Ch. 15 Age of European Exploration (1415-1800)
Lesson 1- New European Trade Routes
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The Renaissance was marked by a spirit of adventure and curiosity.
This created an outcome of huge importance: the beginning of the Global Age.
There were 4 developments that took place that made the 1400’s the right time for the global
age to begin.
1) The Crusades: it showed many Europeans the marvels of other places.
2) The desire for riches from trade with Asia.
 Many merchant wanted to get rich by trading and selling spices and silks to
other European states.
3) Inventions including better maps, the compass, the astrolabe, and a new type of sail.
 These inventions allowed European to make long voyages. The new sail allowed
ships to sail into the wind.
4) The desire to expand Christianity.
 Many Europeans wanted to spread their religion around the globe.
 Prince Henry and Portuguese Explores
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1420-Portuguese were the first Europeans to explore along Africa’s west coast.
Prince Henry wanted Portugal to become rich from the spice trade. He
encouraged sea captains to take voyages.
First trips were short because captains were trying to determine the size of
Africa.
Wherever they stopped, the captains established trading posts.
This was the beginning of Portugal’s trading Empire in Africa.
Some of the goods they got from Africa were gold and the enslavement of
Africans to use as servants.
1488 Portuguese finally rounded the southern tip of Africa: they named it the
Cape of Good Hope.
1497-vasco de Gama was the first Portuguese to sail around Africa and into
India. His round-trip took two years.
His cargo of spices sold for 60 times the cost of his trip.
 Trading in India, Southeast Asia, and China
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Portuguese set out to gain control of the spice trade.
First, they destroyed Muslim and Indian shipping along the coast of India.
Then they took control of the waterway around the East Indies (“Spice Islands”).
Finally, they forced the rulers of the Spice Islands to sell them all its spices.
Portuguese set the model for how Europeans dealt with non-Europeans: they
used guns and cannon to get what they wanted.
Portuguese and other Europeans tried to expand their trade with China and
Japan.
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However, their trade goods had little appeal to Chinese and Japanese.
China and Japan limited cargo trade with Europeans.
They thought that the Europeans were uncivilized.
They also feared that Europeans would use their weapons to seize land.
Within time powerful nations capture the trading empire of the Portuguese.
In 1595 the Netherlands (Dutch) took control of the posts in East Indies and kept
the French and English out of the East Indies.
Lesson 2 Sailing West to go East
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The armies of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella drove the last Muslim invaders out of
Spain in 1492.
 At this time Christopher Columbus asked the monarchs to finance his voyage.
 The Spanish were ready for an overseas empire.
 Columbus’ plan was to sail west to go to the east.
 By the 1400’s, educated people knew that the world was not flat.
 Columbus persuaded Queen Isabella by telling her of the riches that would come
into Spain.
 However, she also took into consideration all the non-Europeans that could be
converted to Catholicism.
 In August 3, 1492 Columbus sails west with 90 sailors on 3 caravels.
 On October 12 he lands on the Island of Hispaniola and Cuba, and not Asia.
Columbus though that he has reached the East Indies.
 Soon Spain and other nations realize Columbus had found two unknown continents.
 Europeans called it the New World.
 Portugal and Spain also found what is now known as Brazil.
 Portugal and Spain felt that the wealth and people belonged to them.
 1494 Pope Alexander VI divides the New World in the Treaty of Tordesillas.
 Treaty of Tordesillas established the line of Demarcation at 38 degrees west
longitude. Everything west of the line belonged to Spain; everything east of the line
belonged to Portugal.
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Overthrowing the Aztec Empire
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By 1515, the Spanish controlled most of the islands in the Caribbean.
Eventually they set out to explore Central America.
Hernan Cortes (conquistador), lands on the Yucatan Peninsula.
Cortez uses la Malinche as an interpreter in the Aztec Empire.
According to Aztec prophecy, a white God (Quetzalcoatl) would return back to
Tenochtitlan. When this happened the Aztec Empire would die.
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Cortes fights the Aztec Empire in 1520. He is unable to win. However, he returns
the next year with fully equipped horses and guns, and defeats the Aztecs.
Cortes destroys Tenochtitlan and builds Mexico City.
The Aztec temple was replaced by a Catholic church.
Overthrowing the Inca Empire
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As the Spanish build settlements in Central America, they started hearing about the
rich kingdom in the Andes Mountains. This was the Inca Empire.
Francisco Pizarro (conquistador) set out to find the Incas.
In 1531 he reaches the Inca capitol of Cuzco.
The Inca Empire was torn by civil war at this time.
Two half-brothers, Atahualpa and Huascar, were fighting for power over the Empire.
Atahualpa ends up asking Pizarro for help. However, Pizarro end up kidnapping him
and asks for ransom gold and silver.
Atahualpa ends up having his brother killed.
Pizarro keeps the gold and silver and he end up giving up Atahualpa to the Incas.
Atahualpa is found guilty of the murder of his brother, thus, end up getting killed.
Incas are leaderless.
Pizarro and 180 soldiers, with the help of other natives that were tired of Inca
dominance over them, end up fighting and defeated the Incas.
Pizarro seized much of the territory and its vast wealth of gold and silver for Spain.
Lesson 3 Colonizing Central and South America.
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By the mid-1500 the Spanish had claimed Mexico and much of Central and South America.
They were also moving north into what became the Unites States.
 The Spanish monarchs encouraged their citizens to build settlement in the New
World because the more wealth the colonies created, the wealthier the monarchs
became.
 To govern Spanish America, Spain set up viceroyalties.
 Viceroyalty was an area governed by a viceroy.
 Viceroy: a governor who represented the monarch.
 By 1535 there were two viceroyalties: the viceroyalty of New Spain and the
viceroyalty of Peru.
