traders, similiar to Berber tribesman in the Sahara? Especially the Southern Plains people? They had Dog Travois and Plains Sign Language was the Lingua Franca for trade from Southern Mexico to the St Lawrence. If Mississippian Cultures develop as people say they could in this thread, wouldn't they be the be the natural middlemen between Mississippi and MesoAmerica?

Possibly. There were trade routes between the Puebloans and Mississippians, so the people who lived in the Plains were basically middlemen, and could have expanded their role.

But connecting the Mississippi basin and Mesoamerica might be a bit more multifaceted. The Mesoamericans didn't think much of the peoples (Chichimecs) living north of them. You'd need more organisation there, maybe like how the Thracians and Gauls were brought into the Greco-Roman sphere and eventually assimilated wholesale. And then there's the route by sea. A few weeks back there was a thread here about the Maya expanding in the Caribbean. That might be what you could do to link Mesoamerica to the Mississippian region by sea. Connections between centers of civilisation can only improve these regions.
 
Alright then, another question. What would the hypothetical Fuedal era of these alternate America's look like? With Fuedal being applied loosely and not requiring it's adoption in more than one Culture Group.
 

Magical123

Banned
Alright then, another question. What would the hypothetical Fuedal era of these alternate America's look like? With Fuedal being applied loosely and not requiring it's adoption in more than one Culture Group.
You need organized polities of at least a minor size to start with reduced but more evenly spread populations-perhaps a plague or two they weren't near that level of development. I imagine in any Amerindian feudal scenario would probably have been say 4500-5500 AD.
 
You need organized polities of at least a minor size to start with reduced but more evenly spread populations-perhaps a plague or two they weren't near that level of development. I imagine in any Amerindian feudal scenario would probably have been say 4500-5500 AD.
I know that it would take longer to develop, that wasn't my question. I'm wondering more where is most likely to reach that sort of level first, how widespread it is, and far along is the rest of the continent in comparison.
 

Magical123

Banned
I know that it would take longer to develop, that wasn't my question. I'm wondering more where is most likely to reach that sort of level first, how widespread it is, and far along is the rest of the continent in comparison.
I can't give you those details I'm just giving you a wistful extrapolation for when such conditions would occur, you might have feudal polities on the plains or in the Amazon or in North Mexico.

Someone needs to build a supercomputer so we can make these sorts of extrapolations.
 
I can't give you those details I'm just giving you a wistful extrapolation for when such conditions would occur, you might have feudal polities on the plains or in the Amazon or in North Mexico.

Someone needs to build a supercomputer so we can make these sorts of extrapolations.
No biggy. Figured you had a better chance of having a rough picture then me.
 
Alright then, another question. What would the hypothetical Fuedal era of these alternate America's look like? With Fuedal being applied loosely and not requiring it's adoption in more than one Culture Group.

I don't think that there really would be a feudal era equivalent to that of Europe (I don't think that talking about 'levels' of development is helpful, as it suggests cultural superiority of one culture over another).

In an ASB-sealed Americas here are the changes we may see over the course of 1,000 years, going from north to south:

Arctic and Taiga: Would remain hunter-gatherer. However, as technology develops the populations would grow, peoples might centralize to a degree as they compete over shrinking resources. While I don't think we would see @DValdron 's "Land of Ice and Mice" timeline become a reality, we may see more intense management of the wild to encourage the growth of edible plants like the ones that take a central part in that timeline.

Pacific Northwest: Would become quite 'feudal' in many places, with elites continuing to concentrate their power as they did IOTL. These elites may enforce the adoption of agriculture on the 'commoners' if potatoes are traded that far north.

California Coast: Would *most likely* remain hunter gatherer. However, ecological or artificial disruptions (such as large-scale slave raids) may force people to adopt agriculture from the East or South, possibly adding domesticated varieties of previously gathered native plants to these foreign agricultural packages.

Southwest: Post-Anasazi, the Pueblo peoples had found a good equilibrium for their agriculture. Without horse nomads to threaten them, they are liable to live quite in peace and IMO would partially assimilate the Athabaskan peoples. I think the apocalyptic strains of religious thought common in Pueblo culture may fade away or lose some of their edge, as long as they maintain that equilibrium and aren't threatened by outside forces.

