12th century in North American history
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| Centuries: | 11th century 11th century in North American history The 11th century in North American history provides a timeline of events occurring within the North American continent from 1001 to 1100 CE in the Gregorian calendar. This time period is known as the Post-archaic period... - 12th century - 13th century 13th century in North American history The 13th century in North American history provides a timeline of events occurring within the North American continent from 1201 to 1300 CE in the Gregorian calendar. This time period is known as the Post-archaic period... |
The 12th century in North American history provides a timeline of events occurring within the North American continent from 1101 to 1200 CE in the Gregorian calendar
Gregorian calendar
The Gregorian calendar, also known as the Western calendar, or Christian calendar, is the internationally accepted civil calendar. It was introduced by Pope Gregory XIII, after whom the calendar was named, by a decree signed on 24 February 1582, a papal bull known by its opening words Inter...
. This time period (from 1000 BCE–present) is known as the Post-archaic period (Post-archaic stage). Although this timeline segment may include some European or other world events that profoundly influenced later American life, it focuses on developments within Native American
Indigenous peoples of the Americas
The indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of North and South America, their descendants and other ethnic groups who are identified with those peoples. Indigenous peoples are known in Canada as Aboriginal peoples, and in the United States as Native Americans...
communities. The archaeological records supplements indigenous recorded and oral history
Oral history
Oral history is the collection and study of historical information about individuals, families, important events, or everyday life using audiotapes, videotapes, or transcriptions of planned interviews...
.
Because of the inaccuracies inherent in radiocarbon dating and in interpreting other elements of the archaeological record, most dates in this timeline represent approximations that may vary a century or more from source to source. The assumptions implicit in archaeological dating methods may also yield a general bias in the dating in this timeline.
List of events
- 900–1150: Pueblo II EraPueblo II EraThe Pueblo II Era, AD 900 to 1150, was the second pueblo period of the Ancient Pueblo People of the Four Corners region of the American southwest. During this period people lived in dwellings made of stone and mortar, enjoyed communal activities in kivas, built towers and water conversing dams,...
in the American Southwest - 1000–1200: Early Mississippian culture in the Eastern Woodlands
- 1000–1200: Dresden CodexDresden CodexThe Dresden Codex, also known as the Codex Dresdensis, is a pre-Columbian Maya book of the eleventh or twelfth century of the Yucatecan Maya in Chichén Itzá. The Maya codex is believed to be a copy of an original text of some three or four hundred years earlier...
written and illuminated. This Yucatecan Mayan codex from Chichén ItzáChichen ItzaChichen Itza is a large pre-Columbian archaeological site built by the Maya civilization located in the northern center of the Yucatán Peninsula, in the Municipality of Tinúm, Yucatán state, present-day Mexico....
is the earliest known surviving book from the Americas - 1000–1200: Acoma PuebloAcoma PuebloAcoma Pueblo is a Native American pueblo approximately 60 miles west of Albuquerque, New Mexico in the United States. Three reservations make up Acoma Pueblo: Sky City , Acomita, and McCartys. The Acoma Pueblo tribe is a federally recognized tribal entity...
and Old Oraibi are established, and become the oldest continuously inhabited communities in the United StatesOldest buildings in the United StatesThis article attempts to list the oldest extant freestanding buildings constructed in the United States of America by Europeans , Africans, Native Americans and other immigrants and native born people... - 1142: League of the Iroquois is founded, and the Great Law of PeaceGreat Law of PeaceGayanashagowa or the Great Law of Peace of the Iroquois Six Nations is the oral constitution whereby the Iroquois Confederacy was bound together. The law was written on wampum belts, conceived by Deganwidah, known as The Great Peacemaker, and his spokesman Hiawatha...
is adopted by the Mohawk, Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, and Oneida people. WampumWampumWampum are traditional, sacred shell beads of the Eastern Woodlands tribes of the indigenous people of North America. Wampum include the white shell beads fashioned from the North Atlantic channeled whelk shell; and the white and purple beads made from the quahog, or Western North Atlantic...
invented by AyenwathaHiawathaHiawatha was a legendary Native American leader and founder of the Iroquois confederacy...
, which the Haudenosaunee used to record information. - 1150–1350: Pueblo III EraPueblo III EraThe Pueblo III Era, AD 1150 to 1350, was the third period, also called the "Great Pueblo period" when Ancient Pueblo People lived in large cliff-dwelling, multi-storied pueblo, or cliff-side talus house communities...
in the American Southwest - The Inuit Thule peopleThule peopleThe Thule or proto-Inuit were the ancestors of all modern Inuit. They developed in coastal Alaska by AD 1000 and expanded eastwards across Canada, reaching Greenland by the 13th century. In the process, they replaced people of the earlier Dorset culture that had previously inhabited the region...
largely displaced the old Dorset cultureDorset cultureThe Dorset culture was a Paleo-Eskimo culture that preceded the Inuit culture in Arctic North America. It has been defined as having four phases, with distinct technology related to the people's hunting and tool making...
in Arctic Alaska. - The most important city of the Mississippian cultureMississippian cultureThe Mississippian culture was a mound-building Native American culture that flourished in what is now the Midwestern, Eastern, and Southeastern United States from approximately 800 CE to 1500 CE, varying regionally....
of mound builders, CahokiaCahokiaCahokia Mounds State Historic Site is the area of an ancient indigenous city located in the American Bottom floodplain, between East Saint Louis and Collinsville in south-western Illinois, across the Mississippi River from St. Louis, Missouri. The site included 120 human-built earthwork mounds...
on the Mississippi RiverMississippi RiverThe Mississippi River is the largest river system in North America. Flowing entirely in the United States, this river rises in western Minnesota and meanders slowly southwards for to the Mississippi River Delta at the Gulf of Mexico. With its many tributaries, the Mississippi's watershed drains...
opposite modern Saint Louis, Missouri, reached its zenith with a population near 20,000 or perhaps 40,000. No other city in the United States would boast of such a large population until the early days of the Republic. - Natives of the American Southwest began building spectacular cliff dwellings housing hundreds of people in the later half of the century.