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Many missionaries came with the colonist to Christianize Native Americans. They
burned native books and tore down native temples and statues.
Native Americans were to give up their native dress, customs, language, and
religion.
 Enslaving Native Americans and Africans
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When colonists began settling the islands in the Caribbean, Queen Isabella granted
them encomiendas.
Encomienda: the right to demand labor from Native Americans living on the land.
Many colonists used the encomienda to enslave them.
When colonists discovered gold and silver in Mexico and Peru, they forced Native
Americans to work their mines.
Hundreds of thousands died from hard work, others starved to death, while millions
died from smallpox and measles because their bodies were not immune to these
diseases.
In an effort to save Native Americans, Bartolome de las Casas (Priest) urged using
Africans as workers.
After 1542, the Spaniards were forbidden to enslave Native Americans.
As a result the trans-Atlantic trade in enslaved Africans became big business for the
Spanish.
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 Society in Spanish America.
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Peninsulares: Native- born Spanish who were sent from Spain to run the colonies.
(Small number of people but the highest social class).
Creoles: their ancestors had been the original Spanish colonists. They usually owned
plantations, mines, and trading businesses. They had little power in the colonies.
Mestizos: decendents form Spanish and Native Americans.
Mulattos: descendents from Spanish and Africans.
They were the low social classes.
Native Americans and enslaved Africans were below the social class.
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Lesson 4: Colonizing North America
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By the 1500’s European nations were competing for land and power in Europe. As explores
found “new” lands, European monarchs often transferred their rivalry to these parts of the
globe.
This rivalry among European nations was behind the desire to claim territory and set up colonies
in the Americas.
 New Spain
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By 1513, Spanish explorers were moving into what is today the United States.
The first permanent Spanish settlement was built in Florida in 1564. St. Augustine
was settling to keep the French out of the area.
By the mid-1700’s the Spanish’s started setting in the south west territory.
Some settlements were missions.
Missions housed a priest and Native Americans who had been converted to
Catholicism.
Soldiers and farmers also moved to this area.
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Many of them had to protect themselves and their homes from unfriendly Native
Americans from the area.
 New France
 In 1608, Samuel de Champlain founded Quebec in what is today Canada.
 The French focused on fur trappers and traders.
 By late 1600’s the French had a line of trading settlements in New France from Canada
to the Gulf of Mexico.
 Much of the fur and skin would be shipped to France where it would be sold for high
prices.
 New Netherlands and New Sweden
 In the mid-1600’s the Dutch tried taking over territory in the North Eastern part of what
is now known as the U.S.
 They were successful at founding trade posts; however, eventually the English were able
to take over these settlements.
 Sweden also built settlements around this area but the English also took over this area.
 English colonies
 England’s first permanent colony in North America was Jamestown, settled in 1607.
 However, many of the early colonists starved to death because they did not know how
to find food in this new world.
 In 1620, a religion group known as Pilgrims settle Plymouth colony. They fled religious
persecution in England.
 Eventually you have many Protestants coming to New England to make settlements and
to flee persecution from England.
 Many English came to make a better life for themselves.
 Southern colonies eventually turn into plantations because the climate and soil were
good for this.
 Owners begin to need help for their plantations; thus, they begin to import enslaved
Africans.
 As more colonists migrated; they wanted more land.
 Thus, many wars between Native American and colonists occur. By 1700’s Native
Americans are killed or pushed out of their land.
 About half of the colonies were proprietary colonies. They were owned by individuals
or private companies.
 Other colonies were royal colonies. They belonged to the English monarch.
Lesson 5 The Effects of the First Global Age
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The First Global Age began with Christopher Columbus’ voyage in 1492.
Four of the most important changes occurred between 1492 and 1800. These four changes
affected all parts of the world.
1. Columbian Exchange: the sharing of goods and ideas that began with Columbus’ first
voyage.
 This included food and animals that Europeans carried from region to region as they
moved around the world.
 The y also introduced their own ideas about religion, government, the arts, and
language.
 Europeans taught Native Americans how to make iron and copper.
 Native Americans taught Europeans how to farm unfamiliar land in unfamiliar
climates (corn and tobacco).
2. Mercantilism: the wealth of a nation depends on how much gold and silver it has.
 A country trying to keep a favorable balance of trade. This occurs when the value
of the goods that a nation exports, or sells to other nations, is greater than the value
of the goods that it imports, or buys from other nations.
 Colonies provided their home countries with raw material, and then their home
countries would sell them back the finished products.
 Home countries passed laws to keep their colonists from buying goods from other
nations.
3. Native American Defeats: Interactions between Native Americans and Europeans resulted
in the death of millions of Native Americans.
 European colonists throughout the Americas murdered, worked to death, and
starved to death Native Americans.
 What European guns did not do, their diseases did.
 Europeans wanted Native-American labor, wealth and lands.
 English colonists care less about Christianizing Native Americans. They simply
wanted Native American land and fought deadly wars to gain it.
 After the American Revolution, the U.S. continued taking the land of Native
Americans- usually at gunpoint.
4. The African Slave Trade
 Many Europeans did not think that there was anything wrong with enslaving
Africans.
 Europeans thought of themselves as far superior to everyone else in the world.
 Since African’s language and customs were different, Europeans though that
Africans were inferior then them.
 This belief of Ethnocentric was reinforced because of slavery.
Effects of Slave Trade
A. Slave raiders kidnapped the youngest and healthiest Africans.
 Thus, many areas of West Africa were left without young people to have
families.
B. The empire of West Africa became less important.
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Kingdoms close to the coast rose into power. Their kingdoms were
based on trading people in exchange for guns.
C. The more wealth a ruler had, the more he wanted.
 A cycle of warfare to gain captives to sell to slavers developed among
many African Kingdoms. People lived in a state of constant warfare and
fear.