Iroquois city names, huh?

Wrong, all wrong. Most of us couldn't pronounce the correct names. To have Salamanca as the capital is kinda cruel, it's a small city in New York State that is owned by the Indians but is white people (they charge rent). It's a white man enforced reservation for jeepers sake. The site of present day Syracuse, New York is pretty much where the contact period "capital" if that's what it must be called, was. Did you all know that the Iroquois were considered a matriarchal socitey? Means the women ran the show. Mostly because the men were never home much.

So anyway on to the point. If I want to deleat the names for the Iroquis and put in the correct ones, how would I do it? Some where around here I have the books to do it right, as well as other correct Indian cities (They were never called cities, they were castles, towns sometimes, but castle is correct.) As their influence was wide spread and they do represent Native Americans in the game, other correct towns of non 6 Nations could be put in as well.

You mean how to change the city names?

If so, just use the editor and go to Civilization tab and change those name in the box

I think someone has already done so in the completed mod pack section.

And Merry Christmas :santa:

Heya Fred,

I both agree and disagree with your point of view on the city names for the iroquois.

First though, Dark Sheer is right in how to change the names of the cities. Go into the editor, (the civ3mod.bic) and go to the tab (under rules) for Civilizations, in the middleish of the screen there is a list of the names, which you can change at will.

Okay back to the fun, (important?) stuff, ). most of the standing settlements for any of the river valley peoples in what became America, we simply have no way of being sure of the names, (and translations into english).

I know the Cahokian culture (based in Cahokia, I know they're the 'mississipian's' but since that ain't their word I tend to go with Cahokia, (boy I hope I'm spelling that close, I'll blush if I'm too far off) better than I do the NE-stern tribes, in both instances though you are dealing with half remembered names passed down through a culture that went through radical (to say the least) changes.

Where I disagree with you, is about giving Sid and the boys (err and girls) heck for it. The fact they included the Native peoples of north america in the first place is a cool thing. (even if they did do the special unit more like the plains tribes) instead of just concentrating on the aztec and mayans or incas. The fact they put in the confederacy of the Iroquois as a 'viable' politcal group was pretty forward thinking of them.

With the names, if you look at it from a mid-eastern context, we call cities that are built ontop of other cities by their current names in archology despite what the ancients called themselves. The notable exception obviously is Bystantium, but com'n it is Byzantium (boy all I want for xmass is a dictionary) (Yeah I know about spell check but that's cheatin') one of the 'cradles of the modern civilized ideal.

The fact also they used the iroquois rather than the more vocal native groups based upon the nature of the game rather than the PC'ness of the modern tribes mouth-pieces also should be commended.

I half wanna do a mod using the Mound-building cultures of north america, starting with Cahokia and working southward, but the very thing you pointed out, a lack of knowledge about the city names for the peoples, has stopped me. That and I draw worse than road-kill.

Thanks for saying the thing about the cities though, the same thing caught my attention. (btw, I know you were givin' anybody heck, it was meant more as a phrase

Dark Sheer: I couldn't find a mod that changed the Iroquois names listed. But I've been using a city name mod/ leader name mod for a while. Thanks for the info. If I get ambitous I'll do it, if I can hunt down all the books


micmc_atl_ga: Didn't mean to come at Sid and company so strong. Actually I'm so used to seeing the Native American cultures screwed up, I don't think about it too much any more. Just ment it to be more of a FYI type thing. It just kind of struck me that, to my eye anyway, the other civs were done really well and the Iroquois were done more in terms of reservations of today. I too was very pleased to see them in the game, they were something else again. The more I studied the Native Americans the more I was in awe of them. That is not to say I believe in the "noble savage", because I sure as hell don't.

In reality we do have a good wealth of information for their town names. Now I'm speaking contact period. Many city names were kept "Indian". I wouldn't translate them, but would keep them in the native form. I have a bunch of sources for the North East. I did NE Archaeology for many many years. Parker on the Iroquois is a good one, Sullivans march against them during the war is another good source, a good road map (you can pick em out real easy), Morgans book (I think, been so long) and on and on.

When speaking of the mound builder culture ( and there were many), now you're talking precontact in most cases and indeed most if not all is lost, name wise. Worked on a truncated mound in West Virginia, good stuff And they paid me to do it, hehe, go figure.

Actually you don't have to look at the east for the city upon a city thing. There are very few single componant sites, that I've come across. That the strats are in good shape, like the tells you speak of, is another matter.

