Europeans brought horses to North America in the sixteenth century. The blog, Delancey Place @gmail.com of December 15, 2015 describes this transformation with excerpts from American Colossus by H.W. Brands.
The Cheyenne Indian God spoke to the tribe through their oldest priest:
Comanche warrior Ako and his Horse
Courtesy Wikimedia Commons
“If you have horses, everything will be changed for you forever. You will have to move around a lot to find pasture for your horses. You will have to give up gardening and live by hunting and gathering, like the Comanches. And you will have to come out of your earth houses and live in tents……You will have to have fights with other tribes, who will want your pasture land or the places where you hunt. You will have to have real soldiers, who can protect the people. Think, before you decide.”
“Progress” means change, and change is uncomfortable and not necessarily a good thing for the people. But I don’t suppose we have a choice. Change will come. That was a wise Cheyenne Indian God.
We seem to be in the midst of plenty of change right now.
Meaning the Indians didn’t have it before that? Now that’s new (for me, that is) 🙂
Yes, change is always with us.