Perhaps we do have a right to the Americas. An amateur historical speculation.

originally posted by: ArMaPFor how things look today I just have to look at photos, videos and all the people from Latin America that live here (and they are many, mostly from Brazil, for obvious reasons, but also many from Venezuela).

Of course they look like the Old World. Spain, Portugal, Africa, North Africa.

Small bands of Old World pirates need not have dominated the entire hemisphere for my theory to be correct. It is possible they hadn't reached Amazonia or found it too wild.

Clearly for you. I asked you for examples of the similarities, but you didn't provide any, unless I missed them, the last days have been a little stressful for me.

I invited you to look at pictures.

As it looks like you don't believe in anthropologists, I don't know how can you reach any conclusion, if you are really interested in knowing instead of looking just for confirmation of you "theory".

I don't believe in your assumption of what anthropologists would say. You haven't cited any.

originally posted by: Solvedit
ArMaP,

You are trying to impeach my argument on details.

No, but details are important, and it looks like you are ignoring those that do not suit your intended result.

Do you think the New World was truly unknown before Columbus?

No, there are many references to something being there. Some people, like Columbus, thought it was Asia, others thought the Earth was bigger and Asia was too far away (they were right).

Not one guild of fishermen, not one band of pirates ever realized there were two continents there?

Fishermen, at that time, didn't venture too much into the open ocean. Some did, but not many.
There was nothing on that area at the time for pirates to attack, pirates were common on the Asian routes, as those were the ones where all the commerce of the time went through.

And, if so, could it not have been a crime problem? Especially if they did not know what their gold and copper ore was worth in the Old World?

Sorry, I don't understand what you mean by "a crime problem".

Are there not signs of Pre-Columbian contact? Ancient Chinese stone anchors off California. Viking settlements in Newfoundland. The Portuguese were known to have fished the grand banks off Newfoundland before Columbus. The Bimini Road. Viking Runes on stones in Minnesota. And so on.

Contact is not the same thing as having a mixed native-European population. For that it would be needed frequent contact, like the one we had in what is today Portugal between the native population and the Phoenicians, which brought things to sell and took local products. One kilometre from where I live they found signs of a Phoenician trading post, near the place where later the Romans built some tanks to make salt fish and even later the Moors built some grain silos.

Where there's constant (even for a relatively short time, from a historic point of view) contact between two people it's natural that there is some mixing, but that doesn't happen only by "racial" mixing, it also happens (faster) with a mixing of the languages, with some foreign words starting to make part of the other people's vocabulary. If a "racial" mix happens them what also happens is names mixing. If a Spanish soldier (or whatever) named Juan Garcia, for example, had some children from a native woman, what would they call those children? The father would use his own traditions and would call them by a Spanish first name. That's why there are so many Spanish names in the Philipines or Portuguese names in some regions of India.

originally posted by: ArMaPThere was nothing on that area at the time for pirates to attack, pirates were common on the Asian routes, as those were the ones where all the commerce of the time went through.

Try two continents with gold lying on the ground in riverbeds waiting to be picked up.

originally posted by: ArMaPSorry, I don't understand what you mean by "a crime problem".

Pirates could have been trafficking opium or people for gold which funded Eurasian wars.

originally posted by: ArMaP
Contact is not the same thing as having a mixed native-European population. For that it would be needed frequent contact, like the one we had in what is today Portugal between the native population and the Phoenicians, which brought things to sell and took local products. One kilometre from where I live they found signs of a Phoenician trading post, near the place where later the Romans built some tanks to make salt fish and even later the Moors built some grain silos.

That is one model of contact.

Another model is if pirates brought opium or captives for gold. They would have wanted to minimize contact so as to keep the natives willing to spend time scouring riverbeds for gold. They would have tried hard to leave nothing and take nothing back but gold in order to keep their secret.

The race for the New World could have all started to happen after Columbus, but if word got out that there was gold, it would have still been necessary to take charge of the place before someone hostile to Europe's interests took charge of it first.

