WHII.4 Age of Exploration Narrative

WHII.
4 The European Age of Discovery
Part I: Foundations of Exploration

In 1453 the Ottoman Turks conquered the Byzantine Empire and took control of their
capital, Constantinople. This allowed the Ottomans to take control of some of the most important
trade routes in the world – the ones leading to the East Indian Spice Islands. European merchants
desperately wanted to sail the oceans to reach these Spice Islands in the East, but when the Arab
Ottomans captured Constantinople, Europeans began turning towards the Atlantic to find new trade
routes. By 1490 improvements in ship-building, map-making, and navigation made it possible to
achieve this goal. This caused a new era of exploration and colonization of foreign territories. In
Portugal, Prince Henry was strongly interested in exploration and even established a school for
navigators. In time he became known as Prince Henry the Navigator. With new technology and an
increased competition for trade, power, and wealth, European nations were strengthened and
became some of the strongest nations in the world, often at the expense of other civilizations.
Early European explorers and conquistadors (Spanish explorers/conquers) were first

motivated by a desire to find a better trade route to the Spice Islands and other trading areas in
Asia. In time, however, exploration and conquest were driven by three major desires: an
overwhelming lust for gold and other New World riches (including valuable natural resources like
spices and precious metals), a desire to convert native populations to Christianity, and finally, a
desire to bring glory to mother countries and their leaders. In short, the main motives for European
expansion were “gold, glory, and God.”
During the 15th century, Europeans were eager explore, gain new riches and power, and
establish foreign territories. It all started because Europeans were eager to expand trade with India
and Southeast Asia. These regions produced spices and other products that were in great demand in
Europe. Both Spain and Portugal financed explorations of the open seas to find the shortest possible
path to Asia. After the success of Spain and Portugal, other European nations like England and
France also began sending explorers across the globe and with that, the European Age of Discovery
was under way.
Part II: Explorers - Spain and Portugal

Italian sailor Christopher Columbus (1451-1506) convinced King Ferdinand and Queen
Isabella of Spain to finance an expedition to the west to reach East Asia (the Indies). Columbus
thought he could sail westward across the Atlantic Ocean and arrive in East Asia. In 1492, he
landed on the islands known today as the Bahamas, Cuba, Haiti, and Santo Domingo. Columbus
claimed these lands for Spain and to his death believed he had found the Indies. However, other
explorers realized that what Columbus discovered was an entirely new part of the world that was
completely unknown to Europeans. Many explorers quickly launched expeditions of their own to
explore these unknown places.
With so many explorations aiming for the new world, conflicts began between who could
claim what land. On June 7, 1494 the Treaty of Tordesillas was signed to avoid confusion
between Spain and Portugal on the claim of land in the New World. The treaty divided the world
into two hemispheres along an imaginary line down the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean. Lands
east of the line belonged to Portugal; lines to the west belonged to Spain.
From 1519 to 1522, Ferdinand
Magellan led a Spanish expedition to
expand trade with India and Southeast
Asia. Although Magellan died en route,
his crew continued on and became the
first to circumnavigating (sail around)
the entire globe. Spanish ships carried
silver and gold from the New World to be
traded for luxury goods in China for
export to Spain and her colonies.
In 1518, Hernan Cortes (1485-1547) sailed from Spain to the coast of Mexico, making
contact with the Aztecs. Cortes believed the Aztecs possessed large amounts of gold, so in 1521 he
led a group of Spanish Conquistadors that fought with and brutally defeated the Aztecs. Cortes
claimed the Aztec Empire of Mexico and renamed it the Kingdom of New Spain.
In 1532 Francisco Pizarro (1470-1541) conquered the Inca who had controlled Peru and
much of eastern South America since 1200 A.D. Pizarro’s conquest, motivated by desire for gold
and silver, led to the Spanish colonization of most of South America. Created in 1542, the Spanish
domain was called the Viceroyalty of Peru.
After taking control of many parts of South America, the Spaniards began shipping precious
metals like gold and silver back to to Spain in great quantities. This, however, led to “too much of a
good thing” because Spain only passed these riches on to other countries to buy goods from around
the world causing horrible taxation and inflation in Spain. Spain’s economy was eventually ruined
and it had many negative impacts on other European and Asian economies.
The Spanish royal government allowed the conquistadors to use encomiendas, a system that
gave them the right to take advantage of (exploit) indigenous land and labor. Native Americans
were then called Indians, after “Indios,” the Spanish word for “inhabitants of the indies.” The
Spanish required these Indian’s to work for the colonial government and accept Spanish culture,
religion (Catholic), and education (led by the Jesuits). Because of this forced labor, starvation, and
diseases from Europe, many Native Americans died. These diseases, particularly smallpox,
measles, and influenza, wiped out almost the entire native South American population. Africans
were then imported as slaves to replace the lost labor force.
In order to adapt and survive, many of the remaining Native Americans adopted European
cultural practices. They converted to Christianity, got educations, and worked for imperial
administration. The Roman Catholic Church, represented mainly by the Jesuits (Society of Jesus),
played a key role in educating and introducing European culture to the native population.
Immigration from Europe to South America accelerated in the 17 th century. However, the
initial lack of European women there led to the mating of European men with Indian women. The
mixed-blood children, called mestizos, later became the majority ethnic group in Latin America.
Those of pure Spanish decent enjoyed a higher status in colonial society.
While most of Spain’s efforts were on colonizing South America, Portuguese explorers,
sponsored by Prince Henry the Navigator, sailed down the west coast of Africa and out into the
Atlantic with hopes of finding trade routes to Asia. Around 1497-1498, Vasco da Gama turned
south into the Atlantic and sailed around the tip of South Africa-the Cape of Good Hope and
reached the coast of to India. He failed to persuade local merchants to trade with him but the
expedition established a new commercial trade route. In 1500, Pedro Cabral led 13 ships to the
Indian Ocean, winning control of it by defeating a large Arab fleet. The Portuguese soon sailed
beyond India to the Spice Islands. They built bases along their route: in West and East Africa, on
the west coast of India, and in the East Indies.
Part II: Explorers - England, France, and the Netherlands

