Conquerors and conquered in history...

[Externet]

Good day.  Please move to another section as deserved.

Conquerors, migrants, as in the 'discovery' and settlement of Australia, America, Oceania, Africa as by europeans half a milennia ago was reported as finding savages, uncivilized tribes, with poor justice practices, perhaps ignorants surrounded by gods, myths...

Is there any recorded opinion as what did the conquered tribes and civilizations thought of their conquerors and their guns, riding horses, methods of building dwellings, transportation using wheels, tools, clothing, writing, inventions... ?  What did those tribes think of their conquerors ? 

Those currently isolated amazonian and other tribes, what do they think of the civilized ? 

[dimreepr]

36 minutes ago, Externet said:

Good day.  Please move to another section as deserved.

Conquerors, migrants, as in the 'discovery' and settlement of Australia, America, Oceania, Africa as by europeans half a milennia ago was reported as finding savages, uncivilized tribes, with poor justice practices, perhaps ignorants surrounded by gods, myths...

Is there any recorded opinion as what did the conquered tribes and civilizations thought of their conquerors and their guns, riding horses, methods of building dwellings, transportation using wheels, tools, clothing, writing, inventions... ?  What did those tribes think of their conquerors ? 

Those currently isolated amazonian and other tribes, what do they think of the civilized ? 

This brings to mind:

 

No one wants to be conquered, however benevolent their intention's; people just want to enjoy their own culture not be forced into another's.

They can be pursuaded, but conquerors' tend to prefer force.

[beecee]

On 8/12/2021 at 10:45 PM, Externet said:

Good day.  Please move to another section as deserved.

Conquerors, migrants, as in the 'discovery' and settlement of Australia, America, Oceania, Africa as by europeans half a milennia ago was reported as finding savages, uncivilized tribes, with poor justice practices, perhaps ignorants surrounded by gods, myths...

Is there any recorded opinion as what did the conquered tribes and civilizations thought of their conquerors and their guns, riding horses, methods of building dwellings, transportation using wheels, tools, clothing, writing, inventions... ?  What did those tribes think of their conquerors ? 

Those currently isolated amazonian and other tribes, what do they think of the civilized ? 

Perhaps explorers [with good intentions] that saw the inhabitants of the lands they explored as savage and ignorant, and "deserved" of conquest via change to modern European society?

Australia's ingress of European migrants, albeit mainly convicts, sadly saw the virtual extinction of indigenous society, most notably in Tasmania. Even as late as the 1950's and 60's children born to indigenous women, with European Fathers, were taken away from their tribes [supposedly for their own good] and put in religious institutions and foster homes. These were/are know as the "Stolen Generation" and is a reason for great uneasiness between indigenous settlements and white Australia.  Finally when the Labor party won elections in 2007 Kevin Rudd became Prime Minister, and offered a long sort after apology in Parliment to indigenous Australia and the Stolen generation and other wrongs that were done.

Later exploration and European settlement of the South Pacific Islands, saw a different approach with religious missionaries trying to convert the locals. A missionary in the late 1800's on the main Fijian Island of Viti Levu, was making good progress with converting the Fijians from a remote village in the highlands, when being  ignorant of local customs [one being it is tabu to  touch a chief on the top of his head] He was subsequently eaten and his remains [the soles of his shoes] can be found in a Museum in Suva. Also on the North side of Viti Levu near Rakiraki is a monument to a Fijian chief called Ratu Udre Udre and a world record attributed to him. There are 999 special stones that decorate his monument, being a stone for every person he had eaten.That  is apparently a record.  Fijians today, while being highly religious, are quite open about their cannibilisitc past.  

Edited August 13, 2021 by beecee

[Peterkin]

On 8/12/2021 at 8:45 AM, Externet said:

Is there any recorded opinion as what did the conquered tribes and civilizations thought of their conquerors and their guns, riding horses, methods of building dwellings, transportation using wheels, tools, clothing, writing, inventions... ?  What did those tribes think of their conquerors ? 

I'm not aware of any existing records. Of course, the oh-so-much-more-civilized Europeans took care to destroy as much knowledge and as much of the literatri of other cultures as possible, just as the Germans and Russians were to kill off the intelligencia  of Poland and Estonia. Whatever records the conquered peoples might have made would have disappeared long before an impartial historian got hold of them. It's not by accident that history is written by the victors.

While there must be diaries and letters from China, India and the Middle East from various periods of conquest, there certainly would be no trace of what the North American and Australian natives thought, since they didn't keep written records. In South America and Africa, the occupying Europeans had plenty of time to seize and destroy any subversive documents.

Edited August 14, 2021 by Peterkin

[beecee]

2 hours ago, beecee said:

Perhaps explorers [with good intentions] that saw the inhabitants of the lands they explored as savage and ignorant, and "deserved" of conquest via change to modern European society?

Australia's ingress of European migrants, albeit mainly convicts, sadly saw the virtual extinction of indigenous society, most notably in Tasmania. Even as late as the 1950's and 60's children born to indigenous women, with European Fathers, were taken away from their tribes [supposedly for their own good] and put in religious institutions and foster homes. These were/are know as the "Stolen Generation" and is a reason for great uneasiness between indigenous settlements and white Australia.  Finally when the Labor party won elections in 2007 Kevin Rudd became Prime Minister, and offered a long sort after apology in Parliment to indigenous Australia and the Stolen generation and other wrongs that were done.

An error on my part, actually in the highlighted part of the above...I had something else in mind. The stolen generation, refers to any indigenous child that was forceably removed from his family and tribe, to foster homes and institutions for supposedly better lifestyles and assimilation.

A movie fairly accurately portraying this policy was "Rabbit Proof Fence" about three such little girls who escaped from an institution and trudged 2400kms, following a fence line installed to keep rabbits out of planations etc, back to their home.

Edited August 14, 2021 by beecee

[MigL]

3 hours ago, Peterkin said:

Of course, the oh-so-much-more-civilized Europeans took care to destroy as much knowledge and as much of the literatri of other cultures as possible ... It's not by accident that history is written by the victors.

That is often stated by 'apologists', but is not always true.
The Roman Empire was sacked. and conquered, by many Northern and East European tribes for several hundred years, yet it was the Roman culture, law, and way of life that assimilated the 'barbarians; not the other way around.
The 'barbarians' in effect, became Romans; Roman citizens did not become Goths, Burgundians, Lombards, Francs, or even Huns.

 

 

[Peterkin]

47 minutes ago, MigL said:

The Roman Empire was sacked. and conquered, by many Northern and East European tribes

What was the Roman reaction to their occupations? How do the Roman records of those invasions compare with those of the Visigoths, Germans and Huns?

[MigL]

I was born in a little town called San Angelo dei Lombardi, with nearby ( at higher elevation ) Guardia dei Lombardi. 
Bot were established by the Lombards, before the turn of the millenium, close to their Duchy in Benevento.

And I get my 'history' of the Roman Empire from my books by E Gibbon

The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Wikipedia

Edited August 15, 2021 by MigL

[Peterkin]

Thanks, I'm familiar with Gibbon. Is this on topic?

[Prometheus]

To reinforce MigL's point that history isn't always written by the victors we can look to the Arthurian myth which demonises the victorious Anglo-Saxons (and later used by the Normans to frame themselves as liberators of the native population), and the Three Kingdoms period of China in which the Han empire was overturned by the Jin dynasty, yet it's the former who come out smelling like roses. And of course, the Romans conquering Greece - but i'm not aware of any Epics written by the conquered peoples in that instance.

I once heard that the US government is in some part influenced by Iroquois governance - is there any truth to that?