Hist 108 - 1st Mini Exam

Question 1

Why was the Columbian Exchange important?

Answer 1

It was important for Europe + Americas because it helped initiate contact with the new world.

Question 2

When, How and Why did Europeans engage in Maritime expansion?/ What were the main results of their exploration?

Answer 2

When: Mid 1400’s to mid 1500’s (First contact made by C.C -1492)
How: the innovation of traveling tools such as the caravel, gunpowder, weapons, compass + astrolabe, map
Why: To accumulate wealth and gain power over their rivals

Question 3

What was the Columbian Exchange?

Answer 3

Def: A massive transfer of animals, and diseases across the Atlantic.
-Crops like potatoes fed European farmers
-European livestock decimated American Ecologies
-Rats transmitted diseases

Question 4

Who was Vasco Da Gama?

Answer 4

1460-1524; First to reach India by circumventing Africa

Question 5

What was the Treaty of Tordesillas?

Answer 5

the marking of the splitting between the Portuguese and the spaniards

Question 6

Who was Christopher Columbus?

Answer 6

Explorer for the Portuguese; touched the Americas in 1492; spread christian faith and wanted wealth

Question 7

What was the Encomienda System?

Answer 7

1503 - A system set up by the Spanish government to assuage the abuse going on in the colonies. The Spanish would be the heads who exchanged their protection for the labor and goods of the indigenous.

Importance: highlights the motive of profit + christian conversion behind Spanish colonization

Purpose: control violent + exploitative behavior of Spanish in America

Reform attempt 1540’s; failed

Question 8

Who was Hernan Cortes?

Answer 8

Spanish/ Portuguese explorer who won over Mexico

Question 9

Who were the Mapuche?

Answer 9

People in southern Chile who managed to ward off the Europeans; Found success because of militant culture, location, and adoption of European military tech + food, horse + weapons

Question 10

What were the results of the European Maritime Expansion?

Answer 10

1. columbian exchange
2. creation of Atlantic World
3. Colonialism
4. Massive Death in America due to Disease
5. Beginning of Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
6. Wealth for Spanish + Portuguese colonizers
7. Global Population growth: 1400’s - 360 mil; 1600

Question 11

What are some beliefs that can be derived the European expansion?

Answer 11

1. natural world is a source of wealth. Explorers sold idea: more mastery of land/acquisition - more wealth
2. Human equality: Expansion brought contact between new people + Euro’s : European superiority/ difference

Question 12

What did the Europeans believe about the indigenous population in the America’s?

Answer 12

They were a source of labor + inferior to them

Question 13

What were some of the motives for European exploration?

Answer 13

Gain power, wealth, spread christianity, gain access to the source: spices, gold, slaves

Question 14

Why did Portugal want to dominate trade?

Answer 14

there was a dwindling amount of goods they could offer, and there was alot of pull from its opponents to explore abroad

Question 15

What was the middle passage?

Answer 15

The markets for the slave emerged in the 1500’s; The voyage to the Indies that trafficked slaves

Question 16

What were the genies?

Answer 16

prominent belief of western African religions that certain objects, lands, natural locations, are sacred

Humans should respect these spirits

These beliefs got mixed up with Christian + islamic practices to create Africanized practices in the Atlantic world.

Question 17

What is the importance of Angola?

Answer 17

It was a Portuguese colony that gave them an access point for slaves to take back to the new world.

Question 18

Where is Benin?

Answer 18

it is a kingdom in South Africa that gives us an example of what you’d see prior to European involvement

Question 19

What is Songhai?

Answer 19

A city in Africa that was an interior empire/ the last empire on the interior , that was raided in 1591. Once again, tells us about the situation before explorers came in.

Question 20

Nzinga Mbemba

Answer 20

A king of the Congo that ruled by the name Alfonso I. he borrowed things from the Europeans that helped strengthen his empire.

His conversion to Christianity destabilizes his empire.

Allows the Portuguese to come in and out of the his territory.

The Portuguese overtake.

Question 21

Who were the Pygmies?

Answer 21

An indigenous group that adapted to the threat of the encroaching European powers; as they moved farther inland, their resiliency with diseases as well as ability to make the most of the dense forest allowed them to survive and continue as an indigenous group

Question 22

What were the main driving forces?

Answer 22

1. European desire for profit and need for labor
2. African desire for items supplied by Europeans, good relations with a powerful ally, access to European shipping to export their products
3. External conflict in Africa
4. Portuguese colony in Angola
5. interior climate

Question 23

Effects of the expansion on West African peoples + cultures

Answer 23

1. Redirected trade to coast and disrupted traditional trade routes
2. increased conflict
3. African kingdoms (on the coast in particular) could be strengthened
4. subject to new racist beliefs
5. Christianity spread to new areas

Question 24

What was the #1 item traded for slaves?

