Featured Venetian trade beads in Alaska before Columbus

A recent find in Alaska, Venetian trade beads that must have been there for at least 450 yrs, which means they were there before Columbus.



https://news.artnet.com/art-world/alaskan-archaeologists-uncovered-venitian-glass-beads-date-back-540-years-meaning-made-north-america-columbus-1945050?utm_content=from_artnetnews2&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=EU News Afternoon 2/19/21&utm_term=EUR Daily Newsletter [AFTERNOON]

 

Our ancestors seemed to have travelled & traded more than was originally thought, and as more discoveries are being made the more our history needs to be rewritten. I was watching a recent tv programme for example, about a horde of finds found in one B.C. burial mound here in England. It contained Chinese Buddhist items, ancient Egyptian pottery, Viking jewellery and Russian amber.

 

Wow! What a outstanding find. When we celebrate Columbus Day, I always think what are you talking about. The Americas were populated with a whole nation of peoples, who "discovered" it long before the Europeans. Then there is Leif Erickson. One of the reasons, I was so set on travelling to Newfoundland/Labrador, was to see and experience the proof of this earlier visit by those from across the ocean. Now this! Just tells you those who write history are the ones who make history, not the actual people.

 

Fascinating. I'll have to track it down.

 

Agree, many of us don't realise how much trade there was. For instance, the garnets in Dutch Frankish and pre-Medieval Frisian jewellery were traded from India.

Exactly! And the possible early Irish travels. It has been suggested that the Vikings traveled to North America because of the early Irish accounts. One of those accounts is "Voyage of St Brendan", first thought to be a legend, but now researchers think there is some truth in it.

 

There is even suggestion/evidence that the ancient Egyptians traded with South Americans. Not to mention the Kon-Tiki expedition in circa 1947.

Kon-Tiki expedition - Wikipedia

 

"In 1492, Columbus discovered that the Native Americans had been there all along".

To quote a T shirt I own.

Phoenicians came to Cornwall, of course.

 

Q: What happened in 1492?

A: Native Americans discovered Columbus.

 

..and there went the neighborhood....

 

I don't think Columbus had anything to do with the widespread destruction of Native American Indians, do You? They were eradicated by the Americans.

 

He wasn't a pleasant chap.

https://www.history.com/news/columbus-day-controversy

It was the English, Spanish and French who kicked off the massacres of Native Americans.

 

From the initial contact it was European diseases that first decimated the Native populations. The wars, massacres and assimilation attempts just finished them off.
In the West the Spanish were by far the first to make contact, first via sea trade, then the missionaries and brutal colonization. All nations have been responsible for some atrocity or another.

 

Its a crying same, isn't it. If only we could step back in time to alter our ways. We never seem to learn either. It has taken less than 200 years to destroy much of our planet and its inhabitants, and yet still we continue to poison our world as if we own it!

 

And what have the Romans ever done for us? LOL

 

Just as they have found evidence of Vikings and earlier people travelling by boat along the northern coastlines between Iceland, Greenland and Canada, there may have been a travel route along the northern rim of the Pacific as well. There are theories that posit such a coastal route for the early populating of the Americas, as opposed to (or in addition to) the inland "ice free corridor" across Beringia and down through Canada. But finding evidence for it is challenging because of changes in sea level. We are so used to thinking in terms of travel overland that we don't see the obvious river and sea routes for people who knew how to make boats. If you compare the art of the Ainu in northern Japan with Northwest Coast art you can see some unexpected similarities.

Columbus's expeditions introduced disease and enslavement to the Taino people of the Caribbean, practically wiping out the Native population by the first quarter of the 16th century. This is why the Spanish resorted to importing Africans as slaves.

In 1542 Gaspar de Carvajal, a Dominican friar, accompanied the expedition of Francisco de Orellana from the headwaters of the Amazon in eastern Peru down to the mouth of the river on the Atlantic. It was one of the first contacts of Europeans with Amazonian peoples. He later published a report of the journey, including descriptions of large settlements of Native Americans all along the river banks. Later explorers thought he was making it up, because the land appeared uninhabited and lost to the rain forest. But recent archeological studies are beginning to indicate that de Carvahal was correct. Evidence is beginning to show that there were extensive settlements throughout the Amazon basin. The best explanation for the dramatic change is that the population was decimated by European diseases before there were major incursions by Europeans into the territory.

The same thing appears to have happened in North America, but there are fewer written accounts of the conditions prior to major contact.

 

Columbus's expeditions introduced disease and enslavement to the Taino people of the Caribbean, practically wiping out the Native population by the first quarter of the 16th century. This is why the Spanish resorted to importing Africans as slaves.

That maybe the case, but the Caribbean is not in America? Most nations are responsible for the demise of their own people in more ways than one. Even in Africa where slavery is still rife. Black Americans, don't exactly have it good today in some USA states, do they? And how many died whilst being forced to pick cotton? England didn't exactly get off Scott free either! Roman and Viking invasions, Norman invasion too. You can no more blame the English for everything today, than you can blame the USA today for its own history.

Fact check: U.S. was not the only (or first) country to abolish slavery | Reuters

 

I am not sure I understand your point, but it is not a matter of blame. It is about trying to understand human history as much as we can.

 

Earlier posts were merely 'suggesting/hinting' that Columbus and/or the Brits were 'responsible' for the demise of Native American Indians. I take your point and agree with it. It usually takes more than one thing to destroy a civilisation along with their valuable traditions, and it can happen quicker than we think.

 

Responsible, yes, in the sense that the original peoples of the Americas (North, Central, South and Caribbean) would not have been largely destroyed if Europeans had not arrived with practices and diseases that harmed them.

Blame involves moral judgements, which may be more complicated.

 

I live in the Southwest US, and the Native people are still here, despite the best efforts of the Spanish.
There is still animosity between the 19 Pueblos of New Mexico and those who claim Spanish ancestry.