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What indigenous place names tell us:
The inhabited terra nullius
By Alfred de Zayas, OHCHR retired
Alabama, Alaska, Algonquin, Allegheny, Apache, Apalachee, Appalachian, Appomattox,
Arizona, Arkansas, Biloxi, Calumet, Calusa, Canada, Caribou, Cayuga, Chatanooga,
Chautauqua, Chepanoc, Cherokee, Chesapeake, Cheyenne, Chicago, Chickasaw, Clatsop,
Colusa, Comanche, Connecticut, Cree, Dakota, Delaware, Detroit, Erie, Hialeah,
Hiawatha, Hopi, Huron, Idaho, Illinois, Inyo, Iowa, Iroquois, Kansas, Kenosha,
Kentucky, Klondike, Lillooet, Malibu, Maliseet, Manhattan, Manitoba, Massachusetts,
Merrimac, Metoac, Miami, Miccosukee, Michigan, Micmac, Milwaukee, Minnesota,
Mississippi, Missouri, Modoc, Mohawk, Mohegan, Mohican, Monache, Montauk, Muscogee,
Nakota, Nanaimo, Nantucket, Napa, Narragansett, Naugatuck, Navajo, Nebraska,
Niagara, Norwalk, Ohio, Okanagan, Okeechobee, Oklahoma, Omaha, Omak, Oneida,
Ontario, Oregon, Orono, Ottawa, Palouse, Pataha, Pawnee, Pennacook, Pennamaquan,
Pensacola, Penticton, Peoga, Peoria, Peotone, Pequot, Poconos, Pontiac, Potomac,
Poughkeepsie, Quebec, Roanoke, Sarasota, Saratoga, Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Savannah,
Sawhatchee, Scituate, Seattle, Sebago, Sequoia, Seminole, Sewanee, Shannock,
Shawnee, Shenandoah, Shetucket, Shoshone, Sioux, Sonoma, Spokane, Squamish, Sunapee,
Susquehanna, Tacoma, Taconic, Tahoe, Tallahassee, Tampa, Tecumseh, Tennessee,
Texas, Ticonderoga, Topeka, Toronto, Tucson, Tuscaloosa, Tuscarora, Tuskegee,
Utah, Wabash, Waco, Walla Walla, Wallowa, Wanakit, Wasco, Waupaca, Wenatchee,
Wichita, Winnebago, Winnimac, Winnipeg, Wisconsin, Wyoming, Yosemite, Yukon,
Yuma – what language do these sonorous names speak? What message do they
convey to us?
Indigenous names, vestiges of the First Nations who lived and prospered in the
rich lands of the Americas, descendants of the early Asians who migrated ten
thousand years ago to the continent over the frozen Bering Sea and Alaska, gradually
making their way down to what later became Canada, the United States, Mexico,
Central and South America. Serious anthropological research estimates that some
ten million human beings resided in North America (in the territories North of
the Rio Grande) when their lands were “discovered” and claimed by
the Europeans. The vast and beautiful continent was theirs, from
the Shenandoah Valley to Yosemite. The land was prosperous, full of villages,
wigwams, laughter and life. Where are the indigenous of North America now? Where
have they all gone? Decimated by European diseases, shot down and massacred
at Bear River (1863), Sand Creek (1864), Wounded Knee (1890) and at so many other
unknown places of horror. Gone and forgotten, blown with the wind and the clouds.
The broken remnants of the Seminole, Dakota, Cree and Pueblo people eke out an
existence in their “reservations.” Some do rain dances for the tourists.
What do the names Chapultepec, Chichen Itza, Palenque, Uxmal, Teotihuacan, Iximche,
Tikal and Machu Picchu tell us? That south of the Rio Grande the continent was
also inhabited by millions of human beings, perhaps as many as 60 million. Their
land was not terra nullius. We can still recognize the Aztec, the Maya,
the Inca, the Quechua in the populations of Central and South America. From the
writings of the Dominican friars Bartolomé de las Casas and Antonio de
Montesinos we have learned that the Arawacs, the Siboneyes and Tainos were massacred
and enslaved. From the reports of the conquistadores Cortés and Pizarro
we know how they dealt with the “Indios”. How many indigenous lives
were deliberately extinguished by the European colonizers (migrants with the
sword)? How many died of disease and deprivation? Ten million? Twenty million? We
even took away their historical identity, since to this day we call the descendants
of the survivors “Indian” as if they had anything to do with the
Indian Sub-continent in Asia.
Historiography has failed to take into account the many uncomfortable facts that
do not harmonize with our positive evaluation of the European conquest of the
New World. Indeed, many people still believe that the “clash of civilizations” in
the New World was ultimately good for humanity, that Providence ordained it,
that the Europeans did a great service to mankind by settling and developing
the new American continent, which allegedly was only sparsely populated by
backward and uncivilized peoples.
A different historical paradigm deserves testing: Were our ancestors
more like "migrants" to new frontiers? Throughout history,
migration has been a natural behaviour of the human species, hardly "deviant
conduct". Yet, one of the many differences between 21st century
migrants and 16th-20th century migrants is that 21st century migrants
do not come to destroy our crops, slaughter our buffalo or wipe us out.
Basically, all that modern migrants (we often call them "illegal
aliens") want is a better chance for themselves and their families.
Anything wrong with that?
How did our ancestors in Europe live during the "age of discovery"? From
every reliable historical source we know that Europe was poor, cities
were squalid, overcrowded, hunger, unemployment and disease were rampant.
