Discovery of America. American Indians.

Throughout the 15^th century cartographers partitioned the world into3 parts: Europe, Asia and Africa. To this in 1507 the German cartographer Wald Seemiller added a 4^th part, he called it America after A. Vespucius, whose diaries he found most interesting.

It was Columbus who called people in America Indians, who differed from Europeans. Columbus landed on the Bahama Islands, he believed that they were Indians (people who lived there).

Indians were the first Americans, they populated NA long before the continent was settled by Europeans. American Indians are of Asian ancestry (distantly related to Siberian and Mongolian tribes). They entered NA from Siberia by crossing a narrow strip of land, that once connected Alaska and Siberia. Today this place is called the Bering Strait. Living comfortably on much foot supply produced by forests and rivers the newcomers spread out. Some stayed in the North (Eskimos = Inuit), some moved South and many moved further South to Central and South America. These migrations took thousands of years. Those people were different in their lifestyle: some tribes were hunters, others were farmers; some were peaceful, some were hostile. They spoke over 300 separate languages.

Why were they called Indians? When Columbus stepped ashore on one of the islands in the Caribbean, he was sure that he had reached the India. The people he saw looked different and Columbus called them Indians. Nowadays the politically correct term accepted in the USA is American Indians.

(Доп. Материал не из лекций. На всякий случай.) Peoples who occupied North America before the arrival of the Europeans in the 15th cent. They have long been known as Indians because of the belief prevalent at the time of Columbus that the Americas were the outer reaches of the Indies (i.e., the East Indies). Most scholars agree that Native Americans came into the Western Hemisphere from Asia via the Bering Strait in a series of migrations. From Alaska they spread east and south. The several waves of migration are said to account for the many native linguistic families while the common origin is used to explain the physical characteristics that Native Americans have in common (though with considerable variation)Mongoloid features, coarse, straight black hair, dark eyes, sparse body hair, and a skin color ranging from yellow-brown to reddish brown. Many scholars accept evidence of Native American existence in the Americas back more than 25,000 years. In pre-Columbian times (prior to 1492) the Native American population of the area N of Mexico is estimated to have been between one and two million. From prehistoric times until recent historic times there were roughly six major cultural areas, excluding that of the Arctic, i.e., Northwest Coast, Plains, Plateau, Eastern Woodlands, Northern, and Southwest.

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14