1120 transportation: The Americas THE AMERICAS BY MICHAEL J O’NEAL Horses, donkeys, and oxen were not introduced to the Americas until the time of European contact Meanwhile, the large native animals, such as buffalo, were poorly suited to domestication either for riding or for pulling loads Some smaller animals, such as the llamas of South America, could be trained to carry modest burdens on their backs but were too small to ride or to use as draft animals Wheeled vehicles existed only in the form of a few toys, since there were no animals to pull the real thing Thus, for thousands of years, when ancient Americans traveled by land, they went on foot, carrying whatever they needed with them Prehistoric Americans traveled along routes that were determined primarily by two factors One was the movement of wild game, which they followed in search of food Migratory animals such as mastodons, deer, elk, and bison created trails through forests and over plains, and ancient Americans followed these trails in search of food They became adept at reading the signs that nature provided, including hoofprints and the droppings the animals left behind From these signs they could tell when animals had passed and what they were eating, which provided hunters with clues about where to look for them The other factor that determined the footways of ancient Americans was the terrain Throughout the Americas people were confronted with different types of terrain, from the Rocky Mountains of the American West and the Andes Mountains of South America to the tropical forests of Central America and the woodlands of the eastern half of what is today the United States When the first Americans crossed the land bridge between Siberia and Alaska and then moved southward, their movements were channeled by a path between two glaciers They faced changes in elevation, marshes and swamps, ravines, rivers and streams, mountains, and other natural obstacles Naturally they sought to avoid these obstacles in their travels or, if that was not possible, at least to find the easiest way over them Many modern roadways, as well as hiking trails in national parks, follow the same tracks left behind by ancient Americans During prehistoric times, when people survived by hunting and gathering, they moved about in search of food, often following similar routes each year as the seasons passed The advent of agriculture required those who adopted this way of life to settle in more or less permanent communities, remaining in one place year-round or at least for much of the year But circumstances often caused even settled farmers to pack up their belongings and travel, sometimes for great distances In some cases they were motivated by the basic human need to explore In other cases changes in climate conditions forced them to seek new farmland, or perhaps a natural disaster such as a flood, earthquake, fire, or volcanic eruption forced them to move In time the roadways that people had worn into the ground over generations became used for trade and cultural contact Roads led to the diff usion of languages and ideas and to the construction of cities that served as administrative centers and hubs for the movement of goods and people Roads enabled rural people to transport their goods to the cities Empires such as those of Central America needed roads for communication and in some cases military conquest In many cases roads were needed to transport raw materials used for building cities They also led to ceremonial centers, where people gathered for religious purposes As time passed, some early Americans traveled by water Those who settled along waterways or in coastal areas used canoes and small boats, usually for hunting purposes but sometimes to transport goods for trade as well Most of these early boats were dugout canoes; that is, they were carved out of a single log Numerous examples of dugout canoes dating to ancient times have been found in the southeast of what is now the United States, with its long coastline and numerous rivers and lakes Archaeologists have discovered 400 such canoes, and although some date from the later medieval period, others are thousands of years old In Mesoamerica water became important for the transportation of goods late in the ancient period, and the peoples of the Caribbean islands relied on seacraft to travel from island to island trading goods By about 300 c.e the Moche of Peru in South America were using canoes to hunt mammals at sea This growing reliance on waterways for transportation, however, was a late development in the ancient period Transportation by foot remained the norm for many millennia See also agriculture; art; economy; festivals; inventions; metallurgy; migration and population movements; military; religion and cosmology; roads and bridges; seafaring and navigation; ships and shipbuilding; slaves and slavery; trade and exchange FURTHER READING Lionel Casson, Travel in the Ancient World (Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994) Jac J Janssen, Donkeys at Deir el-Medina (Leiden, Netherlands: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten, 2005) M A Littauer and J H Crouwel, Wheeled Vehicles and Ridden Animals in the Ancient Near East (Leiden, Netherlands: E J Brill, 1979) Robert Partridge, Transport in Ancient Egypt (London: Rubicon Press, 1996) Stuart Piggott, The Earliest Wheeled Transport (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1983) Stuart Piggott, Wagon, Chariot and Carriage (London: Thames and Hudson, 1992) D T Potts, “Camel Hybridization and the Role of Camelus bactrianus in the Ancient Near East,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 47, no (2004): 143–165 Steve Vinson, “Transportation.” In The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt, ed Donald B Redford, vol (Cairo: American University Press, 2001): 450–453