Viking colonialism in the New World

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

I've heard it argued that if it had been the Vikings who remained the dominant colonising force in the New World (rather than the Spanish/English/French), the relations with the Native Americans would not have been so horrendous.

The sagas indicate tension with the "skraelings", so I'm not entirely convinced. What's your take on the subject?

[Barnabas]

It would have been impossible for vikings to be a dominant colonising force.

The spaniards of the year 1500 who had cannons, gunfire etc, could conquer and kill natives easily.

The vikings, would not have been able to conquer, only found small colonies on the coast, they were too few in number, and the advantage in weapons was not that great.
If I recall probably their colonies in north canada may have been wiped out by the natives.

It would have been really impossible, this is not an issue.
Also the europeans of the XVI century used galleons which could cross the ocean in one trip from London to New York or Cadiz to Cartagena, the vikings had inferior ships (altough great for their time)

The most important factor which decided how natives were treated, was, if the europeans who moved to the americans were overwhelmingly male (like the spaniards), or if they were families (like the english)

Spaniards had to intermarry with natives, because predominantly they didnt bring women from Spain, the english moved with their entire family, so the interactions they had with natives were of a very different nature than the ones spaniards had.
Spaniards intermarried with natives, and ruled the natives, the natives were most of the society of spanish america.

In the 13 colonies, what you had more than a mixture of cultures, was a european country transplanted to america, the english moved with their families, the indians were not a part of the society, and the relation was one of warfare as the european settlements expanded.


Anyway, hundreds of thousands of english and spanairds moved to the america, I doubt scandinavia had thousands of thousands of people which they could send across the ocean

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by Barnabas
The spaniards of the year 1500 who had cannons, gunfire etc, could conquer and kill natives easily.

More importantly, they had an imperialist drive of an organized state and were in the lucky position to relatively easy dominate sedentary people used to hierarchical ruling by applying divide and rule strategies.
Even the Spanish failed for a long time in the frontier areas of America, so I think it would have been impossible for the Vikings to conquer the North-East of America.

Spaniards had to intermarry with natives, because predominantly they didnt bring women from Spain, the english moved with their entire family, so the interactions they had with natives were of a very different nature than the ones spaniards had.
Spaniards intermarried with natives, and ruled the natives, the natives were most of the society of spanish america.

I think there are more reasons there to explain the different forms of treatment. At first, one has to say that mestizos were usually from non-marital offspring. Also, the Spanish didn't regard America as something like a promised land utopia as the Protestants did but were rather happy to have Indians doing the dirty work - the average Spanish was more urban, the average English needed his own chunk of land for his farm. And finally, the civilization argument: IIRC, the US Americans got along quite a bit better with Pueblo and Hopi than with Sioux or Apache (which isn't hard)

Anyway, hundreds of thousands of english and spanairds moved to the america, I doubt scandinavia had thousands of thousands of people which they could send across the ocean

Back on topic, I think that's the most important part.

[Mercator]

Can you really compare the Vikings against the Spanish et al.? The Vikings were there ~500 years earlier and didn't have gunpowder.

Even if they had stayed around longer and tried to colonise the place they wouldn't have had the advantage over the "natives" that the others had 500 years later.

Assuming that the Vikings actually expanded in the Americas, held on to these colonies and stayed in contact with the European continent for 500 years, the American tribes might have had a slower, more drawn-out introduction to Europe. They'd have had more time to adjust to European disease, and they would've come into contact with gunpowder and horses sooner.

So while that might have "saved" the Americans in the long run (compared to the sudden onslaught of the 15th and 16th centuries), that doesn't necessarily mean the Vikings would've been any less brutal.

[Hueij]

A continental Iceland. Imagine what saga's it would have gotten us...

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Originally posted by Barnabas

Anyway, hundreds of thousands of english and spanairds moved to the america, I doubt scandinavia had thousands of thousands of people which they could send across the ocean

They managed to invade England and set up sizeable kingdoms on more than one occasion.

[molly bloom]

Given the distances involved, and even with ocean-going ships, it's still difficult to see how the Vikings could have made as big an impact as the Spanish did in Central America.