You are so busy denying the possibility but of course the New World is full of people from the Old World and of course you can't always easily tell where they came from especially because there could have been a time when allegiance to Spain, Portugal, or France or England was very important.

The point isn't that they shouldn't be from North Africa or the Ottoman Empire. The point is that the European powers would have suffered heavily and maybe even been wiped out, if they hadn't taken custody of the New World before the other empires of the world did. They couldn't just leave it lying around.

originally posted by: Solvedit

originally posted by: ArMaPFor how things look today I just have to look at photos, videos and all the people from Latin America that live here (and they are many, mostly from Brazil, for obvious reasons, but also many from Venezuela).

Of course they look like the Old World. Spain, Portugal, Africa, North Africa.

In fact, only a few look like Old World, most look like a mix of European, African and South American.

Small bands of Old World pirates need not have dominated the entire hemisphere for my theory to be correct. It is possible they hadn't reached Amazonia or found it too wild.

The problem with that pirates' idea is that there weren't any on the Atlantic before there were ships to attack. Also, it looks like you are basing that idea on another idea, that it was easy to get a ship capable of crossing the Atlantic. At the time, that was something that only governments were able to do, and there were few builders, so big ships were not common until there was a big enough source of merchandise to transport. Then the pirates appeared.

I invited you to look at pictures.

You did, but you didn't say which, so I don't know which are you talking about. Carvings from the Incas and Mayas? Or from some other people? The ones I have seen have obvious differences.

I don't believe in your assumption of what anthropologists would say. You haven't cited any.

That's true, I haven't cited any, I have been talking of what I have read in books many years ago.
Not knowing exactly which people you are talking about (you generalise too much, different groups in South America have different characteristics) it's hard to know what to look for.

originally posted by: Solvedit
Try two continents with gold lying on the ground in riverbeds waiting to be picked up.

They needed to know that the gold was there, so who was the first to know about the gold?

originally posted by: Solvedit
Another model is if pirates brought opium or captives for gold.

Pirates did not trade in opium or captives, that was done by governments. Pirates attacked government ships. Sometimes, the pirates had a letter from an enemy nation allowing them to attack that nation's enemies. Those were called privateers.

Is there any record of opium use in the Americas before the 18th century?

They would have wanted to minimize contact so as to keep the natives willing to spend time scouring riverbeds for gold. They would have tried hard to leave nothing and take nothing back but gold in order to keep their secret.

To make the natives willing to spend time "scouring riverbeds for gold" (are there any evidences of that?) they had to give them something more than "opium or captives", as they didn't have any need for opium and had enough captives, they didn't need to import them.
The ones that didn't kept captives didn't need them.

The race for the New World could have all started to happen after Columbus, but if word got out that there was gold, it would have still been necessary to take charge of the place before someone hostile to Europe's interests took charge of it first.

That's a huge if.

originally posted by: Solvedit
You are so busy denying the possibility but of course the New World is full of people from the Old World and of course you can't always easily tell where they came from especially because there could have been a time when allegiance to Spain, Portugal, or France or England was very important.

France and England only got to be important after the 17th century or so.

The point isn't that they shouldn't be from North Africa or the Ottoman Empire. The point is that the European powers would have suffered heavily and maybe even been wiped out, if they hadn't taken custody of the New World before the other empires of the world did. They couldn't just leave it lying around.

Which European powers? And what "other empires of the world"? Name them, please.

No pirates at all in the Atlantic, really?

No one thought there could be any gold in the New World until absolute proof was obtained?

You need exact specifics about which empire could be a threat to Europe if they got their hands on enough gold to buy the latest weapons?

We can't assume they could have hooked natives on, of all things, opium, unless you have absolute proof?

I think you are trying a little too hard.

You're just not a Bigfoot-caliber internet commentator. If there's not proof from someone official, you think it must not be real.

what about those carved giant stone heads? the Olmec do that?

astecs had the gold if i remember.machu pichu and all that, around the 1500's?


but wasn't there a myth about a lost city of gold?


bunch of cheap movies were made about it i think.

originally posted by: Solvedit
No pirates at all in the Atlantic, really?

