Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021 • Hacker News Board

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#311

Post by bnralt » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:33 AM UTC

seph-reed wrote: post #256

VHRanger wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uh, go to a place like r/badhistory where they actually cite sources for their problems with it for a start Actual academics have problems with it

I went down another rabbit hole on r/badhistory. There's definitely plenty of holes in the theories of GG&S, if that's what you mean by "academics have problems with it" === "it is not a perfect theory." But overall, it seems most of the points hold more than enough water to be worth merit. None of them perfect, but vastly better than throwing the whole thing out. ----- Also, holy crap I'm giving you the benefit of t…

Yeah, in my experience there's a lot of misinformation floating around r/badhistory. It's not uncommon to have some comments halfway down (below all the highly upvoted snark and attempts at humor) that point out the inaccuracies in a post, so that's something at least.

But a large part of the problem with r/badhistory, and r/AskHistorians as well, is that it seems like most of the users don't realize that being better at history than most of Reddit is an extremely low bar. There's certainly some good stuff that ends up there (well, in r/AskHistorians, less so in r/badhistory), but there's still a lot of junk as well, and too many people act as if the stuff there is equivalent to published work by professional historians.

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#312

Post by fennecfoxen » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:45 AM UTC

headcanon wrote: post #84

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #28

An interesting counter-factual that comes to mind - if the Norse Greenlanders had brought smallpox or other diseases with them, then Native Americans would have had 500 years to recover (and keep immunity?) - The conquistadors would have faced millions of not-dying-natives. A much different world would have resulted.

I do think about that idea as well, but population density (on both sides) is an important factor though. Both the Vikings and the native populations had far lower population densities than, say, 15-century Spain and Italy, which is likely why the diseases didn't spread in the first place. Mesoamerica a few centuries later did end up having the density required for disease transfer as history shows, but it was also h…

> If the Spanish hadn't ever set foot on shore and the Mesoamerican society was allowed to develop, they would likely have developed their own diseases

Not really. Old World societies had access to many more domesticated animals, a key reason that they also had major diseases.

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#313

Post by PeterisP » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:50 AM UTC

s1artibartfast wrote: post #259

BurningFrog wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is very far from my expertise, but surely you can also live off the land? Hunting and fishing shouldn't be very different in Newfoundland compared to Norway/Iceland. Bring a few chickens along, and you have another food source. I assume/guess the vikings were better at this stuff than the Mayflower crowd.

Simply put, living off the land is HARD, even with an established settlement and some trade, mass starvation is a pretty likely outcome. Reality is more complex and challenging than Farmville or AnimalCrossing.

I'm just wondering why the same process how vikings settled Greenland would not work in the (IMHO much more hospitable) North America.

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#314

Post by soylentnewsorg » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 3:53 AM UTC

chestertn wrote: post #41

There are plenty of valid claims that many other civilizations contacted America: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_co... But it is meaningless since they did not write about it nor they stablished commerce. The fact is that before 1492, most civilizations in Africa/Asia/Europe did not know that America existed and that other humans lived there. After 1492, that changed forever.

I think there's also a point everyone who talks about other "discoveries" of America purposely ignores. This is about the discovery of it not for Europe the continent. This is about its discovery for what was the civilized nations in Europe. So if we look at Iceland - a place that's essentially a standalone island already half way to America - where a bunch of vikings lived who at the time weren't hanging out with people from places like Spain or Italy or France - it's an apples to oranges comparison.

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#315

Post by PeterisP » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 4:03 AM UTC

irrational wrote: post #53

hprotagonist wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the consensus has been for some time that they showed up, caught some fish, logged a few trees, decided it sucked, and left, all in probably less than a decade.

This is the part I don't get. These guys were awesome sailors. It didn't occur to them to sail down the coast until they got to the Florida Keys and set up a little surf shop?

They most likely had a family and a harvest to return to back home - viking raids generally were seasonal in between farming, so they had a built-in time limit.

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#316

Post by 0xBABAD00C » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 4:06 AM UTC

There's a fun wikipedia article [1] on various theories of pre-columbian contact with the Americas. Some of these are very dubious, of course, but the Roman fruit bowl from 2000 years ago does look like it contains an actual pineapple, which is an American fruit [2]. There is also evidence of nicotine and other substances found in Egyptian mummies from even longer ago, which could indicate at least some sort of indirect trade/contact across the ocean.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_co...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pre-Columbian_trans-oceanic_co...

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#317

Post by PeterisP » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 4:07 AM UTC

jfengel wrote: post #142

privatdozent wrote: post #8

Scandinavians are pretty proud of this fact. Look up Leif Erikson, supposedly the first European to set foot in America, 500 years before Columbus.

Seems like a weird thing to be proud of. "We found this whole new continent, sparsely populated and rich with all kinds of resources, but only explored a tiny piece of it and then basically ignored it/forgot about it." I suppose it's better than "We found a whole new continent, killed vast numbers of inhabitants, and then brought over millions of others to subject to horrific abuse".

Didn't Columbus die without ever claiming or even knowing that he found a whole new continent? As far as he was concerned, he succeeded in finding another trade route to Asia.

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#318

Post by maldeh » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 4:15 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #249

hapticmonkey wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's like saying The Apollo moon missions were meaningless because they failed to set up commercial hub on the moon.

I hate to say it, but in a sense, they were meaningless because there was no followup. We haven't had a machine that could even get us back there for 50 years now.

One could argue that we are doing the followup even to this day (with the China CLEP programme, India’s Chandrayaan, USA’s ongoing Artemis campaign and others). The deed was done, the minimum bar was set and humanity has been as determined as ever to breach the peak it had achieved back in the sixties even as government funding waxes and wanes. Public interest has not changed in the least.

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#319

Post by boomboomsubban » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 4:21 AM UTC

gremloni wrote: post #271

boomboomsubban wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I can only think of one settlement the Vikings set up in Gaul Are you calling Normandy one settlement? As they certainly spent most of the Viking age colonizing from Iceland to Sicily.

Most of the “colonizing” happened in prehistory. It was also based out of Ukraine, don’t know if you can attribute that to the Vikings.

This is akin to saying "most of the pillaging in history happened by people besides vikings, so you can't really attribute that to them." Yes, others colonized the areas. The Vikings also did during the Viking age.

Re: Evidence for European presence in the Americas in AD 1021

#320

Post by WalterBright » Thu, Oct 21, 2021, 4:28 AM UTC

jcranmer wrote: post #310

WalterBright wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since the Conquistador commanders sent back written reports, I doubt they were illiterate. And even if they were illiterate, they were trained by military people who were. And even if those were also illiterate, they were steeped in military traditions of discipline, organization, tactics, etc., that went back to the greeks. The way they operated was clear evidence of military sophistication.

> And even if those were also illiterate, they were steeped in military traditions of discipline, organization, tactics, etc., that went back to the greeks. And why couldn't, say, the Inca draw on the Wari, who could draw on the Moche, who could draw on the Chavin, who date back even before the Greeks? The problem with claiming the utility of writing in developing military tactics is that Western Europe doesn't have…

The only reason we know how Pizarro conquered the Inca is because he wrote it down. The bulk of what we know about Inca life comes from the Spanish who wrote it down. Most of the rest comes from archaeology and guesswork.

If you've got evidence that the Inca military had organized tactics, like units, feinting maneuvers, flanking attacks, procedures for taking fortified positions, covering fire, strategic retreat, breastworks, defense in depth, etc., I'm interested.

We do know the Inca had no plan for when their leader was captured but not killed. But Pizarro knew about that one, and that's how he defeated an empire. Disrupting the enemy's command and control is a well-understood technique in Western military tradition.