If you get a chance rent the movie "The Black Robe" it is by far the best movie I've ever seen on the subject. Acurate, wow, I only saw one thing in the movie I might disagree with and believe me I was lookin

Micmc I agree with you about city names. I've had Civ3 since it was released but just discovered that there was an editor and just discovered these websites a few days ago and I decided I wanted to do a Native American scenario, but it's been tough to find information about pre-columbian city names. So far I've used the internet, an encyclopedia, and my normally very good "Atlas of the North American American Indian, " and I think to make this reality I'll have alot of research to do.

(If you, or anyone else, would like to team up to create this scenario, the name I came up with is "First Nations" with the idea to conquer NA before 1492. After some research, I decided, for historical importance and georgraphical reasons, the 10 Civs to use would be: Maya, Aztec, Apache, Shoshone, Salish, Chipaweyan, Sioux, Cree, Iroquoi, and Cherokee)

I disagree, though, with your statement:

"The fact also they used the iroquois rather than the more vocal native groups "

Historical, certainly the Iroquoi merit as one of the strongest native politcal entities. However they've been far from... ummm... unvocal. The Iroquoi today issue Iroquoi passports, field a national team in the Lacrosse World Cup, and did not delcare war against Germany in World War II. If there's any Indian nation that expresses it's sovreignity in modern times, it's the Iroquoi.

Heya Conq,

I hadn't know those things about the modern Iroquois, it is a very interesting set of facts. I had been talking in the orgianal post about (primarily) the first american stifling of archology
--which I can understand their thinking considering the history of 'intellectual' grave robbing, however I think it is shooting themselves in the foot. So much has been lost in the oral histories, it may only be in the digs were some things are known (theorized) again.

As far as teaming up that would be great Can you draw? *grin* I think one of things we could do is to use american city names that are derived from native american languages, such as Hiawassee, Talahassee. While I could see this being viewed as a slap in the face it maybe the best historical source material that is available.

The alternative is using 'Great Chief's' names, Pontiac, Tecumseh, etc. Or the next alternative which would take a lot of work is to contact the reservations (or the cenus records) and use family-names, either american-ized or traditional.

I'm not sure what is PC here, and I'm not sure how much we have to worry about it, as long as we approch the project from the beginning with the respect and senstivity the first peoples of what became the americas deserve.

(btw, my wife just reminded me about good intentions, so maybe we should get as much historically correct as is possible

"J Fred Muggs"??

Since when do chimps care about the Iroquois?

Unfortunately, I'm not much of a drawer Maybe someone else who is a good drawer wants to join us.

For city names, modern city names in Indian languages would be a good idea. I'd still like to try to do some research into finding historical place names. And while I know what some Civ qualities would be some will also take some research (like for the Salish, about whom I know nothing other than they were the biggest tribe of the northwest cultural area; although I was thinking of doing the Kwakutl instead)

In regards to PC, as far as I'm concerned if it's historically correct I don't care if it's non-PC. I'm not a big fan of history revisionists, either by rightists or leftists. I respect and apprecicate native cultures, (and I'm sure anyone esle who would want to help with this scenario would also), so I don't think that would be a problem. My goal is simply to make a scenario based on pre-columbian nations depicting them as historically correct as possible (and reasonable for a game).

OK, that said, I don't plan on starting it today, I mostly plan on drinking a lot today But we'll get going on it soon, and also see if anyone else, particularily those with drawing talents, want to join in on this.

And in the future lets talk about this via PM so we don't waste eveyone else's time

Originally posted by Zouave
"J Fred Muggs"??

Since when do chimps care about the Iroquois?

Click to expand...

I've used this nic for along time. Most forums and usernet groups don't have a clue who J Fred was. Should have known I couldn't get away with it on a forum where the average is higher then 13 Maybe change it to Zippy or Cheeta or something.

I love indian culture

But I am not sure what you mean when you guys ask whether someone can draw

I can do some drawing if thats needed to get a new mod on the way

Originally posted by Dark Sheer
I love indian culture

But I am not sure what you mean when you guys ask whether someone can draw

I can do some drawing if thats needed to get a new mod on the way

Click to expand...

Yeah, that's pretty much it. I can't draw, and even if I could I know nothing about graphics files. It'd be a shame to do research and get some really great historically correct Native American Civs and then not be able to have any unique graphics to accompany them. I'll count you in, thanks!

Hey MICMC, I was trying to contact you but your settings won't allow me, so if you could send me your email address we can get started on this MOD.

If you're interested in doing modest animations, --i'd personally rather go for depth of coverage in units than in breadth of animation cells, (but that's just my opinion) on some units let me know.