In the 15th century? No, unless you present evidence of their existence.
Pirates attack ships that may give them some loot, if there were only fishermen's boats, why would they bother?

Sea commerce in the 15th century was small and close to the (European) coast, that's why there were only a few references to some islands that could exist further West in the Atlantic (the Azores, Madeira and Canary islands were only officially discovered in the 15th century, but they are all closer to Europe than to the Americas).

Any pirates attacking the commerce ships would also navigate close to the shores, as most of the commerce at the time was done keeping the shore in sight.

No one thought there could be any gold in the New World until absolute proof was obtained?

I see you haven't grasped how much it would cost an expedition to the Americas at the time. Even for a kingdom like Portugal or Spain it was a huge undertaking that took around one year to prepare, so even if they knew for sure that there was some land there and knew for sure that there was easy gold there, they would need a huge amount of money to build the ships (ships to sail long distances into the Atlantic had to be built on purpose, as nobody used them), to find a competent crew for the ships (one ship wasn't enough, they needed at least another for the supplies) and buy all the supplies for several months for all those people aboard the ships.

You need exact specifics about which empire could be a threat to Europe if they got their hands on enough gold to buy the latest weapons?

Yes, otherwise it's just your imagination. Also, there wasn't any thing like "the latest weapons" they didn't have already, there wasn't any special secret weapon that a country developed that had a big advantage over others.

We can't assume they could have hooked natives on, of all things, opium, unless you have absolute proof?

Exactly. Just because you say so it doesn't make it real. Where are the signs of opium ever been used before the 18th century or so in the Americas? Also, why would anyone with cheap access to coca leaves would want to pay for opium?

I think you are trying a little too hard.

Well, I think you aren't even trying. Your approach appears to be based on a couple of ideas with no real support from facts, while ignoring the known facts of how things were at the time.

For example, you are ignoring that crossing the ocean in a ship with a square sail like those of the Viking ships was very difficult, as they could only sail with the wind close to its back. A ship stranded in the middle of the ocean with a contrary wind was a dead ship. Only after the Portuguese developed the caravel, adapting the lateen sails from the ones used in the Mediterranean ships, it became easier to sail with contrary winds. It was also only after the Portuguese voyages of the 15th century that the trade winds in the South and North Atlantic were discovered and mapped, making it easier for the ships to catch the right wind to return to Europe. Although they had to make a longer trip, it was faster than doing all those hundreds of miles with a contrary wind, and the longer a voyage takes the more supplies they need to take as they start it.
Another thing that was needed was a good navigation method, that was only easy to do with the adaptation of the astrolabe into a maritime version. Even then, navigation was mostly limited to getting the latitude, longitude had to be estimated, only after the 17th or 18th century, with the use of the sextant, was possible to get a relatively accurate longitude.

You're just not a Bigfoot-caliber internet commentator. If there's not proof from someone official, you think it must not be real.

No need to be official, any verifiable evidence would do, the problem is that you haven't provided any.

originally posted by: ArMaP

originally posted by: Solvedit
No pirates at all in the Atlantic, really?

In the 15th century? No, unless you present evidence of their existence.
Pirates attack ships that may give them some loot, if there were only fishermen's boats, why would they bother?

Sea commerce in the 15th century was small and close to the (European) coast, that's why there were only a few references to some islands that could exist further West in the Atlantic (the Azores, Madeira and Canary islands were only officially discovered in the 15th century, but they are all closer to Europe than to the Americas).

Any pirates attacking the commerce ships would also navigate close to the shores, as most of the commerce at the time was done keeping the shore in sight.

Then how did they discover the Azores? Couldn't pirates from some other part of the world sail into the Atlantic if there was evidence of two continents there? Do they need an "official Atlantic Pirate" card?

No one thought there could be any gold in the New World until absolute proof was obtained?

I see you haven't grasped how much it would cost an expedition to the Americas at the time. Even for a kingdom like Portugal or Spain it was a huge undertaking that took around one year to prepare, so even if they knew for sure that there was some land there and knew for sure that there was easy gold there, they would need a huge amount of money to build the ships (ships to sail long distances into the Atlantic had to be built on purpose, as nobody used them), to find a competent crew for the ships (one ship wasn't enough, they needed at least another for the supplies) and buy all the supplies for several months for all those people aboard the ships.

