Mounted Indian Scout, Frederic Remington

FROM Jeff Fyn-Paul’s Not Stolen: The Truth About European Colonialism in the New World (Bombardier Books, 2023):

There is one small problem with [the] image of peace-loving Native American societies: it is completely untrue. Before the Spanish imposed peace on Amerindian tribes from California to Tierra del Fuego, the unrelenting reality of their lives was a Hobbesian war of all against all. (The parallel with Rome, which imposed a similar peace through violence on the Gauls and other tribal peoples of Western Europe, is striking in this regard.) Outside of a tiny area of city-states in Mesoamerica and the Andes, Native American societies were uniformly tribal chiefdoms. Wherever in the world such city-states and chiefdoms have arisen, warfare has been a continuous part of life. As a rule, the majority of males in chiefdoms are trained in the art of war; in city-state areas, elite males train in war while the rest of the males participate in agriculture or crafts that support the warrior elite.

There are very few general truths in the history of global civilization, but one of the most reliable is that in areas where rulers monopolize violence on a small scale, warfare, raiding, and slavery will be endemic. Steven Pinker calls this “the inescapable logic of anarchy.” Only modern-day first-world anarchists for whom war remains an abstraction—e.g., people such as Dave Graeber (whom we met in chapter 2)—would argue otherwise. General peace is only possible when strong rulers monopolize violence on a large scale; this is the only thing that has historically protected people from a near-continuous threat of localized raiding.

The prevalence of violence in tribal society was summarized in a recent interview with Korsai, one of the last Indigenous inhabitants of Papua New Guinea to give up his traditional ways of life. The interviewer noted that the village next to Korsai’s had been enticed by American missionaries to go and live in an apartment building in town. When asked whether he felt he was missing out on modern amenities by not going along with them, Korsai responded: ‘Not for long! Off our neighbours went, and we were left alone on the mountain. And we loved the missionaries—because they’d taken those neighbours away! We didn’t need to worry about being attacked anymore. Also, we didn’t have to get up in the night to attack them!’ Now the Yaifo women could go off to tend the gardens without fear; the gardens were expanded and no one ever went hungry; health dramatically improved. (pp. 164-165)

Further reflections on the peacefulness of the Native Americans can be found in this account of the life of St. Isaac Jogues and this description of his death:

In early spring of 1644 he returned to Canada, and in 1646 was sent to negotiate peace with the Iroquois. He followed the same route over which he had been carried as a captive. It was on this occasion that he gave the name of Lake of the Blessed Sacrament to the body of water called by the Indians Horicon, now known as Lake George. He reached Ossernenon on 5 June, after a three weeks’ journey from the St. Lawrence. He was well received by his former captors and the treaty of peace was made. He started for Quebec on 16 June and arrived there 3 July. He immediately asked to be sent back to the Iroquois as a missionary, but only after much hesitation his superiors acceded to his request. On 27 September he began his third and last journey to the Mohawk. In the interim sickness had broken out in the tribe and a blight had fallen on the crops. This double calamity was ascribed to Jogues whom the Indians always regarded as a sorcerer. They were determined to wreak vengence on him for the spell he had cast on the place, and warriors were sent out to capture him. The news of this change of sentiment spread rapidly, and though fully aware of the danger Jogues continued on his way to Ossernenon, though all the Hurons and others who were with him fled except Lalande. The Iroquois met him near Lake George, stripped him naked, slashed him with their knives, beat him and then led him to the village. On 18 October, 1646, when entering a cabin he was struck with a tomahawk and afterwards decapitated. The head was fixed on the Palisades and the body thrown into the Mohawk.

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