Answer 24

Cloth (cotton) from India

Question 25

Who was Olaudah Equiano?

Answer 25

A proponent for the abolition of slavery, who was himself, sold into the slave trade. Writes his autobiography in English.

Question 26

When are racist ideas most intense?

Answer 26

In the 1780's

Question 27

Who was the Dutch West India company?

Answer 27

A private company with support from the Dutch government that was mostly active in the Atlantic world - 1621. Main ones doing the trading from 1600's to 1700's. Wanted the slave trade to continue.

Question 28

What was the Middle Passage?

Answer 28

The crossing of the slaves from the east to the west during the 1500's - 1850's. It was important because it showed the horrible things that racist ideas can achieve.

Question 29

Who was Queen Njinga?

Answer 29

Living from 1583-1663 She actively and successfully rejected European control, engaged in slavery, managed the situation and kept control of those she traded with. Njinga was an important because she was a women that was powerful and able to thrive in a Man-Dominated world.

Question 30

What was the Atlantic Slave Trade?/ What were its motivators?

Answer 30

Lasting from 1441-1880's Europeans + Africans were an important part of the process who they traded cloth for. Motivators: sugar was needed Columbus's arrival in 1492 started Globalization the main focus was the product

Question 31

How did the Atlantic slave trade work?

Answer 31

Europeans traded captives at locations on African coast Africans enslaved other Africans through warfare and through intentional trading Slaves were then transported across the Atlantic.

Question 32

How was the slave trade facilitated?

Answer 32

-European demand for labor on the New world sugar drove trade for slaves -Increased demand led to increased competition for slaves -At first state-subsidized companies were made to monopolize trade, but then they broke off into smaller companies (after 1725)

Question 33

What two things led to horrible conditions on slave ships?

Answer 33

The drive to maximize profit coupled with racist ideas that dehumanized those captured, led to horrible conditions aboard slave ships.

Question 34

What factors supported the thriving Indian Ocean trade in the period 1450 - 1750?

Answer 34

1. Monsoon winds 2. Large populations in India, china, and southwest Asia provided a market 3. Consumer demand for luxury products such as spices, cotton fabric, silk, gold, ivory, porcelain, and exotic woods 4. desire to travel to muslim, hindu, and bhuddist pilgrimage sites 5. ship technology (able to carry more cargo and move more swiftly) 6. Empires such as vijayanagara , mútala, and Mughal helped provide products from interior to the coast and trading port cities such as Kilwa provided base for the trade to happen 7. Gold from Africa and later silver from the Americas provided material for coins that supported trading.

Question 35

How did Europeans insert themselves into the Indian Ocean trading network?

Answer 35

1. 1500's - Portuguese led the way (motivated by desire to monopolize spice trade) 2. They used violence (+ship innovations)(- not as advantages on land tho) 3. Established coastal forts in strategic locations 4. They paid for items with silver from America's + Gold from Africa

Question 36

Who was Nur Jahan?

Answer 36

Ruling in the 1600's or around 1620 - she was a Persian-iranian woman who took over her husband's kingdom after he experienced a mental + physical decline. 1. coins struck in her name 2. developed the economy 3. arranged for niece to be wife of next emperor Importance: depicting a woman in South Asia holding political power (she was the exception to a male dominated society) Last woman to hold power up until 1970's

Question 37

Kilwa

Answer 37

A coastal port in EAST AFRICA; others of its like (it included) were vital parts of a much larger trading network in the Indian Ocean; part of a hybrid culture on the East African coast that blended Asian + African elements.

Question 38

Mutapa

Answer 38

Importance: part of Indian Ocean trading network; CONNECTING AFRICAN INTERIOR TO THE COAST; SHOWS POWERFUL KINGDOM EXISTED IN SOUTH AFRICA

Question 39

Vijayanagara

Answer 39

like mutapa (except on the Indian coast); connecting Indian interior to coastal trade; shows powerful asian kingdoms existed w/in the interior during this period.

Question 40

Akbar

Answer 40

Established administration + cultural basis for the Mughal empire (power military + allowing hindu princes into positions of power); cultural effect: Islamic + hindu influences

Question 41

Q: How did Europeans insert themselves into the Indian Ocean trading network? Pt. 2

Answer 41

Trading ports: Mombasa (1505) Mozambique (1507) Hormuz (1515) Goa (1510) Melaka (1511)

Question 42

Q: How did Europeans insert themselves into the Indian Ocean trading network? Pt. 3

Answer 42

The dutch, English, French forced out the Portuguese from the Indian Ocean trade and competed with each other for control

Question 43

Dutch East India Company

Answer 43

founded in 1602 (early 1600's). Declines in 1700's under increased completion from French +English trading companies. Importance: represent an early phase of European Imperialism that achieved direct control of the land and people in the interiors of Africa + Asia.