West America (Sideways Earth)

West America is the name given to the western continent that dominates the southern hemisphere south of the Eurasian continent. First settled by primitive Asian seaman in the fifteenth century BC, the tribes that became known as "Australians" thrived for over two thousand years before the Europeans sailed south across the Mediterranean Sea to first Greenland in 1000 AD, and then the mainland ("Newfoundland") nearly five hundred years later. The continent consists of a vast temporate forest and plain bordered to the south by a tundra leading up to the Antarctic circle. The tundra is bracketed by two mountain ranges - the Rockies in the west and the lower Appalachian range in the east. In modern times the once great aborigine populations have built a nation that rivals the conquerers who banished them there. Near the south geographic pole, a large isthmus leads to what has been named East America since the days of its exploration by Spanish and Portugese explorers in the fifteenth century.

To the north is the Mediterranean Sea, with the island of Greenland between the Hudson Bay and Norway in the northern hemisphere. The island of Greenland contains the provinces of the kingdom of Canada, a land inhabited mostly by native Vikings and British settlers from the years following the American war for independence. "America" (officially the United States of America) is the name of the nation surrounding the Hudson Bay, from Alaska to Nova Scotia. To the south is the land of Australia, with a hardy population of former African slaves and American aborigines.

Discovery
About the time the tribes of Israel were entering their "promised land" (1400 BC) wandering tribes from southern Asia had struck out in boats hollowed out of tropical trees to find lands of their own. These Asian explorers found a land much like the one they had left. The way was not long, and no one knows exactly what caused the venture, but once the first men made the journey, others followed. Game was plentiful, fruit grew on trees and life was easy. As some would periodically return to Asia, the migration to the new world became steady. Within a century the first "Americans" had reached the shores across from the great island to the north.

Paradise Regained?
The tribes of subtropical America were varied, from the tribes along the north shore to those of the southwestern mountains near the anarctic circle. They would range from fishermen to trappers, from lavishly clothed to practically naked. But for the most part, they lived in peace. Human nature divided them, of course, as it had in Asia and earlier in western Europe. The great coastal plain on the southern shore of the Mediterranean Sea, though, had no great mountain ranges. Few tribes ventured south to the tundra between the oceans. Civilizations rose around the traditions of the ancestors, with very little advancement as those to the north might measure it. However, tensions arose among a subtribe living on the north shore of what would one day be the heart of European America - the Hudson Bay. Some wanted to change the way of the fathers, but they were a minority. So they lost the right to live among their brothers, being exiled to the island known only as the "Great Green Land." This was around 800 BC.

"Green Land" had only been seen from fishing vessels and the mytery of it had left it unexplored. Some had even thought it to be the southern tip of the ancient homeland of all mankind. But the wiser among them had studied the stars and realized that the earth was larger than that. The exiles, rather than suffering, had thrived in what for all practical purposes was paradise. The wisdom of generations of wanderings came together as the Southern Hemisphere's first civilization - the Olmec - took shape. They would flourish for over a thousand years, being overan by an invasion of a less advanced civilization known as the Mayans that had developed on the mainland around the turn of the fifth century AD.

The Mayan civilization, building on - or perhaps just borrowing - what the Olmec had done, moved onto the island and flourished for about six hundred years, falling to the invasion of the Vikings around 1000 AD. Having found what seemed to be the fabled "Paradise," the Vikings would begin colonizing Greenland, even restoring many of the Mayan structures to use as their own. By the thirteenth century the colonists had pettitioned the king of Denmark for Independance only to be refused due to the taxes that were gained in trade with the homeland. It would not be until 1405, eight years after Denmark had joined in the Kalmar Union (one king over Denmark, Norway and Sweden), that a successful rebellion was waged. When the massive fleets from the KU came ashore, they found that the Greenlanders retained the verosity of their forefathers. In 1409, Greenland won it's freedom.

more to come ...