Okay so in North America, several native American tribes (for instance the Apaches) acquired horses and became extremely good horsemen. The benefits of cavalry on the great plains are somewhat obvious, but what if the Aztecs somehow managed to fend off the Spaniards? Would they have any real incentive to adopt horses? Mesoamerica was far more densely populated than North America, so I suspect that using horses as beasts of burden wouldn't be very attractive due to cheaper and easier-to-source human labour. The climate also seems sub-par for horses. So would there be any use for them at all to the Aztecs? If so, how would their culture be impacted?
Implications of Aztec adoption of horsemanship and other European technologies
- Thread starter Hrvatskiwi
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Yeah, of course, this happened anyway. Whilst the disease epidemic obviously weakened the Aztecs a lot, that doesn't make the Spanish conquest (at least the initial one) a foregone conclusion
They'd need a large breeding population of the horses. The Apache and other Plains Indians got theirs from when the Pueblo Revolt helped turn loose a ton of horses, supplemented by constant raiding of Spanish settlements in that area once the Spanish returned. How are the Aztecs going to get a solid breeding stock of horses?
The Aztecs live in a highland region with lots of forests, and not a place as suited for horses as the southern Great Plains. Not to mention, it took decades for the horse to be adapted by the Plains Indians in a place which was VERY suited for it, so I wonder how fast the Aztecs would begin to use horses?
The Aztecs live in a highland region with lots of forests, and not a place as suited for horses as the southern Great Plains. Not to mention, it took decades for the horse to be adapted by the Plains Indians in a place which was VERY suited for it, so I wonder how fast the Aztecs would begin to use horses?
Yeah, that pretty much restated my question. There's always the possibility, however remote, that other European powers could trade horses to the Aztecs, or any number of other possibilities. I'm skeptical about the prospects of the Aztecs using horses much, but I figured I'd ask.
It's really "what do they need horses for?", enough to import significant amounts of them. Maybe they'd have their own native cavalry force after a while, but it would be small, and no doubt every other state in that part of Mesoamerica would have them too.
There's also the fact the Aztecs might be critically weakened by the smallpox and collapse, and a new empire rise and take their place. If a breeding population of horses is established in Mexico, it will filter northwards, where horses are more useful, so the Apache will probably get a hold of them anyway at some point, and probably start raiding tribes all over the North of Mexico to get more horses as well as slaves. This could cause quite a bit of instability and a sort of "migration era" for Mesoamerica.
RodentRevolution
Banned
To elaborate but there is strong evidence that domesticated animals are the main reservoir of diseases that kill humans, think chickens and influenza for example. A bigger supply of disease incubators means more outbreaks of nastiness among the Aztec population.
Most modern zoonotic diseases arise from wild sources, as did many past major killers, from smallpox to the plague to malaria.
the Apache weren't really that good with horses being mostly mountain tribes if you want good horsemen look at the Comanche, Kiowa, Cheyenne, Lakota (Sioux) in other words the true plains tribes, the Comanche were considered the best light cavalry of the Indian tribes during the US/Indian wars
Well, there's always the ISOT story "The Other Time" by Dean Ing and Mack Reynolds. A 20th century anthropologist(?) gets dumped back in time, and convinces the Aztecs to do just that.
Seriously, Cortes' expedition was a hairs-breadth away from failure a couple of times, and if the Aztecs had rounded up the survivors and the horses, and made good use of them, they could have held off the Spanish without a lot of trouble. IMO.
The biggest problem is the mindset shift - co-opting/hiring defeated soldiers instead of e.g. sacrificing them.
Seriously, Cortes' expedition was a hairs-breadth away from failure a couple of times, and if the Aztecs had rounded up the survivors and the horses, and made good use of them, they could have held off the Spanish without a lot of trouble. IMO.
The biggest problem is the mindset shift - co-opting/hiring defeated soldiers instead of e.g. sacrificing them.
RodentRevolution
Banned
The problem for the Aztecs however was not emergent infections but rather infections long established among the Eurasian humans and their domesticated livestock. Hence my specific use of the word reservoir. In many cases it is humans that will have infected the livestock which then reinfect humans or in the case of human population with no extant immunity unleash the disease bomb.
Smallpox and measles have no nonhuman reservoirs. Cocoliztli is another thing altogether, and the bubonic plague has principally rodent reservoirs.
Those four were all major killers in 16th-century Mexico. Influenza was also bad, but that's only one out of five.
The problem with the Aztecs surviving, IMO, is the ability for outside forces to exploit internal divisions. The Spanish were like Iran during the Peloponnesian Wars, except the Spanish had disease and some modern weapons/horses on their side.
The Inca would have probably held out if luck hadn't fucked them in the ass (Wayna Capac dying, Waskar and Atahualpa fighting a civil war, then Surprise Spanish Sodomy)
The Inca would have probably held out if luck hadn't fucked them in the ass (Wayna Capac dying, Waskar and Atahualpa fighting a civil war, then Surprise Spanish Sodomy)
Yep. I'd say in a POD like this, their rise is by no means given, or even their existence as a separate people from the Shoshone. Same goes with the Sioux (originally fur-traders), Cheyenne (same, also migrated from very far away).
Likely you'd have a mostly different set of Plains tribes, especially in the south, possibly immigrated from Mexico, possibly an Apache group, possibly someone else.