by @Chris
Five centuries of North America in one animation: from a continent held wall to wall by Native nations, through the Spanish, French, English, Dutch, Swedish and Russian footholds, to the United States, Canada and Mexico of today. The colours show who really held the ground: a Native nation until its land was settled, conquered or signed away by treaty; a colonial power only around its towns, forts and missions and on land it had taken. The ribbons are the borders the powers claimed on paper: New Spain, New France and Louisiana, New Netherland, New Sweden, the British colonies and Rupert's Land, Russian America, and the United States from 1776. Watch the Dutch on the Hudson (1624–1664, and once more in 1673–74), the fall of Huronia, the Pueblo Revolt, the Proclamation Line, the treaty cessions rolling west from 1784, the removals to Indian Territory, and the reservations that remain. How to read it. Inside the United States, Native land follows the 718 cessions that Charles Royce mapped in 1899, each with the legal date of its treaty or act; land therefore often stays Native on the map after settlers had in fact overrun it, and the Comanche plains are dated to their real loss in 1875. Before the treaties, a nation's country is the land nearest to its known villages: an approximation, since borders between nations were zones, not lines, and many smaller peoples are grouped with their neighbours. Colonial areas are circles around settlements that widen with age. Only today's reservations larger than about 700 km² are drawn. Alaska counts as Native land until the Claims Settlement Act of 1971, Hawaiʻi as a Native kingdom until 1893. Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean are context and drawn more coarsely (Canada by treaty area, Mexico by state). The first Europeans in North America were the Norse, around the year 1000 in Newfoundland; the animation starts with Columbus's landfall. Dates and places come from standard reference works; the towns and forts were re-checked against their articles, the smallest posts and the Native village points were not. Sources: C. C. Royce, Indian Land Cessions in the United States (1899; digital edition by the US Forest Service); US Census Bureau, American Indian areas (2023); Natural Earth; Wikipedia articles on the settlements, treaties and nations.
Spain (New Spain, Florida, Louisiana 1763–1800) · France (New France, Louisiana) · Dutch Republic (New Netherland) · Sweden (New Sweden) · England → Great Britain (colonies, British North America) · Russia (Russian America) · Denmark (Danish West Indies) · Mexico · Republic of Texas (1836–1845) · Canada (from 1867) · Other independent states (Haiti, Dominican Rep., Cuba, Jamaica, Bahamas, Hawaii 1893–98) · United States: territories and unorganized land · United States: states · Confederate States (1861–1865) · Haudenosaunee (Iroquois Confederacy) · Wendat (Huron), Petun, Neutral, Erie → Wyandot · Susquehannock · Cherokee · Tuscarora · Lenape (Delaware) and Munsee · Mahican (Mohican) · Wampanoag, Narragansett, Pequot, Massachusett and neighbours · Wabanaki (Abenaki, Penobscot, Passamaquoddy, Maliseet, Mi'kmaq) · Powhatan and Chesapeake Algonquians · Shawnee · Miami and Illinois Confederation · Anishinaabe (Ojibwe, Odawa, Potawatomi) · Algonquin, Nipissing, Atikamekw · Menominee · Sauk, Meskwaki (Fox), Kickapoo · Beothuk · Innu and Naskapi · Cree · Blackfoot Confederacy and Gros Ventre · Cheyenne and Arapaho · Očhéthi Šakówiŋ (Sioux: Dakota, Lakota, Nakota) · Assiniboine (Nakoda) · Crow (Apsáalooke) · Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara · Omaha, Ponca, Kansa, Oto, Missouria, Iowa · Osage · Quapaw · Ho-Chunk (Winnebago) · Catawba and the Carolina Siouans · Muscogee (Creek) Confederacy · Seminole · Choctaw · Chickasaw · Natchez, Tunica, Houma and the lower Mississippi · Timucua, Apalachee, Calusa, Guale · Caddo and Wichita · Pawnee · Karankawa, Tonkawa, Coahuiltecan · Comanche and Kiowa · Ute · Shoshone and Bannock · Paiute and Washoe · O'odham (Pima, Tohono O'odham) and Maricopa · Pueblo peoples, Hopi, Zuni · Quechan, Mohave, Hualapai, Kumeyaay (Yuman peoples) · Diné (Navajo) · Apache (Ndé) · Dene (northern Athabaskans) · Nez Perce, Yakama, Cayuse, Umatilla · Interior Salish and Kootenai (Flathead, Spokane, Colville …) · Coast Salish, Chinook, Makah · Tlingit, Haida, Tsimshian, Kwakwaka'wakw, Nuu-chah-nulth · Klamath, Modoc, Kalapuya and western Oregon peoples · California peoples (Chumash, Miwok, Yokuts, Pomo, Ohlone …) · Inuit, Iñupiat, Yup'ik · Unangan (Aleut) and Alutiiq · Mexica (Aztec) Triple Alliance · Tlaxcala · Purépecha (Tarascan) state · Maya · Mixtec and Zapotec · Huastec, Totonac, Otomi and other Mesoamerican peoples · Chichimeca peoples (Zacateco, Guachichil, Pame) · Rarámuri, Tepehuan, Yaqui, Mayo, Ópata, Cochimí · Taíno and Lucayan · Hawaiʻi: chiefdoms → Kingdom of Hawaiʻi (1795–1893) · Claimed by Spain · Claimed by Spain · Claimed by France · Claimed by France · Claimed by the Dutch Republic: New Netherland · Claimed by the Dutch Republic: New Netherland · Claimed by Sweden: New Sweden · Claimed by England / Great Britain · Claimed by England / Great Britain · Claimed by Russia · Borders of Mexico · Borders of Mexico · Borders claimed by the Republic of Texas · Borders of Canada · Borders of Canada · Borders of the United States · Borders of the United States