THE AMERICAN INDIANS IN THE PRE-COLONIAL PERIOD 2
The American Indians in the Pre-colonial Period
Description
The American Indian history can be studied by looking at their three major periods,
namely: the Paleo-Indian era, the archaic phase, and the Woodland phase. Evidence from these
periods puts forward that the first American Indians in the Paleo-Indian era were nomads, though
they supplemented this with hunting and gathering. According to Snipp (1986), stone tools were
mostly used for defense, which included scrapers, knives, spears, and clubs. During the Archaic
era, finer stone tools and bone tools were used. The Archaic generation also began to expand
more specialized knowledge of their regions, plants, and animals that lived in their environments.
Even though the Indian Americans did not generally tour in areas outside their familiar
environments, they established trade and migration routes that saw the Natives in the Carolinas
come into contact with them. They exchanged furs for blankets, alcoholic beverages, stone tools,
crafts, and food stuffs. At around 1000 B.C, small scale agriculture was introduced by the Indian
Americans in the Southeast, ushering in the Woodland period. This tribe began to concentrate
their settlements near rivers and streams to access the rich soils for flourishing farming. They
planted crops like pumpkins, beans, corn, squash, and sunflower. They built permanent
homesteads and still relied on fishing, hunting, and gathering (Usner, 1992).
Impact of climate and geography on the unique cultural development of the American
Indians
In the pre-colonial period, the region in the Southeast experienced a climate that enabled
a long growing season due to abundant rainfall. Usner (1992) argues that the plains established
