Transcript European Exploration

European
Exploration
Exploration Encouragement
• Renaissance encourages adventure and curiosity
• Desire to get rich
• Main reason for exploration
• Demand for spices from Asia runs high after the Crusades –
merchants able to charge a lot
• Muslims and Italians control East to West trade
• Wanted to find direct route to Asia (eliminate the middle man)
Spread of Christianity
• Hostility between Muslims and Christians following the
Crusades
• Europeans thought they had duty to keep fighting the Muslims
and convert non-Christians
• Bartolomeu Dias (Portuguese) becomes an early explorer with
Christian motives
Technology Advances
• 1200’s -> impossible to cross the open ocean
• European ships could not sail against the wind
• Ship builders design the caravel
• Sturdier and had triangular sails to sail against the wind
• Sailors begin to use the astrolabe
• Could use it to tell how far North or South from the equator they
were (used the stars)
• Began using a magnetic compass the Chinese invented
Portugal
• Had strong governmental support
• Prince Henry becomes most avid supporter
• Peaked interest from raids in Africa (saw wealth)
• Also wanted to spread Christianity
• Opened a navigation school
• By the time of Henry’s death, Portugal had already established
trading posts on the West coast of Africa
• Traded for spices and eventually slaves
Hello Asia
• Reach Asia by sailing around the Southern tip of Africa
• Bartolomeu Dias reaches this point
• Storm blew them to Eastern coast of Africa
• Crew was tired so they returned home
• Vasco de Gama reaches coast of India
• Direct sea route to Asia
Spain Joins the Race
• Spain watches Portugal intently
• Also wanted a direct sea route to Asia
• Christopher Columbus
• Find route by sailing West
• Reaches island in the Caribbean
• Fuels tensions between Spain and Portugal
• Possible that he claimed same lands?
• To keep peace they drew the Line of Demarcation
• West of line belonged to Spain, East to Portugal
• Signed Treaty of Tordesillas – agreed to the line
Trading Empires
• Portugal takes control of spice trade from Muslim merchants
• Set up many trading posts in the Indian Ocean
• Brought back goods at 1/5 the cost to Europe
• Spanish expedition led by Ferdinand Magellan arrives in
Philippines
• Claim lands and begin to settle there
• Peaks interest of even more European countries
Other Nations
• English, Dutch, French come into the picture
• Challenging Portugal’s dominance of the Indian Ocean
• The Dutch
• Owned the largest fleet (20k + vessels)
• Dutch East India Company -> able to mint money, make treaties, and
raise their own armies
• Drove the English out eventually
• English and French
• English East India Company gains trade control in India
• French establish their own company focused on Indian but never
profitable because of English
Spain’s Conquests
Columbus
• Nina, Pinta, Santa Maria
• “Tierra, Tierra!”
• Called the people encountered los indios (actually the Taino)
• Pg. 483
• Columbus claims land for Spain -> San Salvador
• Interested in the gold and wealth
• Found none in San Salvador -> explored other islands
• Columbus returns to Spain (gets permission for 3 more trips)
• 2nd trip he sailed as an empire builder (17 ships + 100’s of soldiers
+ 1,000 or more settlers)
• Wanted to make the islands colonies of Spain
Other Explorers
• Pedro Alvares Cabral (Portuguese)
• Reached modern-day Brazil
• Amerigo Vespucci (Italian in service for Portugal)
• Traveled along the eastern coast of South America
• Claimed it was not Asia but a new world
• Named the Americas after Vespucci
• Ferdinand Magellan (Portuguese)
• Explored even further in the Americas
• Vasco Nunez de Balboa (Spanish)
• Explored Panama and became first European to see the Pacific Ocean
• Magellan then convinces king of Spain to fund a voyage into the
Pacific
• Reaches the Philippines -> first person to circumnavigate the world
Spain’s Empire
• Hernando Cortes
•
•
•
•
Lands of shores of Mexico
Known as conquistadors (conquerors)
Wanted to find gold and silver
Learns of the Mayan Empire
• Montezuma II thinks Cortes in one of their God’s returning
• Welcomes Cortes with open arms
• Aztecs rebel and drive out Spanish forces
• They counterattack
• Conquer the Aztecs
• Superior weapons
• Cortes able to enlist many enemy Native American tribes
• Disease was carried by the Spanish
Pizarro and the Incans
• Francisco Pizarro
• Conquers the Incan Empire
• Incan king offers gold and silver but is killed anyway
• March his men into Cuzco (capital city)
• Able to take the capital with no problems
• Spanish also responsible for the conquest of the Mayans
• Able to create a new empire -> New Spain
Spain’s Influence
• Spain’s American colonies become strongest in the world
• They begin to build up their military and navy to protect the
colonies and ships traveling back and forth
• Juan Ponce de Leon -> begins to explore Florida
• Francisco Vasquez de Coronado -> Arizona, New Mexico,
Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas
• Catholic priests go along to convert people
• Against the harsh treatment of the natives and encomienda
system
• “There is nothing more cruel than the tyranny which the
Spaniards use toward the Indians for the getting of pearl.”