For this reason, one of the most fascinating historical relics to me are the Incan Quipu [0]. Not only because their logic appears to be 'proto-computational' (at the very least a very complex system of encoding numeric and narrative information through sequences of knots that were also used directly for calculations), but since, neither in the form of a valuable material like gold nor obviously a book to be destroyed, a large enough number survived to this day. There are few traces of the past we know exist that might contain everything from astronomical calculations to old social-institutional histories.

They're comparable in that sense to the Heculaneum manuscripts, which researchers have lately made great progress on with deep learning [1]. I hope an equivalent initiative someday starts on the Quipu.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quipu [1] https://www2.cs.uky.edu/dri/herculaneum-papyrus-scrolls/

The link doesn't mention "seeking out" those books, in fact it mentions catholic priests both burning and lamenting the burn.

Well, we could attempt to reconstruct it from history and similar landempires. We could take babylonian or russian history and transpose it into the language. Then recreate some superiority atrocity justification mythology ("gods chosen people"/"sinners-born-unpure"-must be purged.) Then we take all the tribes that sided with the spaniards, whose history they wiped out and invent some colorful horror-stories that other them. So, the spaniards of the new world getting trampeled by the old world, who brought gonorreha home,creating hyper puritan std ethics, voila.. nothing of value was lost.

Even in the US, the Indian Wars weren't finished until the 1890s. In fact, most of the big wars against the Native Americans took place after the American Civil War. One of the big faults I have with US history in the education system is that it tends to front-load the depiction of Native Americans in the Precolonial portion of history, with an echo in the Trail of Tears and forced migration in the 1830s, and largely edits them out of the history of the settling of the west, despite this process requiring a very violent dispossession of the existing inhabitants.

This is also a difference in outcomes between traditional colonialism (where indigenous people were viewed as a source of labor) and settler colonialism (where indigenous people are viewed simply as "in the way"). That's not to say that traditional colonialism is in any way acceptable, however.

The Mapuche even expanded their territorial control, in large part to their acquisition and mastery of Spanish horses.

Relatively (adjusted by area and duration) not that many people from Spain moved to the Americas between 1500 and ~1800, especially compared to the British colonies in North America.

So they couldn't murder/expel (unlike the British/American colonists) most of the native population (especially considering that North America was much less densely inhabited to begin with) if they wanted someone to work in the mines and plantation (again relatively not that many slaves were imported to the mainland colonies as well).

France was similar (except they struggled even more with getting enough people to move to the colonies).

The Commanche also held out until after the Civil War.

Where for example? I'm curious!

> In addition to that they've invented sadistic religion with human sacrifices and their culture was very aggressive, what finally put Maya civilization to an end, as everyone around happily joined European conquerors to get rid of Mayans ASAP

That was the Aztec, an entirely different culture from the Mayans. The Mayan Kingdoms lasted until 1697.

The Mayans and the Amazon cultures more generally have been shown to have created monumental walkways and structures that we are only now uncovering form the jungle growth via lidar. The idea that they were technologically backwards is far out of date.

They had the wheel, they just didn't find many practical uses for it without having either beasts of burden or nice relatively flat paved roads.

Wheels are great if you have something stronger than a human to pull it, or you only have to move it a short distance, or if you have a hard paved road. But pulling carts or wagons or wheelbarrows through rough terrain or muddy roads with just human power is absolute trash and not worth the effort, and moving things over small short distances alone isn't worth the specialized labor and cost of making decent wheel and axle systems without machine tools.

If you are still unsure, ask yourself why hikers and campers don't pull a cart or push a wheelbarrow everywhere they go instead of using a backpack even though they can have ultra light aluminum construction with pneumatic tires and ball bearing axles. All the effort you would save by using a wheelbarrow on smooth parts of your path would be undone by just a handful of random sticks or rocks you run into with it along the way.

Didn't the Spanish show up briefly, then come back in force later?

I've heard some speculate that this introduced European diseases, and unlike many Native American tribes, the Mayans lived in dense cities. Such disease would spread like wildfire.

(Certainly, some disease made it the other way too! Tuberculosis and syphilis are examples)

I've heard numbers like 95% died, and it was decades between first contact and serious conquest.

That leaves a lot of time for people to grow up with no one to teach them trades, or even how to read.

If we lost 95% of our population, so many active skills would be lost.

*cenotes

We don't really have abundance tho.... We have massive over consumption that feels like abundance. Like a gambler

This reminds me a bit of how the Islamic calendar year is 355 days and doesn't have intercalation for religious reasons (many calendars insert extra months now and then to realign with the year, but the Islamic calendar does not). This is why Ramadan always seems to be at different times of year when you hear about it.

> And the number 13 was associated with the cosmos.

Any reason number 13, of all numbers, has been so significant in different parts of the world, sometimes associated with completely opposite meanings (e.g., between Jews and Persians/Europeans)?

> And the number 13 was associated with the cosmos.

That's the explanation?