By 1577, Spain controlled almost all of Central and South America. An English captain
named Sir Francis Drake began attacking Spanish ships that were bringing goods back from their
colonies. He waged pirate war against Spain, stealing large quantities of Spanish gold for Queen
Elizabeth I. He duplicated the achievement of Magellan’s crew while escaping the Spanish.
Seeing the success of the Spanish people in the Americas, many English, French, and Dutch
migrated to North America in the early 17th century in search of new wealth. They hoped to find a
northwestern passage to the spices and gold of the East Indies by sailing between the islands off
northwestern Canada. The first English expedition to North America was led by John Cabot, who
reached and named Newfoundland (modern Canada) in 1497. A French explorer, Jacques Cartier,
sailed down the St. Lawrence River and found a land filled with fish, lumber and furry animals.
They did not find the same wealth in gold and silver that the Spaniards found in Latin America, but
they did realize that North America itself was filled with many riches. In the modern territory of the
United States, English settlers founded the colonies of New England wanted to gain religious
freedom and worked to create model Christian communities based on Puritan beliefs.
Part III: The Impact of Exploration - Columbian Exchange

The Columbian Exchange, named for Christopher Columbus, was the massive
transformation of the entire globe that resulted from the exchange of plants, animals, and disease
between the Old World (Europe)
and the New World (The
Americas). The exchange
increased global food production
and human populations. However,
it also ruined the ecological
stability of large areas. Diseases
wiped out massive populations.
The Europeans brought

many things to America: crops
like rice, wheat, coffee and sugar;
animals like cattle, pigs, and sheep; and vermin such as rats. While some of these animals became
new sources of transportation, labor, or food, they also damaged or destroyed native plant and
animal species.
In the New World, Europeans were introduced to indigenous plant foods, such as corn,
tobacco, and potatoes. These plants, brought back to Europe, enriched nutrition in the Old World,
greatly increasing the food supply and resulting in global population growth after 1700. Disease,
another aspect of the Columbian Exchange, had disastrous consequences for Native Americans.
These indigenous populations had been isolated for centuries. They lacked an acquired immunity to
diseases introduced by the Europeans. Smallpox and measles, in particular, rapidly devastated
massive populations. At the same time, the desire to grow and sell new cash crops like cotton and
tobacco increased the demand for slaves and forced labor. The increase in crop production led to a
new farming system, the Plantation System, which produced large quantities of crops for trade, but
destroyed native economies and environments.
Part III: The Impact of Exploration -The Slave Trade in Africa

Traffic in slavery had been practiced in some
civilization, including in Africa and ancient Rome, since
early times. Before being enslaved by the Europeans
starting in the 15th century, most slaves in Africa had been
tribal war prisoners. The European colonization of the
Americans brought slavery to the New World. At first,
Europeans relied on the native populations for forced
labor. But, when disease killed off native populations,
Europeans began to buy and ship an increasing number of
slaves from the cost of Africa.
The slave trade was part of the triangular trade

network between Europe, West Africa, and the Americas.
European ships left their homeports loaded with manufactured goods, which included weapons
and rum. Europeans traded these goods for slaves which were packed tightly into the cargo hold of
boats that made their way to the Americas along what was known as the Middle Passage. Africans
were then sold along the coast of Central America, southern North America and the Caribbean
Islands. The money was used to buy sugar, molasses, cotton, and tobacco which were carried back
to Europe and sold. The molasses was made into rum, manufactured goods were purchased, and
the cycle began again.
Part III: The Impact of Exploration - The Spice Trade in Asia

Portuguese explorers like Cabral and Da Gama led some of the first expeditions to the spice
trade in Asia, which made other European countries thirsty to compete for trade in this area. In
1602 the Netherlands established the Dutch East India Company to expand trade in the region. By
1641 they had kicked the Portuguese out of the region and dominated the spice trade. The English
East India Company was formed in 1600. English traders concentrated on the Indian sub-continent.
By 1650 their trading posts and forts were beginning to dot the east and west coasts of India. Indian
textiles began to influence British textiles. In the century that followed, the merchants and soldiers
of the French East India Company would challenge the English for control of the India trade. By
the late 16th century, English, Dutch, and French merchants joined their Spanish and Portuguese
counterparts in linking ports all over the world in global trading networks. By the 18th century,
European had created a mass market that included coffee, tea, sugar, and tobacco, in addition to
other commodities, such as wheat, rice, and other goods.

WHII.4 Age of Exploration Narrative

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WHII.

4 The European Age of Discovery

Part I: Foundations of Exploration

Early European explorers and conquistadors (Spanish explorers/conquers) were first

Part II: Explorers - Spain and Portugal

Part II: Explorers - England, France, and the Netherlands

Part III: The Impact of Exploration - Columbian Exchange

The Europeans brought

Part III: The Impact of Exploration -The Slave Trade in Africa

The slave trade was part of the triangular trade

Part III: The Impact of Exploration - The Spice Trade in Asia

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