Two big advantages for the Spanish that are frequently overlooked in the hagiographic accounts of the gains made by the Conquistadors- they had well-motivated native allies who were eager for revenge on the Aztecs and Incas, and they also spread contagious diseases in highly populated urban areas with links to other Meso-American and South American city states.

Smallpox, measles, influenza - all lovers of large concentrations of humans in one area.


If perhaps the Vikings had established themselves in a large group on island further south than Newfoundland, then matters might have been different.

The smaller native populations of North America (or at least the smaller concentration of indigenous peoples in an area comparable with Tenochtitlan or Cuzco) would also disadvantage any would-be Norse conquerors.

Certainly from the accounst we have of the Norse contact with the 'skraelings' we see that the indigenous peoples were scared of the Europeans' bull, and lacked metal tools.

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by molly bloom
Two big advantages for the Spanish that are frequently overlooked in the hagiographic accounts of the gains made by the Conquistadors- they had well-motivated native allies who were eager for revenge on the Aztecs and Incas, and they also spread contagious diseases in highly populated urban areas with links to other Meso-American and South American city states.

Smallpox, measles, influenza - all lovers of large concentrations of humans in one area.

Two things need to be said. The Spanish chroniclers never denied the role of Tlaxcaltecans or Incan civil war in the Conquest, not even the Conquistadors "forgot" that bit in the average tooting of their own horn.
It would be interesting to investigate when mentioning the indigenous participation was put aside - my guess is the 19th century. That (plus the first half of the 20th) was exactly the period Europeans, generally, where so overwhelmed by their own superiority that, whatever the participation of Indians had been, it surely was negligible. Thus, "European pride" partly even overruled the black legend.

The second, relating to the diseases, my understanding of your post is that it insinuates a deliberate spreading on the part of the Spanish, something for which there is not the least indication I'd be aware of.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Wernazuma III

The second, relating to the diseases, my understanding of your post is that it insinuates a deliberate spreading on the part of the Spanish, something for which there is not the least indication I'd be aware of.

No- not my meaning. The accounts of the epidemics which struck the inhabitants of the Aztec Empire make for painful reading- according to some epidemiologists, the virulence of the new diseases in a population without any native resistance, combined with the disruption of the belief system and the state hierarchy, made a kind of resigned fatalism grip the sick and dying peoples, so that even some who might have recovered 'turned their faces to the wall' and died instead.


Certainly the main Spanish attack on the Incas was preceded (if I recall correctly) by news of a strange lethal ailment spreading along the Inca trade routes from the Caribbean shore of South America.

A civil war, a wave of fatal diseases, native allies who resented Inca rule- all this as well as European metalworking, guns and horses makes the feats of the conquistadors somewhat less remarkable.

As I recall, even a single Spanish expedition into what are now the southern states of the U.S.A. was responsible for a devastating smallpox epidemic (attributed to an African slave/servant who was a carrier).

It would be interesting to investigate when mentioning the indigenous participation was put aside - my guess is the 19th century.

That would have been my guess too, because when people mention the conquistadors it often seems as though they imagine that they did all the conquering by themselves, and that diseases and other indigenous peoples hostile to the Incas and Aztecs never aided the Spanish.

Given that Inca-led revolts occurred long after the initial phase of conquest, and that the new colonial regimes had to fight wars against other indigenous peoples (the Araucanians in Chile for instance), and I think that late18th/19th Century attitudes towards the privileged role of European culture and peoples explains the overshadowing of the contributions of both microbes and indigenous peoples in the subjugation of Central and South America.

[Dr Strangelove]

IIRC the Nordic people who visited America were just Icelanders, not the Danes or the Norse. Iceland was to the Viking world like Australia was to Great Britain, a place reserved for a small select group of exiled misfits. People were sent to Iceland because they were too unruly to fit into Viking society. You can just imagine what that meant. Iceland simply didn't have the population numbers or the resources to successfully colonize North America. As pointed out in earlier posts they didn't have very much of a technoloigical edge on the natives either. Eventually they would have impinged upon a tribe that matched them in aggressiveness, and then that would have been the end of the colony.

