The Colonization of The New World

Sarah   Fri Nov 23, 2007 6:38 pm GMT
Hello All,
I'd like to know who are the first settlers of America, where they settled, in the north or the south, who are the Puritans and what is the difference between the southern and the New England colonies.

Cheers..
Guest   Fri Nov 23, 2007 7:14 pm GMT
The first settlers reached America 50 000 years ago. At those times the Bering strait was covered by ice so peoples from Asia managed to cross it and reached Alaska. From there they slowly spreaded across the entire Continent and arrived to South America. On the other hand, the Puritans were a subversive religious group wich gained momentum under Lord Protector's rule in England back in the XVII century. After the Monarchy was restored, they were declared personae non grata so they were hard pressed to leave England and were allowed to start a new live in accordance with their beliefs in the English colonies located in North America.
Guest   Fri Nov 23, 2007 7:32 pm GMT
The first recorded European settlements in present day United States of America were the Spanish settlements in Florida: the Pensacola colony (1559), Fort Caroline (1565), and St. Augustine (1565), two decades before the first English colony, the "lost" Roanoke Colony in present-day North Carolina.
Skippy   Fri Nov 23, 2007 7:56 pm GMT
There are now debates as to whether or not those that crossed the Bering Straight were actually the first settlers. I remember a big brouhaha from the American Indian community when archaeologists thought they had found Indo-European remains dating back to 28,000 BC.
Guest   Fri Nov 23, 2007 7:59 pm GMT
There were no Indoeuropeans 30 000 years ago. It's a nonsense.
Skippy   Fri Nov 23, 2007 8:00 pm GMT
Looked it up, it's called the "Solutrean hypothesis" (or, in my readings of it, I think it's the same thing).
Guest   Fri Nov 23, 2007 9:56 pm GMT
I'll give it a look but the Kurgan Culture, which is the first manifestation of the Indoeuropeans, dates back from 4000 BC.
Guest   Sat Nov 24, 2007 5:10 pm GMT
It depends on what you consider colinzation, if you think that indigenous peoples colonized the new world, then they might've come to America either from Alaska or from the southern cone.

Then the vykings arrive to America all the way from Iceland then Greenland and then Canada.

And finally the Spaniards who "discover the new world" arrived to the caribbean, and then they named the new world America.
Skippy   Sat Nov 24, 2007 5:33 pm GMT
I think most Puritans moved to the Netherlands and small sects moved to America from there.

ANYWAY... The first settlers in the Americas probably settled in Alaska and moved their way down... I think... And they were typically northeastern Asian, although there are traces of indigenous Japanese mixed in. The tribes of the northeastern US are the ones that have the European groups mixed in.
Guest   Sat Nov 24, 2007 6:08 pm GMT
I believe I've read that so called Japanese genes in Native American gene pool come from Ainu, people of Hokkaido and they are not Japanese. I can't find the article, though.
Lazar   Sat Nov 24, 2007 6:15 pm GMT
The discovery of the 11 500 year old Luzia skeleton in Brazil has led some people to suggest that the first settlers of the Americas may have come from Melanesia and Polynesia. But I'm not really well read in this area.
Uriel   Sat Nov 24, 2007 6:48 pm GMT
The first English settlers in the US settled in Virginia, Sarah, looking for gold and adventure. The Puritans came to Massachusetts several years later, and were a religious group looking for a fresh start. Eventually there would be 11 other British colonies, plus a few more in Canada, all established for various different reasons, including religion, commerce, and even as a dumping ground for criminals (it's no accident that the Australian penal colonies were founded close on the heels of the American Revolution, once that avenue was closed to the UK). There were also large French and Spanish settlements, Russian settlements in Alaska, and isolated scatterings of Dutch, Swedes, Germans, and other European groups. This information is probably best obtained from an encyclopedia or history book, so that you can get more in-depth information.