New Worlds: Americas &
Oceania
Do Now:
• What were the differences between
the manner in which Europeans
pursued their colonial ambitions, and
what were the lasting consequences of
those differences?
Do Now: Actively read "The Holy Herb Nicotine".
• As you read, write what's going through your minds.
• Based on what we know of nicotine today, and with
all of the new laws that are sweeping the country
today pertaining to the above listed "drug," yes,
that's precisely what it is, like crack cocaine, weed,
and varying dangerous drugs, why do you think the
U.S. has done everything but ban it outright? Think
prior to answering.
• Spanish mariners meet indigenous Tainos (Arawaks)
• Originally from Orinoco River valley in South
America, settled in Caribbean in late centuries BCE
through 900 CE
• Columbus uses Hispaniola (Haiti-Dominican Republic)
as base for trading with Tainos
• Disappointed that Tainos had no spices, silks
• Recruit locals to mine gold instead
• Encomienda: Forced labor
4
The Colonial Encomienda System
Peninsulares
Creoles
Mestizos
Native Indians
Mulattos
Black Slaves
• Tainos occasionally rebel, but outgunned by Spanish
military technology
• Smallpox epidemics begin 1518
• Spaniards launch raids to kidnap and replace
workers, spread disease further
• Taino society disappears by middle of 16th century
• Limited gold production causes new interest in
exploiting Caribbean for sugarcane production
• Requires massive importation of slaves
7
• Spanish conquerors (conquistadores) explore other
territories
• Hernán Cortés and 450 men bring down Aztec empire
in Mexico (1519-1521)
• Smallpox destroys besieged Tenochtitlan
• Francisco Pizarro and 600 men bring down Inca
empire in Peru (1532-1533)
• Calls conference of warring Inca rulers, massacres
them all
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• Conquests of Mexico, Peru not the result of imperial policy,
but inspired greater efforts to expand Spanish empire
• Spanish administration based in New Spain (Mexico) and
New Castile (Peru), extended to Florida and Buenos Aires
• Mexico city built atop Tenochtitlan, founded Lima in Peru
• Viceroys rule, but supervised by local courts called
audiencias designed to prevent buildup of local power
bases
• Considerable dispute with Spanish homeland
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European Explorations
• 1494 Treaty of Tordesillas divides entire (nonChristian) world between Spain and Portugal
• Portugal claims Brazil
• Little interest at first, but increases as other
imperial powers take notice
• Exploited for sugarcane production
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The Treaty of Tordesillas, 1494 &
The Pope’s Line of Demarcation
• Spanish towns, forts, missions on east coast of North
America, some on west coast
• Dislodged in 17th century by French, English, Dutch
mariners
• Permanent colonies in North America
• France: Nova Scotia (1604), Quebec (1608)
• England: Jamestown (1607), Massachusetts Bay
Colony (1630)
• Netherlands: New Amsterdam (1623)
• English take it in 1664, rename it New York
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European
Empires
and
colonies
in the
Americas
about
1700
15
• Exceptionally difficult conditions
• Starvation rampant, cannibalism occasionally
practiced
• French, English private merchants invest heavily
in expansion of colonies
• Greater levels of self-government than Spanish
and Portuguese colonies
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• North American peoples loosely organized,
migratory
• Unlike Aztec, Inca empires
• European colonists stake out forested land, clear
it for agriculture
• Increasing number of Europeans arrive seeking
ample land: 150,000 from England in 17th
century
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Do Now:
• Questions for Reflection
•
•
•
•
•
•
Define mercantilism.
How did European nations increase their wealth and power?
Define capitalism.
Why did individuals invest in Joint stock companies?
What was “Triangular” trade?
What was the relationship between a mother country and a
colony?
E. Napp
• Colonists displace indigenous peoples, trespass
on hunting grounds
• English settlers negotiate treaties, poorly
understood by natives
• Military conflict frequent
• Natives also devastated by epidemic disease
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8000000
7000000
6000000
5000000
Native
European
African
4000000
3000000
2000000
1000000
0
1500
1800
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•The Atlantic slave trade was started in the 1500s to fill the need
for labor in Spain’s American empire.