Not an Expedition. Just a little smuggling. They weren't trying to conquer the Incas or the Aztecs at that stage. They were doing a little smuggling. Not every group of indigenous people were so fierce.

You need exact specifics about which empire could be a threat to Europe if they got their hands on enough gold to buy the latest weapons?

Yes, otherwise it's just your imagination. Also, there wasn't any thing like "the latest weapons" they didn't have already, there wasn't any special secret weapon that a country developed that had a big advantage over others.

Buying them cost a lot of money. Do you think European Knights didn't need an estate in order to pay for all the armor and weaponry? Do you think siege engines didn't cost a fortune? Do you think retaining an army didn't cost a fortune?

We can't assume they could have hooked natives on, of all things, opium, unless you have absolute proof?

Exactly. Just because you say so it doesn't make it real. Where are the signs of opium ever been used before the 18th century or so in the Americas? Also, why would anyone with cheap access to coca leaves would want to pay for opium?Because hooked.

I think you are trying a little too hard.

Well, I think you aren't even trying. Your approach appears to be based on a couple of ideas with no real support from facts, while ignoring the known facts of how things were at the time.

For example, you are ignoring that crossing the ocean in a ship with a square sail like those of the Viking ships was very difficult, as they could only sail with the wind close to its back. A ship stranded in the middle of the ocean with a contrary wind was a dead ship. Only after the Portuguese developed the caravel, adapting the lateen sails from the ones used in the Mediterranean ships, it became easier to sail with contrary winds. It was also only after the Portuguese voyages of the 15th century that the trade winds in the South and North Atlantic were discovered and mapped, making it easier for the ships to catch the right wind to return to Europe. Although they had to make a longer trip, it was faster than doing all those hundreds of miles with a contrary wind, and the longer a voyage takes the more supplies they need to take as they start it.
Another thing that was needed was a good navigation method, that was only easy to do with the adaptation of the astrolabe into a maritime version. Even then, navigation was mostly limited to getting the latitude, longitude had to be estimated, only after the 17th or 18th century, with the use of the sextant, was possible to get a relatively accurate longitude.

Maybe they used some of those Mediterranean ships the Portuguese adapted the Caravel from. It was harder to sail before the 16th century, not impossible. No one questions that Zhong He sailed all around the Indian ocean and Western Pacific and may have even reached what is now California.

You're just not a Bigfoot-caliber internet commentator. If there's not proof from someone official, you think it must not be real.

No need to be official, any verifiable evidence would do, the problem is that you haven't provided any.

Tell me, why on Earth is that a problem?

If you don't want to speculate on possibilities, you don't have to read the thread.

Why do there have to have been "Official Atlantic Pirates" in order to do a little smuggling in the Americas? Couldn't someone from some other part of the world go? Couldn't they have visited bars and heard rumors about evidence of unidentifiable floating plants and debris, or giant dust storms blowing in from the ocean? You know the Sahara gets a lot of dust from Brazil every year, do they not see it coming? Couldn't someone from North America or the Caribbean have cast away in a storm and drifted to the Azores? Couldn't rumors have spread in seaside sailors' haunts until some enterprising sort decided to check it out?

originally posted by: Solvedit
Then how did they discover the Azores?

The Azores were first discovered, most likely, by chance, as nobody went there, it was too far away for fishermen and completely out of the way for the ships sailing from Lisbon to Northern Europe or vice-versa.
The official discovery and colonisation happened only when Portugal started an concerted effort to explore the seas.

Couldn't pirates from some other part of the world sail into the Atlantic if there was evidence of two continents there? Do they need an "official Atlantic Pirate" card?

First, there wasn't any evidence of a continent (or even a large island) there.
Second, such a voyage, if successful, would take several months and they would need not only a second ship for the provisions, they would also need to stop pirating during all that time, as there weren't any merchant ships in the area.