Great Plains: As stated by other posters, would have agriculture in the river valleys, with a few nomads using dog and possibly llama travois to skirt the edges of the plains.

Eastern Woodlands: A 'feudal' system of elites may rise up again, imposing a neo-Mississippian order. However, the form of control these elites use would be very different from that in Europe-for example, there would be a dominant class of religious ritualists instead of a warrior class and religious class sharing power as in Europe.

Northern Mexico: If potatoes are introduced, it might become a little more agricultural as potatoes are much less thirsty crops than corn, and so more appropriate for the region.

Mesoamerica: Metallurgy would develop further and a 'bronze age' could begin, but ultimately the average person would not have access to metal tools or weapons. A possibility is that larger unitary states will grow out of Aztec-like tribute empires. If potatoes are introduced, highland areas like Chiapas and southern Guatemala may become more densely populated and culturally influential

Central America: More involved in a nautical trade network, acting as an important bridge between Caribbean and Pacific trade networks.

Caribbean: The development of nautical technology will probably see many of the Caribbean islanders drawn into mainland trade networks and material cultures, with ensuing shifts to adapting mainland cultural practices such as the Mesoamerican ballgame.

Andes: IMO the Inca empire will collapse, but it may spread a precedent for centralized states and will leave behind a rich (and useful!) material legacy in the form of terraces for farming and roads for transportation. I expect that the Inca Empire will serve as a rough analogue to the Roman Empire for Medieval and modern Europe for the cultures of the Andean peoples.

Amazon basin: Terra preta agriculture continues to spread, and more of the land is engineered for human needs.

Southern Cone: If agriculture comes eastward, like I said the area is ripe for the rise of a very densely populated agricultural civilization.
 
I don't think that there really would be a feudal era equivalent to that of Europe (I don't think that talking about 'levels' of development is helpful, as it suggests cultural superiority of one culture over another).
That's why I said Feudal was applied loosely. And I didn't mean it in a level of civilization kind of way. I meant more as time period of instability and competition between small "states" as populations grew and available resources and space became scarcer. An era resembling more Early city states, but I thought Feudal would be more efficient, sorry about that.

Thank you for answering my question. And FYI, what you called Taiga, is called the Boreal region in the Americas.
 

Magical123

Banned
With regards cultural development I think it is a useful concept hunter gathers simply don't have as complex a society as the say the modern United States. That doesn't mean there not human beings but it does mean we shouldn't give them more credit than they due.

Oh and by the way some cultures are superior to another depending of course on how one measure's superiority.
 
Everyone here has already covered the dynamic, complex, developed nature of pre-columbian societies in the Americas. What I was always more curious about was the potential aesthetic of ATL American cultures had they somehow (ASB) avoided the devastation of the Columbian exchange. I have always been jealous that cultures all over the world have unique, modern examples of art and architecture while growing up in western North America we had generic strip malls. I can't even get a modern tule-weaved basket.

Sorry, I guess thst turned into more of a rant than a contribution... Carry on then.
 

Vuru

Banned
Without horses or any other riding animal, they're absolutely fucked, which is why North America was either big confederations or millions of little statelets, barring the Inca because llamas
 
Not at all as we know them. Although Numic speaking peoples like the Shoshone (who spawned the famous Comanche) seem to have been expanding before European interference. But they'd amount to very little without the horse to revolutionise their lifestyle (as well as their reasons for warring with other peoples).

The powerbase in the Plains would remain in the hands of the more agricultural peoples like the Pawnee who lived in the river valleys. Nations like the Sioux and Cheyenne would stick to their original lifestyles and never become the horse nomads they are most famed of being.

Well, in the Northern Plains you had agricultural tribes, such as the Mandan, who farmed the river valleys and ventured out into the plains to hunt. They were eventually swamped by the Sioux (being pushed into the Plains by the Anishinaabe) who had the horse and were more effective hunters. But it would be interesting to see how the Mandan and their agriculture would survive and prosper without the pressure from the Sioux and other tribes who adopted the horse.
 
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