Historical events in Civ IV terms

also, someone mentioned cahokia, which in 1250 had a population higher than london (source is wikipedia).

Cahokia is the largest prehistoric site in North America, north of Central Mexico.

The city of Cahokia was inhabited from 1300 to 600 BP. (in other words, not even effected by Europeans).

At its peak from 900 to 800 BP, the city covered nearly six square miles and had a population of up to 20,000.

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Not very impressive. It does meet the standard to be a Civ4 "City"... any others?

http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/archaeology/sites/northamerica/cahokia.html

kochman said:

Cahokia is the largest prehistoric site in North America, north of Central Mexico.

The city of Cahokia was inhabited from 1300 to 600 BP. (in other words, not even effected by Europeans).

At its peak from 900 to 800 BP, the city covered nearly six square miles and had a population of up to 20,000.

Not very impressive. It does meet the standard to be a Civ4 "City"... any others?

http://www.mnsu.edu/emuseum/archaeology/sites/northamerica/cahokia.html

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To be fair, a population of 20,000 in those days was pretty substantial. Very few northern European cities could boast of that large a population. It would have been a substantial city in Italy at that time as well.

Maybe they left the "Avoid Growth" button on?

I seriously question the number 20,000, to begin with, in all reality... but I guess there is nothing we can do about that. At least with European cities we generally have some histories...
And N. Europe in this period (600 AD) was pretty much undeveloped in the sense of cities as well, but later grew...

This is apparently the peak of N. American Indian civilization... almost 1,000 years before anyone with written language (and the semblence of being able to be historical) would be there.

Yeah... the mayan were the only ancient americans that had a written language... that's why they are credited with the financial trait to power up science rate.

The map I referenced in the Cambridge Atlas shows well over a hundred city sites. The statement that these were "ceremonial centres" predicates the fact that large populations, well in excess of the ten thousand mark, were present in most, if not each one. Such statements were also made by early archeologists who investigated the Maya sites in the Yucatan and southern highlands. Later, such statements had to be modified--satellite data revealed that the sites surrounding the ceremonial centers were very much populated, but that the presumably wooden and thatch structures failed to leave the more lasting imprints of the stone structures. Ongoing archeological digs here in the states will likely reveal much the same thing. These sites were definitely cities, and, as I stated, the mobilization of labor necessary to build the mounds once again speaks to the demographics in question--mounds 50 feet high and 200 feet long aren't thrown together by a village of hunter gatherers, or even early farmers; they are the unmistakable construct of societies large enough to utilise a labor force in the thousands, and one complex enough to have a heirarchical social structure in which command labor is a factor. Roads exist from site to site. Trade networks existed. By any definition, these were cities, and the number was substantial.

Part of the problem, I suspect, comes from the Eurocentric idea of "city." This has been addressed elsewhere. Land use, food economies, and housing types vary widely from European standards elsewhere in the world. Locating and identifying these sites has been a task only recently undertaken by fieldworkers, who have learned that European standards of what constitutes a "city," are not universal. I'd suggest two publications; Changes in the Land, by William Cronon, and African Civilizations, by Graham Connah. Both these monographs are archeological perspectives that demonstrate the point at issue. Nowadays, archeology is more complex than simply finding stone ruins and excavating.

No one, myself included, claimed that the plains Indians built cities. Nevertheless, in very many regions of the Americas, cities existed prior to the Exchange. Finding and investigating them is the primary task of American prehistorians today.

650 ad would actually be 1300 bp, rather than 900 bp, but that's besides the point. the point is that even though the mississippians were behind europe technologically, cahokia had a higher population than some of their contemporary major cities


that being said, permanent settlements existed, though most of them were abandoned at one point or another, for one reason or another

@ Kochman:

If you are going to insist on a city being 10,000 or greater then most of the civilizations included in CIV should not be there, since they often did not pass that benchmark.

Also, where I live in Montana, we only have about a half dozen cities that are bigger than 10,000. The majority of what we call cities only have between 5000 and 10,000 people, mostly the smaller number. However, all of these provide the services and community features that most people would agree constitute a city. I suspect your viewpoint is biased by you living in a region with enormous cities.

Peregrine said:

The map I referenced in the Cambridge Atlas shows well over a hundred city sites. The statement that these were "ceremonial centres" predicates the fact that large populations, well in excess of the ten thousand mark, were present in most, if not each one.

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Agree to disagree I guess. I don't think a stable burial area means there was a city... it only means they put their dead in the same place. Nothing more.

Peregrine said:

Such statements were also made by early archeologists who investigated the Maya sites in the Yucatan and southern highlands. Later, such statements had to be modified--satellite data revealed that the sites surrounding the ceremonial centers were very much populated, but that the presumably wooden and thatch structures failed to leave the more lasting imprints of the stone structures. Ongoing archeological digs here in the states will likely reveal much the same thing. These sites were definitely cities, and, as I stated, the mobilization of labor necessary to build the mounds once again speaks to the demographics in question--mounds 50 feet high and 200 feet long aren't thrown together by a village of hunter gatherers, or even early farmers; they are the unmistakable construct of societies large enough to utilise a labor force in the thousands, and one complex enough to have a heirarchical social structure in which command labor is a factor. Roads exist from site to site. Trade networks existed. By any definition, these were cities, and the number was substantial.

