Chapter 2 - Early Globalization Flashcards
Summarize Portuguese Exploration and Spanish Conquest.
Portuguese explorers, backed by Prince Henry the Navigator, pioneered sea routes along Africa to access Asian trade, establishing a maritime empire. Spain, inspired by Columbus’s voyages, launched conquests leading to the fall of the Aztec and Inca empires, using advanced weaponry, alliances, and the spread of European diseases.
What were the impacts of religious upheavals in the developing Atlantic World?
The Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation fueled competition among European powers. Religious motives often intertwined with colonial expansion, shaping policies in the New World, with Spain enforcing Catholicism and England promoting Protestant settlements
What challenges did Spain face in maintaining supremacy?
Rivals like England and the Netherlands challenged Spain’s dominance through piracy and colonization efforts. The defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 marked a decline in Spanish naval power, allowing others to establish footholds in the Americas.
Explain the impact of the Columbian Exchange.
The Columbian Exchange transferred crops, animals, and diseases between the Old and New Worlds, transforming diets, economies, and populations. Enslaved African laborers became central to plantation economies, with sugar and tobacco driving commerce.
What motivated Spanish and Portuguese exploration?
A desire for wealth, trade routes to Asia, religious expansion, and competition drove Iberian powers to explore and colonize.
How did the Protestant Reformation influence colonization?
Religious competition pushed Catholic Spain and Protestant England to establish colonies aligning with their faiths, often clashing over ideology and territory.
What role did the Columbian Exchange play in transforming the Atlantic World?
It created economic opportunities and cultural shifts but also spread diseases that devastated Native populations and expanded African slavery.
What were the consequences of religious upheavals of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries?
These upheavals fostered religious wars and colonization efforts, with countries like Spain enforcing Catholic dominance, while Protestant nations established religiously aligned colonies.
How did the Spanish conquest shape the Americas?
It led to the collapse of empires like the Aztec and Inca, the introduction of European governance and Christianity, and the forced labor systems that exploited indigenous and African peoples.
What role did slavery play in the economic development of the Atlantic World?
Slavery underpinned plantation economies, generating wealth for European powers through the production of lucrative cash crops like sugar and tobacco.
How did the Columbian Exchange reshape diets and economies in the Atlantic World?
New foods like potatoes and maize boosted European populations, while American agriculture incorporated Old World livestock like cattle and horses, transforming local economies.
In what ways did competition among European powers shape their colonial strategies?
Nations used piracy, trade monopolies, and alliances to undermine rivals, leading to diverse colonial practices and intensified exploitation of resources and labor.
Who were the early leaders in exploration?
The Portuguese.
What played a decisive role in the conquest of indigenous empires?
Disease.
What did the Columbian Exchange transfer?
Crops like potatoes to Europe and horses to the Americas.