I'm sure between us (Conq, Myself, and whoever else wants in who knows the dewey decimal system (but clearly not how to spell it) we can find some drawings that you can base the units that you might do on, or even find something that could be used as a base for the actual animation. (don't get your hopes up with this one, most of the native american art is so stylized it wouldn't be useful as even a skeleton

Since I think we're focusing mainly on North american cultures I'd like to start off with basic warrior types, warclubs, tomohawk & knife, light bowman, that kind of fighting unit.

One thing I'd like to see if we can do, (assuming we can get the art done (again just basic 1cell/direction at the beginning) is extropalate from the ancient world into the modern.

Um, sounds cool don't it. Don't ask me how it's goin' get done just now since what became the americas cultures were more organically based (as opposed to intensively iron based)

So we might end up with instead of the:
bowman-musket-rifle-automatic rifle-Big nasty Nuke Boom routine

We might end up with an evolution that goes

light bow-heavier bow-composite bow-multi-firing bow (think springal)-Big Nasty Organic (read germ-warfare) Boom

Those are just an intial thoughts, but taking aircraft down more the hanglider/floating wing route, rather than the powered flight, instead of siege engines throwing big ole stones, using basic ballista.


Those are just some of the unit drawings that we'll need. What would be great would be new city drawings, new leader heads (again personaly I'd sacrifice big honkin' FLC files for 16 good native american tribal heads which while static are represtive of the named tribes.)

The building/wonder stuff is basic enough even I can do that, so anything you'd like to contribute would be happily welcomed.

As the project is fully mapped out I'm sure there will be work enough to keep everybody from getting bored before St. Pat's day. (since Conq and I are drinkin' men, we have to set our priorties

In the mod I've been toying with, I'm using two North American civs, "Iroquois" and "Anasazi". I take these both to be somewhat "generic" and simply take them to be, in order, the Mississippi mound builder civilization and the Anasazi "pueblo" civ.

I start the "Iroquois" at Cahokia (the main mound known, modern St. Louis) although I choose their first city name as "Mississippi", i.e., "Father Of Waters". Second city is Cahokia. Then I use tribal names - Lakota; Choctaw; etc., as both keeping in the spirit and assuming that any continent-spanning civ will incorporate these peoples.

Similarly, "Pueblo", although descriptive of architecture, is what I use for the first Anasazi city (what can I say - it literally sounds homey); Hohokam (after the first culture to begin irrigation in the area) second. Then tribes again -- Apache, Arapaho, etc. As far as I know, most, if not all, the original names are lost, and there must have been many as, ca. 1000 CE, Chaco Canyon was the center of a network of 100+ villages linked by 400 km of roads.

Interestingly, remains of ritual ball courts at the sites known by their modern names of Snaketown and Casa Verde indicate cultural exchange with MesoAmerica.

I use these two cultures in my scenario as they were roughly contemporaneous (Anasazi/Hohokam 900-1300 CE; Mound Builder 1050-1450 CE) and both evidently declined due to climactic changes, and a little "what-if" with climate hardly seems out of order in Civ-land.

-Oz

Heya Ozy, (cool name btw)

Great idea for your mod! You're right the Anazasi and Mississipians were (probably, as close as we can know with carbon dating and tree ring dating) contemp's of each other. Err at least ending about the same time,

Conq and I are doing an involved thing, hopefully with a reworking of the natures of improvements, (to reflect semi-nomadic lifestyles of some cultures) (not a lot of library builders in the americas, a couple, but not many) with hopefully orgignal grapic units (insert deep breath here, followed by a simpson's laugh track-effect) You're welcome to tag up with us, if you're interested, both the Mississipians and the Anazasi are on our Short List of the civ's in the mod, anything you can contribute from graphic stealing/designing to historical documatation would be great.

You're right I think a little toying with the what-if's of history blends nicely into the Civscape, it's a nice time to be civvin', don't ya think?

A dividing line you might want to consider is something along these lines. There were basicly 2 groups in late Native North American history, those that farmed and those that didn't. Plains, extreme Northern, and some Southern stayed with the hunter/gather tradition. This doesn't mean their culture was less interesting, just different. Those that farmed for the mainstay could do some things the others couldn't, as easily.

Also the bow and arrow was a very late thing, about 1000AD. Before this they counted on a spear thrower for better hunting. Now a spear of this type isn't what you might think. It is better described as a long arrow or dart.

micmc,

Thanks for the offer. I'm fairly preoccupied with my world-wide 1000 CE mod right now. If I come across anything of interest on native Americans I'll post.

Regards,

Oz

I will be interested when you are finished with your project. Let me know if I can help. I have a number of First Nations books (Native American/Indians to the uninitiated).