Pre-Columbian Exchange and Spanish Exploration and Influence II Flashcards
Timeline: Early Globalization - The Atlantic World, 1492-1650
1492: Christopher Columbus lands on Hispaniola. 1494: Treaty of Tordesillas divides the Americas between the Portuguese and the Spanish. 1517: Martin Luther publishes Ninety-Five Theses. 1521: Hernan Cortes conquers Tenochtitlan. 1530: John Calvin strengthens Protestantism. 1534: Henry VIII breaks with Catholic Church and establishes Church of England. 1584-1590: English efforts to colonize Roanoke fail. 1603: Samuel de Champlain founds New France. 1607: First permanent English settlement begins at Jamestown. 1624: The Dutch found New Amsterdam on Manhattan Island.
Commercial Revolution
The Commercial Revolution consisted of the creation of a European economy based on trade, which began in the 11th century and lasted until it was succeeded by the Industrial Revolution in the mid-18th century. Beginning with the Crusades, Europeans rediscovered spices, silks, and other commodities rare in Europe. This development created a new desire for trade, and trade expanded in the second half of the Middle Ages. Newly forming European states, through voyages of discovery, were looking for alternative trade routes in the 15th and 16th centuries, which allowed the European powers to build vast, new international trade networks. Nations also sought new sources of wealth and practiced mercantilism and colonialism. The Commercial Revolution is marked by an increase in general commerce and in the growth of financial services such as banking, insurance, and investing.
*Europe on the Brink of Change* (A)
One effect of the Crusades was that a larger portion of western Europe became familiar with the goods of the East. A lively trade subsequently developed along a variety of routes known collectively as the Silk Road to supply the demand for these products. Brigands and greedy middlemen made the trip along this route expensive and dangerous. By 1492, Europe—recovered from the Black Death and in search of new products and new wealth—was anxious to improve trade and communications with the rest of the world. Venice and Genoa led the way in trading with the East. The lure of profit pushed explorers to seek new trade routes to the Spice Islands and eliminate Muslim middlemen.
*Europe on the Brink of Change* (B)
Portugal, under the leadership of Prince Henry the Navigator (1394-1460), attempted to send ships around the continent of Africa. Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile hired Columbus to find a route to the East by going west. As strong supporters of the Catholic Church, they sought to bring Christianity to the East and any newly found lands, as well as hoping to find sources of wealth.
Explain reasons European explorers and conquerors sailed to the Americas.
God, gold, and glory.
*Portuguese Exploration and Spanish Conquest*
Although Portugal opened the door to exploration of the Atlantic World, Spanish explorers quickly made inroads into the Americas. Spurred by Christopher Columbus’s glowing reports of the riches to be found in the New World, throngs of Spanish conquistadors set off to find and conquer new lands. They accomplished this through a combination of military strength and strategic alliances with native peoples. Spanish rulers Ferdinand and Isabella promoted the acquisition of these new lands in order to strengthen and glorify their own empire. As Spain’s empire expanded and riches flowed in from the Americas, the Spanish experienced a golden age of art and literature.
*Spanish Exploration and Colonial Society*
In their outposts at St. Augustine and Santa Fe, the Spanish never found the fabled mountains of gold they sought. They did find many native people to convert to Catholicism, but their zeal nearly cost them the colony of Santa Fe, which they lost for twelve years after the Pueblo Revolt. In truth, the grand dreams of wealth, conversion, and a social order based on Spanish control never came to pass as Spain envisioned them.
The Columbian Exchange
The Columbian exchange, also known as the Columbian interchange, named for Christopher Columbus, was the widespread transfer of plants, animals, culture, human populations, technology, diseases, and ideas between the Americas, West Africa, and the Old World in the 15th and 16th centuries. It also relates to European colonization and trade following Christopher Columbus’s 1492 voyage. Invasive species, including communicable diseases, were a byproduct of the Exchange - 90% of some populations in the New World were wiped out by disease. The changes in agriculture significantly altered and changed global populations. The most significant immediate impact of the Columbian exchange was the cultural exchanges and the transfer of people (both free and enslaved) between continents.
*New Worlds in the Americas: Labor, Commerce, and the Columbian Exchange* (A)
In the minds of European rulers, colonies existed to create wealth for imperial powers. Guided by mercantilist ideas, European rulers and investors hoped to enrich their own nations and themselves, in order to gain the greatest share of what was believed to be a limited amount of wealth. In their own individual quest for riches and preeminence, European colonizers who traveled to the Americas blazed new and disturbing paths, such as the encomienda system of forced labor and the use of tens of thousands of Africans as slaves.
*New Worlds in the Americas: Labor, Commerce, and the Columbian Exchange* (B)
All native inhabitants of the Americas who came into contact with Europeans found their worlds turned upside down as the new arrivals introduced their religions and ideas about property and goods. Europeans gained new foods, plants, and animals in the Columbian Exchange, turning whatever they could into a commodity to be bought and sold, and Indians were introduced to diseases that nearly destroyed them. At every turn, however, Indians placed limits on European colonization and resisted the newcomers’ ways.
Describe the effect European diseases had on Native American civilizations.
Modern historians commonly accept that around 90% of all Native Americans died as a result of contact with Europeans.