No one thought there could be any gold in the New World until absolute proof was obtained?

I suppose some did, but it was extremely expensive to make such voyages. That's why Columbus asked first the Portuguese king then, when his idea was rejected, he tried the Spanish king. Only a kingdom was able to get the money needed to fund such expeditions.

Not an Expedition. Just a little smuggling. They weren't trying to conquer the Incas or the Aztecs at that stage. They were doing a little smuggling. Not every group of indigenous people were so fierce.

Look the definition of "expedition".
And there's no way of doing a "little crossing the Atlantic", they still needed enough food and drinking water for several months and not getting any money during that time. It would be a stupid decision to stop doing a profitable work to go spend six months or so just crossing the Atlantic in the hope of finding gold.

Buying them cost a lot of money. Do you think European Knights didn't need an estate in order to pay for all the armor and weaponry? Do you think siege engines didn't cost a fortune? Do you think retaining an army didn't cost a fortune?

I was talking about your idea of "latest weapons", not about keeping a standard army. And it's obvious that costs money, war is expensive.

Because hooked.

So, some guys they never met came with a new thing, and they bought it because they were "hooked"? How did they get "hooked" on something they didn't know?

Maybe they used some of those Mediterranean ships the Portuguese adapted the Caravel from. It was harder to sail before the 16th century, not impossible. No one questions that Zhong He sailed all around the Indian ocean and Western Pacific and may have even reached what is now California.

The Mediterranean ships are not strong enough for the Atlantic. Yes, they could have done it, as a suicidal mission.
Harder means longer voyages, longer voyages mean more supplies, more supplies mean more ships, more ships mean a bigger crew. All that it's not something that can be done on a whim, it took lots of money and man-hours of specialised people, as they couldn't get all those things on the Internet.

Tell me, why on Earth is that a problem?

If you don't want to speculate on possibilities, you don't have to read the thread.

Speculating without being based on facts is just dreaming. It may be interesting to read but useless.

Why do there have to have been "Official Atlantic Pirates" in order to do a little smuggling in the Americas? Couldn't someone from some other part of the world go? Couldn't they have visited bars and heard rumors about evidence of unidentifiable floating plants and debris, or giant dust storms blowing in from the ocean?

For anyone to ear those "rumours" someone had to spread them. Unidentifiable floating plants do not cross the Atlantic far enough to reach close to the Europe in a way that people would see them in amounts to make them identifiable as something new.

You know the Sahara gets a lot of dust from Brazil every year, do they not see it coming?

No, I don't know that, it's the first time I ear something like that, and I find it very hard to happen, for a couple of reasons:
1 - Brazil doesn't have a large desert to provide enough dust for a dust storm that lasts all the days needed to cross the Atlantic;
2 - Winds do not cross from the South hemisphere to the North or vice-versa, they stop on the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone.

Couldn't someone from North America or the Caribbean have cast away in a storm and drifted to the Azores?

The Azores were uninhabited before the 15th century.

Couldn't rumors have spread in seaside sailors' haunts until some enterprising sort decided to check it out?

I see you don't get it, it was not something a couple of sailors could do after a few drinks, it was extremely expensive, that's why only a country had enough money to do it, and most didn't even thought it was worth it.

It was almost as today a couple of friends deciding to make a space ship: the technology exists but it's out of their reach.

nypost.com...

70-year-old-man-rows-across-atlantic-ocean-for-alzheimers-research

www.bahamas.com...

"Located in waters west of the bluff of North Bimini are beautiful square blocks and perfectly straight alignments of stones referred to as The Bimini Road...

...According to some researchers, the site is completely identical in design to a known harbor and installations submerged in the Mediterranean..."

a reply to: Solvedit

Good for him!

After knowing what to do and with modern technology things are easier. You may have noticed that the man took 8 weeks to do more or less the same voyage Christopher Columbus did in six, only he was on a row boat and had to stop to rest.

originally posted by: Solvedit
...According to some researchers, the site is completely identical in design to a known harbor and installations submerged in the Mediterranean..."

According to geologists, it looks like a natural formation.