•Each year, traders
shipped tens of
thousands of
enslaved Africans
across the Atlantic to
work on tobacco and
sugar plantations in
the Americas.
•Europeans relied on African rulers and traders to seize captives
in the interior and bring them to coastal trade posts and
fortresses.
•The slave trade
intensified as the demand
for slaves increased in the
Americas and the demand
for luxury goods increased
in Africa.
• The Atlantic slave trade formed one part of a three-legged
trade network know as the triangular trade.
What country imported the most slaves?
Which imported the fewest?
•Hundreds of men, women and children crammed on
one vessel
•“Floating Coffins”
•Dying from disease or brutal mistreatment
•Few of the
Africans who
resisted lived
to see the end
of their
journey
•By the 1800s, an estimated 11 million enslaved Africans
had reached the Americas. Another 2 million probably
died during the Middle Passage.
•The slave trade caused the decline of some African
states. The loss of countless numbers of young
women and men resulted in some small states
disappearing forever.
•New African states arose whose way of life
depended on the slave trade. The rulers of these new
states waged war against other Africans in order to
gain control of the slave trade in their region.
•
Opening trade with Asia, Africa and America changed
(revolutionized) Europe’s economy:
1. Inflation caused by
•
•
•
•
growth in population = increase in demand for goods and
services
because goods were scarce, sellers could raise their prices
by mid-1500s silver and gold were everywhere and rulers
were using it to make coins – thus an increased amount of
money in circulation
combine this with scarcity of goods and prices will rise
2.
Expanded trade and push for overseas empires spurred the
growth of capitalism
•
•
•
entrepreneurs and capitalists wanted more money
they made up a new business class devoted to making profits
this changed the local European economy into an international trading
system
• How did the Commercial Revolution change Europe’s
economy?
• Prices rose (inflation)
• A new business class (entrepreneurs) was created ….capitalism
• The goal of European economies changes from agrarian base to
CASH based (mercantilism)
3.
Basic Ideas behind mercantilism:
•
•
•
Nation’s wealth based on its gold and silver treasure
Must export more goods than imported
Colonies existed for benefit of parent country
•
Provide raw materials and resources
•
Provide a market for selling manufactured goods
•
Colonies could ONLY buy from parent country
•
Nobility/Upper Class
•
•
•
Wealth came from land, not cash
Could not raise money to pay higher costs for luxury goods
Middle Class (Merchants)
•
•
•
Investments led to increased wealth
Grew powerful in cities
Enjoyed comfortable living
•
Peasants/Laborers/Lower Class
•
•
•
Wages did not keep up with inflation
Peasants reluctant to grow new crops
City laborers forced to live in poverty
• Before the Columbian Exchange, there were
• no oranges in Florida
• no bananas in Ecuador
• no paprika in Hungary
• no tomatoes in Italy
• no pineapples in Hawaii
• no cattle in Texas
• no chile peppers in Thailand and India
• no cigarettes in France
• no chocolate in Switzerland
• European, African migrants primarily men
• Relationships with native women formed
• Mestizo (mixed) societies formed
• People of Spanish and native parentage
• Descendants of Spaniards and African slaves
(“mulattoes”)
• Descendants of African slaves and natives
(“zambos”)
• Less pronounced in Peru
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• Race-based hierarchy
• Top: peninsulares, i.e. migrants from Iberian
peninsula
• Criollos (creoles), i.e. children of migrants
• Mestizos, mulattoes, zambos, other combinations
of parentage
• Bottom: slaves, conquered peoples
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• Higher ratio of French, English female migrants
than in South America
• Higher social stigma attached to relationships
with natives, African slaves
• Fur traders have relationships with North
American native women
•Children: métis
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• Hunt for gold and silver
• Conquistadores loot Aztec, Inca treasures and melt
them down for their value as raw precious metals
• Gold not extensive in Spanish holdings, but silver
relatively plentiful
• Extensive employment of natives
• Incan mita system of conscripted labor