New World - First Explorers - Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus (1451-1506) was the first European to discover the New World in 1492 (with the exception of the Norse ~500 years earlier), although he didn’t realize it at the time. He mistakenly thought the Bahamas, Cuba, and Hispaniola were apart of East Asia. Others had possibly been there, but it was Columbus’s expedition that set off the Age of Discovery in the Americas. He would make three further voyages to the New World. It is uncertain if he ever knew he discovered North and South America. Recent scholars have given attention to his role in the extinction of the Taíno people, his promotion of slavery, and allegations of tyranny towards Spanish colonists, which have tarnished his widely venerated immage. Columbus was actually from Genoa, which today is a part of Italy, but he was funded by and sailed under the Spanish flag.
New World - First Explorers - Amerigo Vespucci
Amerigo Vespucci (1454-1512) was also born in Italy, but he eventually became a Spanish citizen. You might notice what his biggest legacy in the new world is - his name. Vespucci first demonstrated in about 1502 that Brazil and the West Indies did not represent Asia’s eastern outskirts as initially conjectured from Columbus’ voyages, but instead constituted an entirely separate landmass hitherto unknown to people of the Old World. A very well-educated man, he figured out the Earth’s circumference at the equator within about 50 miles of accuracy. It was this information that helped him realize he was far from Asia. In Vespucci’s honor, Martin Waldseemüller named the land mass America when he published a map in his Cosmographiae Introductio in 1507.
Discuss the impact that horses and metal tools had in native societies.
Metal tools far surpassed the utility of many native tools made of bone, wood, or clay. The reintroduction of horses radically changed life for the Plains Indians especially, giving them a beast of burden and a tool for hunting and warfare.
New World - First Explorers - Conquistadors
Conquistadors were soldiers/explorers who sailed for personal profit under the banner of the Spanish crown, known for conquering Mexico and Peru in the 16th century. Conquistadors always had priests with them whose duty it was to bring Christianity to the natives they encountered. Some of the most well known are Francisco Pizarro, Vasco Nunez de Balboa, Juan Ponce de Leon, Francisco Vasquez de Coronado, and Hernando Cortes.
New World - First Explorers - Francisco Pizarro
Francisco Pizarro (1471-1541) is most known for his defeat of the Inca in 1535. Pizarro basically took down this great empire with about 150 men. Many factors led to this easy defeat: A mix of deception on Pizarro’s part, arrogance on Atahualpa’s (the Incan leader) part, and the fact that the Inca had just encountered their own civil war.
New World - First Explorers - Vasco Nunez de Balboa
Vasco Nunez de Balboa (1475-1519) came from a poor Spanish family, but he rose to be famous for being the first European to cross Panama and actually see the Pacific Ocean in 1513. When he climbed a peak alone on the expedition, he saw the great water mass and claimed it for Spain.
New World - First Explorers - Juan Ponce de Leon
Juan Ponce de Leon (1474-1521) is most famous for searching for and possibly finding the Fountain of Youth. Of course, fame and fact are not the same thing. It was published after his death that this was his reason for exploration. What we know as more dependable information is that he was the first European to step foot in Florida. So, he is the first of the age of discovery in 1513 to step on what is today U.S. soil.
Year Spanish defeated and conquered the Incan Empire.
In 1535, Francisco Pizarro basically took down the Incan Empire with about 150 men. Many factors led to this easy defeat: A mix of deception on Pizarro’s part, arrogance on Atahualpa’s (the Incan leader) part, and the fact that the Inca had just encountered their own civil war.
New World - First Explorers - Francisco Vasquez de Coronado
Francisco Vasquez de Coronado (1510-1554) is another conquistador known for looking for something thought of as a myth. He was looking for El Dorado - the seven cities of gold. El Dorado was quite possibly a deception on the part of natives. They may have been telling the Spanish about it so that they would go off to find it and leave them alone. It is also possible that it just grew out of old stories of the great cities of some of the early American civilizations. Either way, this quest for gold led Coronado to be the first European to explore the American Southwest in what is today Arizona and New Mexico.
New World - First Explorers - Hernando Cortes
In 1521, Hernando Cortes (1485-1547) defeated the Aztecs. This is what he is most known for. He is remembered for walking in and conquering a great empire, partially by being mistaken for a god. Another important accomplishment for Cortes is that he was the first Spanish conquistador to be granted a hacienda.
Year Spanish defeated and conquered the Aztec Empire.
In 1519-1521, the Spanish, under the command of Hernando Cortes, defeated and conquered the Aztec Empire, which was located in present-day Mexico City, known as Tenochtitlan, over 1000 miles from the present-day California border. The Spanish claimed the area as a colony, or settlement controlled by another country, and named it New Spain.
Haciendas vs. Encomiendas
During the colonial era of New Spain during the 1500’s, the Spanish crown granted Haciendas, or land holdings to the conquistadors and other nobles. This land was theirs to farm or to lease to other Spaniards of lesser social status. In comparison, the encomienda system is what provides the labor for the hacienda, where the holder was granted the responsibility for a number of natives.
Haciendas
A hacienda, in the colonies of the Spanish Empire, is an estate, similar in form to a Roman villa, granted to a conquistador, used mostly as a business enterprise. Some haciendas were plantations, mines, or factories. Many haciendas combined these activities. Smaller holdings were termed estancias or ranchos that were owned almost exclusively by Spaniards and criollos (a person from Spanish South or Central America, especially one of pure Spanish descent) and in rare cases by mixed-race individuals. In 1529, Hernando Cortes was granted the first hacienda in the New World. The head of a hacienda was called the patrón. Peasants, or peones, worked land that belonged to the patrón. The campesinos worked small holdings, and owed a portion to the patrón.
