Since we're dabbling in alternate geology, lets try this on for size: What if the four main, long-standing West Indies islands had stayed closer together, maybe even close enough to form a single West Indies island during ice ages. Even putting Cuba, Haiti, Jamaica, and Puerto Rico together wouldn't form a really large island. During ice ages the resulting island would be a little more than half the size of Madagascar. Still, the resulting island might have made a surprising amount of difference if it could somehow have been substituted in for the West Indies of our time-line. 

The animals of the super West Indies: Let's assume that the islands collectively picked up about the same animals that our time-line's West Indies picked up. It's actually a fairly interesting assortment. Given the larger size of the island, and the chances for cross-development as species move back and forth during times of low sea-level, we should see some very interesting critters. The predators would probably include variants of Cuba's extinct two-foot tall non-flying owl, along with larger versions of the Solenodon--sort of an overgrown cat-sized shrew. In our time-line, Cuba and Jamaica, and possibly the rest of the islands had a wide assortment of primates--related to the South American monkeys but with a lot of peculiarities. Those monkeys would presumably still be there, but in greater diversity. Ground Sloths made it to most of the islands, and generated bizarre forms, some of them the size of a housecat and probably mainly tree-climbers. The old South American rodents made it to the West Indies in both time-lines and generated unique forms in the islands.

The animals wouldn't change much in general structure, but they would be subtly richer in diversity and a bit tougher when the first Indians arrived. That in turn would have an impact on Indian culture.

Indians settle the island(s): In our time-line, and presumably this one, Indians arrived in the West Indies several thousand years after they reached the mainland. There were at least two waves of Indians in both time-lines. The first wave was of primitive hunter-gatherers. The second was of the ancestors of the Tiano Indians that Columbus encountered--agricultural Indians who had displaced the early wave through all but a few pockets of the West Indies. A third wave, the island Caribs, had not made major inroads on the main West Indies islands, but were starting to make their presence felt. 

The human development on the West Indies diverges subtly in this time-line compared to ours. That divergence starts from the time of the first human landing on the islands. This time-line's animal predators are subtly better at what they do, and the sometimes combined islands can support somewhat larger predators. That makes the islands' animals a little more capable of dealing with human predators. The largest and most interesting animals still become extinct shortly after humans arrive but the remainder, including most of the monkeys and the smaller ground sloths, survive and enough settle into a reasonably stable predator/prey relationship with human hunters to maintain a fairly stable ecology. That in turn allows somewhat denser hunter-gatherer populations and a somewhat more complex culture. 

When the ancestors of the Tiano arrive, they face a tougher struggle to take over the islands, both because of the higher hunter-gatherer populations and because there is more communication between hunter-gatherer populations on the various islands. The Tiano face several hundred years of guerilla struggle as they move in, and some of the hunter-gatherers are able to adopt enough elements of Tiano culture to build up their populations and successfully resist further encroachment.

Impact on the outside world: I've been assuming that the different configuration of islands have caused no significant impacts outside the islands themselves so far. That may or may not be a supportable position. Certainly I can think of possible chains of events that would start from a slightly different configuration of West Indies islands and totally change human history--maybe even lead to a significantly different human species or no human species at all. I ignore those possibilities not because they don't exist, but because they are unpredictable and even if they could be predicted they quickly turn history into an unrecognizable and uninformative mishmash. 

The enhanced West Indies will be discovered by Spaniards essentially identical in culture and motives to the Spanish in our time-line.

The islands see much more conflict in this time-line than they did in ours, and the Tiano are somewhat more warlike. They are still no match for the Spanish when the Spanish arrive. Spanish settlers take over the Tiano-held part of Hispanola, as they did in our time-line. Those settlers then quickly turn that island into a nightmarish killing zone, wiping out Indians through overwork, malnutrition, introduced diseases, and too often, random acts of violence. 

Pockets of hunter-gatherers have held out in some inaccessible parts of the island throughout the Tiano period, though most of them have adopted small-scale agriculture as part of their livelihood. At first those hunter-gatherers are pretty much ignored by the Spanish. They simply aren't worth the effort of conquering. The Spanish are willing to leave them alone in exchange for their help in returning runaway Tiano who attempt to find refuge with them.

That changes in 1508. The Spanish population of the islands has rapidly increased as Tiano numbers decline. In 1508, the first smallpox epidemic hits Hispanola, coming at approximately the same time it did in our time-line. In this time-line though, the epidemic doesn't burn itself out in Hispanola. Instead it spreads to neighboring islands and hits their populations hard, then begins bouncing back and forth among the four islands. It also spreads to the mainland, to the Indians around the Spanish colony in Panama, where it begins killing Indians up and down the coast in droves, reaching as far as the Mexican highlands and the highlands of Peru. 

In Hispanola, the epidemic is extremely devastating. The Tiano are overworked, malnourished, and often crowded into areas where the Spanish can easily control them. As many as 75% of the remaining Tiano of Hispanola die of disease or disease-related thirst or starvation before the epidemic burns itself out. The Spanish initially raid the surrounding islands to replenish Indian populations in Hispanola, then conquer those islands. 

There is a major labor shortage on all of the islands by now, and the Spanish respond by raiding surrounding areas for Indian slaves, and by importing black slaves. Some of the black slaves carry malaria, and that disease finds local mosquitoes hospitable carriers. By 1515, malaria is established in at least some part of all major islands. It quickly spreads to the West Indies monkeys, and they serve as a reservoir for it, making it much harder for the disease to burn itself out locally. Large parts of all of the islands become unhealthy for Indians, Spaniards, and to a lesser extent black slaves. 

Black slaves, and malaria have also become common in the Spanish colony at Panama. By 1515, the disease has worked it's way up both coasts of Central America and is spreading into the still densely populated coastal areas of Mexico. At that point the Spanish from both Panama and the West Indies are desperately looking for new conquests. 

The Spanish population of the West Indies is much smaller than it was in our time-line because the malaria has killed quite a few settlers and kept quite a few more from settling in the islands. There are still too many to be supported by the remaining Indians though, and slaving ships keep bringing in more black slaves and kidnapped Indians from the mainland. 

The Spanish colonies in Panama and the West Indies discover the high civilizations of mainland Mexico almost simultaneously, a little earlier than in our time-line--in 1516. Malaria is already becoming epidemic in the southern part of the coast. The preliminary expeditions accelerate its spread north.

Chances are that the first major expedition from the West Indies would not be led by Cortes, and it might actually be content to trade with the locals, which is what Cortes was supposed to do. I believe that the Aztecs took over the Atlantic coast regions relatively late, and the smallpox epidemic, followed by malaria, might have destroyed their hold on the area. As a matter of fact, it might well have destroyed their hold on a lot of peripheral areas of their empire. 

So, we have a much smaller Aztec empire, both in extent and population, contending with a much smaller local Spanish population. 

Where do we go from here? Is this worth pursuing? Would you like for me to continue this scenario?

 

If you enjoyed this essay, or if you are disappointed with it, please let me know. I always read and enjoy any feedback I can get.  

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