• Dangerous working conditions
• Eventually assimilate into Spanish culture
• 1/5 reserved for crown (quinta), hugely profitable
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• Major resource of income
for Spanish crown
• Manila Galleons take it
to the Pacific rim for
trading
• Very popular with
Chinese markets
• Also trade in the
Atlantic basin
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42
• Large estates produce products of European origin
• Wheat, grapes, meat
• Encomienda system of utilizing native labor force
• Rampant abuses 1520-1540
• Gradually replaced by debt patronage
• Peasants repay loans with cheap labor
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44
• Rebellion
• 1680 Pueblo Revolt
• Led by Popè – 12 year success
• 1780 Túpac Amaru rebellion
• 60,000 – 2 years, ends in failure
• Half-hearted work
• Retreat into mountains and forests
• Appeal to Spanish crown
• 1,200 page letter of Guaman Poma de Ayala, 1615 - El
Primer Nueva Corónica y Buen Gobierno (The First New
Chronicle and Good Government)
45
• Sugar mill: engenho, refers to complex of land, labor, etc.
all related to production of sugar
• Sugarcane to molasses, or refined to sugar for export
• Low profit margins, most complex industry in Americas
• Unlike Spanish system of forced native labor, Portuguese
rely on imported African slaves
• Natives continually evaded Portuguese forces
• Large-scale importing of slaves begins 1580s
• Working conditions poor: 5-10% die annually
• Approximately one human life per ton of sugar
46
• Indigenous peoples trade pelts for wool blankets, iron
pots, firearms, alcohol
• Beaver hunts cause frequent incursions into neighboring
territories, conflicts
• European settler-cultivators also displacing natives
from traditional lands
• Albeit initially dependent on native assistance, as
European grains did not grow well in many areas
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• Products developed for European markets
• Tobacco - Jean Nicot
• Rice
• Indigo
• Cotton
• Increases demand for imported slave labor
• European indentured servants, 4-7 year terms
• Chronically unemployed, orphans, political
prisoners and criminals
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300000
250000
200000
150000
Pounds
100000
50000
0
1616
1624
1638
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• African slaves in Virginia from 1610
• Increasingly replace European indentured laborers,
late 17th-early 18th centuries
• Less prominent in north due to weak nature of cashcrop industry
• Slave trading still important part of economy
• Also, products made through slave labor
• Rum, based on sugar from plantations
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• Franciscan, Dominican, Jesuit missionaries from 16th
century
• Taught Christian doctrine, literacy
• Often accumulated cultural knowledge to better
communicate their message
• Bernardino de Sahagún
• Due to conquest and plague, many natives in Spanish
America concluded that their gods had abandoned
them, converted to Catholicism
• Yet often retained elements of pagan religion in
Christian worship
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52
• Less effective than Spanish missions
• Spaniards ruled native populations more
directly
•Migration patterns of North American natives
made it more difficult to conduct Missions
• English colonists little interest in converting
natives
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• Broadly similar experiences to American natives
• Portuguese mariners long in the region, but Dutch
sailors make first recorded sighting of Australia in
1606
• VOC surveys territory, conclude that it is of little value
• Limited contact with indigenous peoples
• Nomadic, fishing and foraging societies
• British Captain James Cook lands at Botany Bay, 1770
• Convicts shipped to Australia, outnumber free settlers
until 1830
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• Manila Galleons interested in quick trade routes, little
exploration of Pacific
• Islands of Guam and the Marianas significant, lay on trade
routes
• 1670s-1680s took control of islands, smallpox destroys local
population
• James Cook visits Hawai’i in 1778
• Good relationship with Hawaiians
• Sailors spread venereal disease
• Cook not welcomed in 1779, killed in dispute over petty
thefts
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