Transcript Age of Early European Explorations & Conquests

A Map of the Known World,
pre- 1492
Motives for European Exploration
1. Crusades and later Ottoman invasion
 by-pass intermediaries to get to
Asia.
2. Renaissance  curiosity about other
lands and peoples.
3. Reformation  refugees &
missionaries.
4. Monarchs seeking new sources of
revenue.
5. Technological advances.
6. Fame and fortune.
New Maritime Technologies
Better Maps
[Portulan]
Hartman Astrolabe
(1532)
Mariner’s Compass
Sextant
New Weapons Technology
Prince Henry, the Navigator
School for Navigation, 1419
Portuguese Maritime Empire
1. Exploring the west coast
of Africa.
2. Bartolomeo Dias, 1487.
3. Vasco da Gama, 1498.
Calicut.
Christopher Columbus [1451-1506]
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kmwriy
3a6sc
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8waBR
2Hpsgk
Columbus’ Four Voyages
Other Voyages of Exploration
Ferdinand Magellan & the First
Circumnavigation of the World:
Early 16c
Atlantic Explorations
Looking for “El Dorado”
Maya
Aztec
Inca
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDfO6L
5_OlQ
T he First Spanish Conquests:
T he Aztecs
vs.
Fernando Cortez
Montezuma II
How was conquest achieved?
•
•
•
•
Disease
Technology/warfare strategies
Alliances
End of the world predicted and initial
friendly welcome.
How was conquest achieved?
• Disease: small pox, 2/3
dead
• Europeans
domesticated and lived
among their animals.
Chickens: influenza,
horses: smallpox
• Technology
• Division among the people
• End of the world predicted
Mexico Surrenders to Cortez
Other Spanish Conquests:
T he Incas
vs.
Francisco Pizarro
Atahualpa
Cycle of Conquest &
Colonization
Explorers
Official
European
Colony!
European Empires in the Americas
T he Colonial Class System
Peninsulares
Mestizos
Native Indians
Creoles
Mulattos
Black Slaves
• Encomienda System and peonage
• Monopoly created with mercantilism
T he “Columbian Exchange”

Squash

Avocado

Peppers

Sweet Potatoes

Turkey

Pumpkin

Tobacco

Quinine

Cocoa

Pineapple

Cassava

POTATO

Peanut

TOMATO

Vanilla

MAIZE

Syphilis

Trinkets

Liquor

GUNS

Olive

COFFEE BEAN
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Banana

Rice

Onion

Turnip

Honeybee

Barley

Grape

Peach

SUGAR CANE

Oats

Citrus Fruits

Pear

Wheat

Cattle

Sheep

Pigs

Smallpox

Flu

Typhus

Measles

Malaria

Diptheria

Whooping Cough
Treasures
from the Americas!
• But maybe most important was the potato
which fed ½ the people in Europe allowing
population to grow and states to stabilize.
• However when using Chinese slaves to
collect guano off of Peru for fertilizer they
brought over the potato blight which
causes devastation. Example: Still fewer
people in Ireland today than before the
famine which struck in 1845.
T he Slave Trade
1. Existed in Africa before the coming
of the Europeans.
2. Portuguese replaced European slaves
with Africans.
Sugar cane & sugar plantations.
First boatload of African slaves
brought by the Spanish in 1518.
275,000 enslaved Africans exported
to other countries.
3. Between 16c & 19c, about 10 million
Africans shipped to the Americas.
• Latin Americans had not made good
slaves as they were dying from disease
and escaping. Also some laws passed
from Catholic monarchs that slavery was
immoral except in the case of Africans.
• Africans had immunities to malaria that
had built up over the years of exposure.
Father Bartolome de Las Casas
New Laws 
1542, ignored and
led to more
African slavery
Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
Slave Ship
“Middle Passage”
“Coffin” Position Below Deck
A frican Captives
T hrown Overboard
Sharks followed the slave ships!
Slaves Working in a
Brazilian Sugar Mill
T he Influence of the Colonial
Catholic Church
Guadalajara
Cathedral
Spanish Mission
Our Lady of
Guadalupe
• Church was complicit in oppression and
conquering lands
T he Treaty of Tordesillas, 1494 &
T he Pope’s Line of Demarcation
New Colonial Rivals
1. Portugal lacked the numbers
and wealth to dominate trade in
the Indian Ocean.
2. Spain in Asia  consolidated its
holdings in the Philippines.
3. First English expedition to the
Indies in 1591.
Surat in NW India in 1608.
4. Dutch arrive in India in 1595.
New Colonial Rivals
Impact of European Expansion
1. Native populations ravaged by
disease and slavery.
2. Influx of gold, and especially
silver, into Europe created an
inflationary economic climate.
[“Price Revolution”]
3. New products introduced across
the continents [“Columbian
Exchange”]
4. Deepened colonial rivalries and
belief in mercantilism.
5. New Patterns of World Trade
• http://flocabulary.com/conquistadors-andslavery/