American Colonies: The Settling of North America

In breaking free of Anglocentrism, Taylor draws the Indians out from the “wilderness” of history as central protagonists in his narrative. In doing so, the full scale of Indian loss becomes clear. The colonies’ success, Taylor argues, was underpinned by what historian John Murrin called “a tragedy of such huge proportions that no one’s imagination can easily encompass it all” (xi). For the Indians, this tragedy can be distilled to three major themes: the decimation of native numbers and culture; European unwillingness to understand or accommodate native ways; and the Indians’ own inability to unite in resistance.

In devoting a full chapter to the history of the Indians before the Europeans arrived, Taylor debunks the myth of pre-colonial America as “virgin” land. North America was in fact widely populated by a diverse array of Indian groups, some of whom were wiped out by European microbes before the Europeans even encountered them. In addition to bringing disease, the Europeans also massacred Indians on a scale that surprised their native allies, who did not conduct “total war” as the Europeans did. Taylor spares no detail in describing the many atrocities the Indians suffered.

Those who survived disease and conflict saw titanic changes to their culture. Survivors were forced to merge with refugees from other groups, a process called ethnogenesis. The colonists’ steady victories discredited tribal shamans, convincing many Indians that their gods forsook them. This drove them to a Christian faith that Europeans rendered incompatible with native ways of life. Thus Indians suffered not only the physical shock of losing their homes, but the psychic shock of losing faith in their chieftains, their religious leaders, and their gods.

The loss of Indian culture was exacerbated by European inability or unwillingness to understand native customs. The Indians had deep, generational knowledge of how to succeed in the Americas. They had developed agricultural techniques that prioritized efficiency and worked in better harmony with the environment. Lacking the concept of capitalism, many Indian societies were also more egalitarian than European civilizations. But as they did not prioritize the same values as Europeans—commercialism, individualism, hard labor—they were branded as lazy and childlike. Some Europeans recognized the benefits of the Indian lifestyle, but they ultimately never questioned the superiority of their way of life. The few defectors were brutally punished. As colonial numbers increased, the Indians were trapped in an unfamiliar system that the rule makers altered at will. Taylor often uses primary source material to allow the Indians to voice their frustration. He quotes one Virginian Algonquian who said, “We Can fly no farther. Let us know where to live & how to be secured for the future” (135).

Finally, Indians were weakened by their inability to unite in a pan-Indian alliance against the Europeans. Taylor attributes this to two factors. Many groups did not initially perceive the Europeans as a threat. Once they did, it was often too late: they were dependent on European trade or were otherwise outnumbered. After the colonists established themselves and solidified native dependence on trade goods, different Indian groups had different priorities to survive, which prevented them from uniting. Some acted as vital military allies for the Europeans. Some even came to rely on Europeans as intermediaries for conflicts that European displacement had created. By and large, the European strategy to turn Indians against each other succeeded.

But the tragic results of colonization—the deaths of thousands of people and their unique cultures—should not imply that the Indians were passive victims. Taylor underlines that the Indian ability to adapt, resist, and occasionally even flourish under colonial rule forced their colonizers to change as well. Both affected the other in a complex web of mutual dependency, “binding Europeans and Indians together in an uneasy embrace” (92).