DSK wrote:
Jeff Rigby wrote:
".... When the english and dutch sought to colonize this country there
were many unclaimed lands."


Really? How come there is no mention of that in any land title documents?

Usually land grants were given by the king, who owned the land by right
of conquest or divine providence, depending... or the large land
grantees also posted ownership claims based on grants & purchases from
Indian tribes.


Floyd Davidson wrote:
So you are saying they ignored occupancy, but you insist that it
should have been mentioned if it happened? That isn't logical.


Not at all. I'm saying that nobody claimed land based on lack of
occupancy, which is what Jeff said happened.

Okay. Except of course that has nothing to do with the
statement quoted above. He did *not* claim that anyone made
land claims based on occupancy, he just state that ".... When
the english and dutch sought to colonize this country there were
many unclaimed lands." Which is true to the extent that the
previous claimants were either all killed by disease, or
weakened to the point were forcible removal was easy.

If you know of any land titles originated by a European settler arriving
in North America, and stating "There was nobody here, so it's my land
now," I'd be interested to see it.
Ahem, try taking a look at the history of the Mayflower's
landing at Plymonth Rock. And keep in mind that that was 200
years *after* de Soto depopulated what is now the eastern US.

There were definitely Indians living around the Plymouth colony. Who do
you think fed the Pilgrims thru the first winter?

They occupied a recently "abandoned village", where there were
no survivors. None, not a one. There was exactly one living
person who had been from that village. He had been taken as a
slave to Europe, managed to escape and return.

That's not to say that they *weren't* affected by plagues brought by the
Europeans, because tehy definitely were. But the Pilgrims certainly
didn't move into uninhabited land, nor did they claim it because it was
empty of humans.

Wrong. They not only moved into an entire village, with no
inhabitants, there is a surviving copy of sermon preached on
Sunday, thanking their Christian God for removing the previous
inhabitants to make room for them, and requesting of course that
such divine assistance continue.

The only correction needed there is that of course it wasn't
pre-1700 and it wasn't the Spanish. But the Native populations
of Alaska suffered just about the exact same depopulation that
happened elsewhere. Due to the remote access it happened later,
but by about 1900 it was in full fury, and lasted well into the
life times of living people.
...(snip for brevity)...


I wonder if the plagues in the far north were made worse by climate &
diet, too.

The disease free nature of the Arctic prior to high technology
travel is in fact an attribute of climate and diet.

--
Floyd L. Davidson http://www.apaflo.com/floyd_davidson
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska)