Post # 88
I have another archeological find to report on today. This one is Spanish, and dates to about 1567, during the latter part of the Renaissance. But, before I do I will write briefly about the main tribes of Waabidengwayan (white faces) my people ran into (my native ancestors).
There were four main tribes of white people we had contact with, followed by a major fifth. Although there were German colonists in California and on the Gulf Coast, their time here was short and their influence small, as were the Swedes in Delaware and New Jersey. The Portugese made quite an impact on the western hemisphere, but their influence was way down in South America (Brazil), so for us they were worlds away and we never even knew about them. We heard rumours of the people in Alaska (the Russians), but that was also far away from any contact with any of the Annishinaabe nations. Our early dealings were primarily with the French, Dutch, English, and Spanish, and later on the Americans. Of course during the Immigrant Period (1860's - 1920's) we had contact with many kinds of Europeans. These were mostly Swedes, Germans, Norwegians, and Finns, with a few Polacks thrown into the mix. Unlike them, we made distinctions between their tribes, and had different names for them all, whereas they just called us all Indians, or Injuns. For instance we called the Finns the "Sweat-Lodge People" and called the talkative, chatty Norwegians the "Gingos" our word for chipmunk. Bur for the sake of this article I'm talking about the four tribes of early contact.
First up I'll talk about the French. La Francé, we called them, because that is what the Hurons and our brothers the Aadawe (Ottawa) called them as many of them (and us) learned how to speak French. We also called them the Gookoosh-wisiiniyag, the pork eaters. The French were by far the friendliest for us. They sought to understand us, and their people often married into ours. Their venture in North America, was mainly commercial, for trading. Other than the area around Quebec City, they weren't bent on settling every place they saw.
The Dutch were a complete bomb. They had bad leaders during their colonial phase. They first of all viewed all native peoples as being the same - just a bunch of "Indians." They executed native men and women, for anything they saw a a crime. When one of their pigs wandered off they accused a Delaware woman of stealing it and had her shot for it. Later on the pig wandered back. When the Delaware responded with an attack and a war started. In the process of the war the Dutch attacked the villages of other nations, because they made no distinctions between "those Indians." If the English hadn't beat them off the continent, their colony would have still failed. About half a century after their failure they came back and only set up various, temporary fur posts. This time they were better at relations with the native populations. Even during the time of their colony they were good at trading. They were the first ones to trade us guns, forcing the other nations to follow suit. Their 18th Century traders continued in that tradition. They also traded their silver, rather than trying to force us to trade for whiskey. They also traded all the other standard trade goods of blankets and kettles, and such. We sometimes called them the Mazina-ininiwag, the coin people.
The next ones are the English. The Hurons couldn't pronounce an "L", so they called them the Yangees. That name for them stuck for most other native people. We all called them the Yangees. The name Yankee, comes both from that, and the Dutch word Junkers. They were in the continent just to settle. Trading for them was a chore they felt they had to do to appease us, while they took up all the land. Their prices were higher than the French or Dutch (smaller payout for furs), and they didn't like it if their people married native women. They always wanted the natives to be their scouts, and often assumed that they were. They made some distinction between various native peoples, but very little. One good thing to say about them though, is they did uphold their treaties. For instance The Ohio River valley was off limits to settle, because Kan-Tuk-Kee was a sacred place to all native peoples, and not to be owned by anyone. When English colonists snuck in there anyway, we would report it and the English soldiers would come and force them back to the accepted lands. This was one of the sources of contention between the Yangee colonists and the Yangee King, George III, that led to their Civil War over here.
When their Civil war was over, and the English colonists became independent from the Crown, they broke every treaty made by the Yangee Crown. They broke treaties with people or changed the terms of a treaty faster than the ink could dry. They enforced these broken treaties with their sabers, which is why we call them the "Gichi-mookoman," the long-knife (today many shorten it to Gichokomo, or Chokomo). Even so, a higher percentage of our populations enlist into the armed services than the percentage of Americans as a whole. We also hold the flag with more honor than many white Americans. I would say it's not so much that they love the country, but that they love the land that the country sits on.
Finally there were the Spanish. In the southern hemisphere they just over ran everything. On the Eastern Seaboard they didn't do so good though. In the mid 1500's they tried to settle colonies throughout Georgia, the Carolinas, and Virginia. They thought the native people were their slaves. As such they didn't "exchange" gifts or trade. They thought that a one time gift sold them into Spanish service They freely beat or whipped the natives. They also used the native women and adolescent girls as a tool for their sexual needs. Viewing them all as slaves, from the minute the Spanish flag was planted on a beach also let them think it was okay every so often grab a few, and bring them to the auction blocks of Spain. For this reason we sometimes called them the Awaakan-Maji-Manidoowag, the Slave Devils.
Almost entirely due to their inability to build relationships with the natives, or even to see us as human, their North American colonies on the Eastern Seaboard came to a quick and violent end. Most of the colonies were completely massacred. The difference between their ways though, and ours, is that warriors of those southeast native nations didn't make the killing of the women and children a part of their goal. They would have been captured, brought back to their villages, and eventually adopted. Their northern colonies were there and gone, long before the English or French got to the region.
The Spanish Fort recently discovered in North Carolina met with the same fate. It only lasted about two years before its colonists were massacred and carried away, according to archeologist and historian Robin Beck, of the University of Michigan, working at the dig site.
This fort, known as Fort San Juan is being considered as the very first one in what is now the US interior. It was built by a Spanish Capitan by the name of Juan Pardo, and the colony's purpose was to find gold. That was the usual purpose for Spanish settlements. This is the largest of the forts that Juan Pardo built.
This archeological find wasn't found by construction workers, like so many others lately. It was found by a dig team from many universities, who were already excavating the site in the foothills of the Appalachian Mts. It was also the site of an even more ancient Mississippian Mound Builder settlement. While excavating the mounds, they first found some of the Spanish barracks. "We have known for more than a decade where the Spanish soldiers were living," another excavator, Christopher Rodning of Tulane University, explained in a statement.
It was only about a month ago that the foundations of the fort were found. They also used magnetronomy to probe down and see what is buried beneath the surface. Some of the features they found in this way are the entryway to the fort, and a moat, 15 feet across and about 5 1/2 feet deep. Also by just sheer digging they found an iron clasp of some kind.
Soon the dig season will be over, and the various archeologists and historians will go back to their universities and analyze their data, and publish papers on it. They are, however, looking forward already to coming back next year to continue working on what has now become a multiple dig site.
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