Many of the 16th, 17th, 18th. 19th century migrants -- the Spanish, the
Portuguese, the British, the French. the Germans, the Irish and other "colonizers" --
were adventurers, mavericks bent on getting rich fast; others were simple
folk hoping for a new start. The historical fact is that what we know
today as North America was a rich land, ecologically-balanced, populated
by millions of human beings, minding their own business and posing no
threat to Europeans, when in 1492 the Genovese Christopher Columbus made
his first appearance, thinking he had found a western route to India.
Whereas the Spanish colonization was bent on exploitation of the natural
resources (and labour) of the Americas, the Anglo-Saxon colonizers basically
just wanted free land – without the native population. They
saw themselves as a “chosen people” who had a God-given right
to their “promised land”. They were not keen on enslaving
the Iroquois or the Pequots -- -nor in Christianizing them. There
was little use for the “Indians”, who were perceived as "devils" and "wolves".
The Massachusetts Puritans, who also burned witches, killed the very
natives who taught them how to survive, while the Reverend John Cotton
of the first Church of Boston, and the Reverend Cotton Mather of the
Second Church of Boston held their xenophobic, rabble-rousing sermons.
In the course of three centuries 98% of the native North American population
was not only displaced pursuant to the official policy of "manifest
destiny" -- it was deliberately exterminated. The founding fathers
of the land of the free and the home of the brave, Benjamin Franklin
("the design of Providence to extirpate these savages"), George
Washington ("beasts of prey"), John Adams ("blood hounds"),
Thomas Jefferson ("merciless Indian savages"), James Madison,
James Monroe, Andrew Jackson ("the wolf be struck in his den")
-- all called for the extinction of the American "Indian".
All these dreadful historical facts lie sleeping in the archives, if
anyone cares to consult them. But History only wants to remember "Thanksgiving
Day" and the story of Pocahontas.
What we know as Meso-and South America, was also a rich land, densely
populated with some 60 million human beings, with magnificent cities
like Tenochtitlán (today Mexico City), capital of the Aztec kingdom,
with towns, villages, impressive architecture, aqueducts, sports facilities,
science, astronomy, art, and vast agricultural lands producing such wonderful
foods as avocado (ahuacat in the Nahuatl dialect of southern
Mexico), beans, cacao, cashew nuts (originally from Brazil, acajú in
the native Tupi language), cassava, cayenne pepper, guava, jalapeños,
maize (mahiz in Arawak language, commonly known as corn), passion
fruit, peanuts, pineapple, sweet pimentos, potatoes (papa or patata in
Inca language), pumpkin, squash, tapioca, tomatoes (tomatl in
Nahuatl), topinambour (also known as Jerusalem artichoke, Helianthus
tuberosus, named after a Brazilian tribe), vanilla (originally from
Mexico), yams, etc., not to mention tobacco (from the Arawakan or Taino
word referred to by Las Casas), hitherto unknown in Europe (until introduced
in Spain in 1558 by Francisco Fernandez).
As we can read in the writings of the Dominican friar (later Bishop)
Bartolomé de las Casas, the Spanish conquistadores brutally aggressed
the indigenous population, murdered and enslaved millions of the men,
raped their women, and eventually mixed with the survivors to create
the "mestizo" society we know in Latin America today. If you
travel to Mexico, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador,
Peru, Bolivia -- you will see the descendants of the Aztecs, the Mayas,
the Incas. Presidents Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, Evo Morales of
Bolivia, Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua and former President Alejandro Toledo
of Peru, have Spanish surnames, but they certainly also have as many
indigenous forefathers (a mucha honra!). So much for the "discovery" of
the Americas and for the legal fiction of "terra nullius".
It is worth remembering that, far from being xenophobic, the first nations
of the Americas received Cristobal Colon with remarkable hospitality. The
European newcomers, however, were migrants with the sword. Perhaps the
only good thing that can be said for Spanish colonization is that the
human rights activities of Friar Antonio de Montesinos ("are these
not also men"?) and Bartolomé de las Casas before the Spanish
king Fernando de Aragón, and later before Emperor Charles V led
to the adoption of the “Laws of Burgos” and of the "New
Laws" of 1540 which recognized the human nature of the indigenous
population and forbade their ill-treatment and enslavement. The great
disputations of Valladolid and Salamanca have gone down in history as
a milestone in the development of the concept of human dignity—and
human rights. Admittedly, Fernando’s and Charles' laws were violated
systematically – and with impunity, but this only illustrates the
truism that norms and their enforcement are not identical. Yet, if we
had no norms, we would be totally subject to the barbarism of the jungle,
otherwise known as "might is right".
I think that it can be safely stated that the “Christianization" of
Latin America and the Anglo-Saxon policy of “manifest destiny” constituted
perhaps the greatest demographic catastrophe in the long history of mankind. One
cannot help wondering how our world would look like if instead of the
Europeans "discovering" America, the Iroquois, the Cree, the
Dakotas, the Aztecs, the Incas, the Arawacs had crossed the Ocean to "discover" Europe.
Would they have slaughtered the Europeans, as our ancestors slaughtered
them? Just a little food for thought.
See: Bartolomé de las Casas, Brief History of the
Devastation of the Indies, Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992; David
Stannard, American Holocaust, Oxford University Press, 1992; Richard
Drinnon, Facing West, University of Oklahoma Press, 1997; Frederick
Hoxie (ed.) Encyclopedia of North American Indians, Houghton Mifflin
Co., Boston, in particular the entry "Population: Precontact to Present",
pp. 500-502 by Russell Thornton, UCLA. |
