The anthropologists among us would also say yes. The alternative worldview that some peoples are civilized (thinking, organized, philosophical) and others are barbaric (violent, disorganized, brutal, militant, uncaring) is reductive and obsolete. If "civilized" is to mean anything, it refers to populations that can form the large permanent population centres we call cities.
What we call cities are vastly beyond the scale of most civilizations with writing, philosophy, etc. As recently as 1500 all it took was 5,000+ people to be considered a city in Europe.
Many Native American tribes reached that standard before Europeans first reached America. They where considered barbarians simply on religious grounds.
The etymologists among us would say, yes.
The anthropologists among us would also say yes. The alternative worldview that some peoples are civilized (thinking, organized, philosophical) and others are barbaric (violent, disorganized, brutal, militant, uncaring) is reductive and obsolete. If "civilized" is to mean anything, it refers to populations that can form the large permanent population centres we call cities.
What we call cities are vastly beyond the scale of most civilizations with writing, philosophy, etc. As recently as 1500 all it took was 5,000+ people to be considered a city in Europe.
Many Native American tribes reached that standard before Europeans first reached America. They where considered barbarians simply on religious grounds.
In this context, that's exactly what we're talking about. To say the native Americans already settled the western US is being obtuse.