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Ummm... what? The Mayans had pretty obvious cities... and once again, I am not talking about C & S American Indians. Why does this topic keep coming up?

Peregrine said:

Part of the problem, I suspect, comes from the Eurocentric idea of "city."

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Not at all, I am using Civ4 standards... if that is based on Eurocentric ideas, so what? Europeans don't consider 10,000 people living in one place a "city", last I was there... That's my point, even with that highly liberal method of defining city, N American Indians don't really meet the standards...
Still waiting for other city names?
What I am getting is a bunch of speculation and examples that don't fit into the context of what I am discussing.

Peregrine said:

No one, myself included, claimed that the plains Indians built cities.

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Was this not the point I was making? That they didn't?
I didn't start debating myself...


@ S. Bernbaum...
Ok, so, great. I asked for lists of cities from N American Indians. I got one.
At least with the others, that existed when people were in much smaller numbers, such as, well, Sumer... we still get multiple cities named.

awesome said:

650 ad would actually be 1300 bp, rather than 900 bp, but that's besides the point. the point is that even though the mississippians were behind europe technologically, cahokia had a higher population than some of their contemporary major cities

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I have no idea what this "bp" scale is, and refuse to use it.

Regarding the size of Cahokia... it is estimated that it had 20,000...
What contemporary "major" cities had lower populations? Maybe ones that had actual architecture? This doesn't mean cities that have since become major, but ones that were considered major at that time please...

@kochman: BP is years Before Present, more confusing albeit more politically correct than BC/AD or even BCE/CE which was basically the same thing with different names

Back on topic: about the recent anarchy/uprising/revolution in - Egypt? Meh, IT'S ALL OVER!!! (hopefully) - ahem, the recent anarchy/uprising/revolution in Thailand, whenever the reporters talked about clashes between the "red shirt" and the "yellow shirt" protesters I couldn't stop giggling because the happy/angry faces in the city screen were the first things that came to mind (no offense to Thai civfanatics). Apparently it was too crowded in Bangkok, so the king garrisoned more units there for HR happiness

joanne said:

@kochman: BP is years Before Present, more confusing albeit more politically correct than BC/AD or even BCE/CE which was basically the same thing with different names

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That is absolutely assinine.
BP?
So, why not just say 1,000 YEARS AGO... since it obviously isn't a static number.

I'll continue to use BC/AD.

Thanks for explaining that to me, so I can know, whenever someone uses that in conversation with me, I am dealing with a total moron.

kochman said:

That is absolutely assinine.
BP?
So, why not just say 1,000 YEARS AGO... since it obviously isn't a static number.

I'll continue to use BC/AD.

Thanks for explaining that to me, so I can know, whenever someone uses that in conversation with me, I am dealing with a total moron.

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Uh, Kochman, you used the term BP in post #62. That's why the other people are explaining it. You might have made a typo.

I don't use BP myself. It may be more politically correct, but in the future people have to do the subtraction by knowing what year you wrote. In conversation it's confusing, in a book it'd be wrong. I still use BC, AD for convenience.

Ataxerxes said:

Uh, Kochman, you used the term BP in post #62. That's why the other people are explaining it. You might have made a typo.

I don't use BP myself. It may be more politically correct, but in the future people have to do the subtraction by knowing what year you wrote. In conversation it's confusing, in a book it'd be wrong. I still use BC, AD for convenience.

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I was quoting directly from the site I listed... I will go back and add the quote coding so as not to be confusing. I did ask what it meant, because as a student of history, I have never seen it before.

In a book it has to be wrong, except for in the one year it was printed... it's ******ed.

Honestly I think we're going nowhere with this discussion which is far from the supposedly humorous topic of the thread. No disrespect kochman but IMO if you strongly believe that the Native Americans shouldn't be in Civ, then don't play them or include them in your game, instead of trying to convince other people who don't care or strongly believe otherwise to play as you want to. No one's right all the time

joanne said:

Honestly I think we're going nowhere with this discussion which is far from the supposedly humorous topic of the thread. No disrespect kochman but IMO if you strongly believe that the Native Americans shouldn't be in Civ, then don't play them or include them in your game, instead of trying to convince other people who don't care or strongly believe otherwise to play as you want to. No one's right all the time

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Ah, in comes the type to not only beat the dead horse, but to tell me we shouldn't beat the dead horse, as if it were hurting people.

Thanks, but I will continue to post as I see fit.

NEXT!

BP means before our standard of Present: AKA 1950.

We are now 60 years in the future of scientific 'present'

I read in wikipedia it can also mean "before physics," 1950.

Which is the year mansa musa discovered physics and got a free scientist

Terrance888 said:

BP means before our standard of Present: AKA 1950.

We are now 60 years in the future of scientific 'present'

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Even worse...
This is utter stupidity, and I am glad that it won't catch on...

Phew. Getting hot in here. Considering the title of the thread can we just agree that BC stands for Before Civ?