from Christianity. Most American history textbooks emphasize the changes in
only one group, the Plains Indians. The rapid efflorescence of this colorful
culture after the Spaniards introduced the horse to the American West supplies
an exhilarating example of syncretism—blending elements of two different
cultures to create something new.^23 The transformation in the Plains cultures,
however, was only the tip of the cultural-change iceberg. An even more
profound metamorphosis occurred as Europeans linked Native peoples to the
developing world economy. This process continues to affect formerly
independent cultures to this day. In the early 1970s, for example, Lapps in
Norway replaced their sled dogs with snowmobiles, only to find themselves
vulnerable to Arab oil embargoes.^24 In the 1990s many Native American
groups gained not only wealth but also new respect from their non-Native
neighbors when their new casinos and hotels connected them to the world
economy. This connecting seems inevitable, hence perhaps is neither to be
praised nor decried—but it should not be ignored, because it is crucial to
understanding how Europeans took over America.
In Atlantic North America, members of Indian nations possessed a variety of
sophisticated skills, from the ability to weave watertight baskets to an
understanding of how certain plants can be used to reduce pain. At first, Native
Americans traded corn, beaver, fish, sassafras, and other goods with the
French, Dutch, and English, in return for axes, blankets, cloth, beads, and
kettles. Soon, however, Europeans persuaded Natives to specialize in the fur
and slave trades. Native Americans were better hunters and trappers than
Europeans, and with the guns the Europeans sold them, they became better still.
Other Native skills began to atrophy. Why spend hours making a watertight
basket when in one-tenth the time you could trap enough beavers to trade for a
kettle? Even agriculture, which the Native Americans had shown to the
Europeans, declined, because it became easier to trade for food than to grow
it. Everyone acted in rational self-interest in joining such a system—that is,
Native Americans were not mere victims—because everyone’s standard of
living improved, at least in theory.
Some of the rapid changes in eastern Indian societies exemplify syncretism.
When the Iroquois combined European guns and Native American tactics to
smash the Hurons, they controlled their own culture and chose which elements
of European culture to incorporate, which to modify, which to ignore. Native
Americans learned how to repair guns, cast bullets, build stronger forts, and