[Wernazuma III]

Originally posted by molly bloom
No- not my meaning. The accounts of the epidemics which struck the inhabitants of the Aztec Empire make for painful reading- according to some epidemiologists, the virulence of the new diseases in a population without any native resistance, combined with the disruption of the belief system and the state hierarchy, made a kind of resigned fatalism grip the sick and dying peoples, so that even some who might have recovered 'turned their faces to the wall' and died instead.

Seems I misread your post then. Yes, there certainly was a smell of doom in the air (literaly)

Certainly the main Spanish attack on the Incas was preceded (if I recall correctly) by news of a strange lethal ailment spreading along the Inca trade routes from the Caribbean shore of South America.

Yes, the Inca suffered a first wave of the epidemics before the Spanish arrived, "helped" by the higher population density from the Caribbean to the Andes and working trade routes.
IIRC, the death of the Inca, which eventually led to the civil war between Atahualpa and Huasca, was probably due to smallpox.

A civil war, a wave of fatal diseases, native allies who resented Inca rule- all this as well as European metalworking, guns and horses makes the feats of the conquistadors somewhat less remarkable.

But still the campaigns of Cortés and Pizarro were remarkable. Cortés was incredibly successful enticing Mexican communities away from the Aztecs, had a natural sense of whom to trust, whom to spare, and whom to punish as an example. And he had Malinche of course, who made all this possible with her negotiating skills and an equally brilliant strategic mind IMHO. After all, he managed to be more liked by most Mexican Indians than the Aztec rule he replaced and the Spanish Crown was worried that he could incite them in a minute and play his own game.
I'm less informed about Pizarro's venture, thus I can't really judge but it from what I know his strategy was more simple and more reduced to the sheer brutality - Pizarro was more or less a monster. Still, he must have managed to exploit the civil war perfectly, I have to read yet more on this.

Given that Inca-led revolts occurred long after the initial phase of conquest, and that the new colonial regimes had to fight wars against other indigenous peoples (the Araucanians in Chile for instance), and I think that late18th/19th Century attitudes towards the privileged role of European culture and peoples explains the overshadowing of the contributions of both microbes and indigenous peoples in the subjugation of Central and South America.

Textbooks all over Europe generally omitted other factors than European bravery in all colonial contexts. I don't think that indigenous issues (like the Inka revolt or the Araucanian War) even played a role in this. Probably more so the independence of South American nations, which fostered the rather dull "Hispanidad"-ideology in Spain.

[Arrian]

I'll give Cortez this: the burning his ships thing was badass.

-Arrian

[binTravkin]

All this 'vikings were less advantaged over natives than spanish' is bs imo.
Sorry, but just look what they did in europe:
England - cut in half by viking kingdoms, then the people winning Hastings were still quite close to vikings - no wonder they are considered to be of different culture than that of french - 'norman'.
Ireland - the many monasteries burnt and towns looted
South Italy - conquered south Italy and then got Sicily from muslims.
France - Charles the Bold, the last ruler of unified frank empire much the same as Charlemagne had to buy them off Paris as he was not sure his army could win them at all.
Russia - they made Rus!
and so on..

If their weapons were inferior, their culture was so warlike, even then-quite-militarised Europe couldn't cope with them. It is only due to their somewhat fragmented and more loot-oriented not empire-building nature they didn't establish something greater in Europe.

The only problem I see with Vikings colonising North America is they would have to find iron deposits quickly to be able to sustain their iron age culture and not drop back to neolithic of natives, which would mostly eliminate their advantage.

The 500 year handicap would come handy and also make up for their lesser numbers.

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Barnabas
It would have been impossible for vikings to be a dominant colonising force.

The spaniards of the year 1500 who had cannons, gunfire etc, could conquer and kill natives easily.

The vikings, would not have been able to conquer, only found small colonies on the coast, they were too few in number, and the advantage in weapons was not that great.

Maybe that's the point.

[binTravkin]

Vikings were much more champions of european warfare than Spaniards in their time. What makes people think american natives would be much problem to them if much more skilled and better organized europeans weren't?