Colonisation and Post-Contact Development of Atlantis and Caribia (Abrittus)

In OTL, the discovery and especially the colonialisation of the Americas by European kingdoms happened in the context of an agressive development of early proto-capitalism and rivalling absolutist monarchies which were struggling to monopolise power traditionally shared with feudal lords and corporations and defending it against their neighbours and nascent popular resistance. It resulted in an annihilation of indigenous polities and cultures, the extinction of many indigenous groups, the forced assimilation of others, the grabbing of indigenous land and the marginalisation of the natives in reservations.

In this timeline, Eurasian interest in the new continents, which are discovered already at the turn of the 8th and 9th centuries, is comparatively limited for many centuries; the establishment of contacts proceeds slower, since their focus is on trade, and the indigenous groups do not have a lot to offer at first. Indigenous groups, who are as stricken by imported diseases as they were in OTL, have centuries of time to recover from the shockwave of initial contact. While some groups openly co-operate and fuse with the limited numbers of newcomers, others prefer to isolate themselves. But even the latter`s ways of life are changing rapidly: internal warfare, state-building, imported animals, weaponry, technology and philosophy influence them with or against their will. While colonisation is successful at the coasts and on the islands, creating societies heavily influenced by Celtic, Roman, Ostrogothic, Liberian and Chinese cultures, the inner regions of both continents host indigenous civilizations which have formed their own states.

The following gives an overview over
 * 1) the phases of contact, colonisation and development
 * 2) the main clusters of indigenous or mixed groups and their civilizations